Merging EMS (Environmental Management System) with QMS (Quality Management System)?

[jmp4429]

I'm looking for people's opinions and experiences on this issue. I am the TS 16949 (an automtoive spinoff of ISO 9000) facilitator for my company. I am also on the ISO 14001 EMS Guidance Team.

My boss would like to see the EMS rolled into our quality system within the next few years. The leader of the EMS GT would like to see them kept separate. I can see the positives and negatives of both schools of thought.

What does everyone think about doing this?

Anyone have experience trying this? How did it work out for you?

[BadgerMan]

By all means integrate the two systems. It has worked out very well for us. The two systems (QMS and EMS) share components like MR, Auditing, and C&PA.

The only way to go IMO.

Now and in the future, please try using the search function as this issue has been discussed at length in the past. You will find a wealth of information that way.

Thanks

[tarheels4 - 2007]

In Reply to Parent Post by BadgerMan

By all means integrate the two systems. I has worked out very well for us. The two systems (QMS and EMS) share components like MR, Auditing, and C&PA.

The only way to go IMO.

I agree too. Be careful though. If you are doing combined audits, my experience has been that sometimes there is no evidence of auditing the EMS. Internal auditors more knowledgable about QMS may not be inclined to audit EMS as thoroughly as the QMS. The same might be said of some QMS 3rd party auditors qualified as EMS auditors.

Make sure audit notes reference EMS documents and records reviewed.

[RCBeyette]

The concept of integrating separate systems into one true Business Management System has been around for sometime...and is one, in my opinion, that should be strongly considered as organizations evolve and build upon their existing systems.

I believe most organizations acheived ISO 9001/TS16949 before pursuing ISO 14001. There are matrices available to show where the commonalities are - and there are many! It is logical to integrate the two.

Concepts such as auditing are easy enough to keep together and it is simply a matter of clearly defining the scope of internal (and external) audits during the planning stage to help keep the results separate.

My own organization has had a relatively well-merged system in place now for a while for both 9001 and 14001. However, we are now looking at merging them even more (i.e., one BMS manual, ensuring structures are consistent, etc.) along with ISRS/OHSAS 18001 and our own Business Technology concepts.

The Canadian Standards Association offers courses on establish, implementing and auditing an integrated system and so I'm sure that similar courses are available in the United States.

[Sidney Vianna]

http://www.irca.org/inform/issue6/Lim_Chooi.htm

[mike101338]

I just finished developing an EMS, doing so as part of our QMS (ISO9001 for 4 years). IMO, it is best to have one managment system to cover your business (ours is known as QEMS, original I know). There is so much overlap between the two it just makes sense.

I wrote a policy manual, level 1 docs, that showed the relationship between the two standards. Level 2 docs, or procedures, are specific to the objective of each, i.e. Training, Material Identification and Environmental Program Development. Level 3 docs are work instructions necessary to support procedures.

It was of great benefit to combine the two as it forced us to review all of our procedures again for effectiveness. Procedures that overlapped, internal auditing, management review..., we revised to include both standards. Procedures new to our system, required as a part of 14K, were added to the sytem while ensuring they kept us compliant with 9K. The process effectively improve our system.

As mentioned above, the auditing is another potential challenge. I currently have auditors trained to 9K and 14K, with some to both. When developing the schedule I ensure I have auditors trained to audit to both standards to ensure effective auditing.

Having 2 seperate systems running at the same time can cause confusion and increase work loads while trying to keep them both running.

[jmp4429]

One more question - how did you handle "Expertise?"

For example, our EMS rep is our ISO 14001 "expert" while I am the TS 16949 "expert." Would you make it a joint effort to develop the integrated system? Sometimes, we don't see eye to eye.

Would you recommend just having one person head up the effort to merge the two systems, and referring to the other "expert" for clarity on certain issues?

I totally agree that it makes more sense to have one integrated system instead of two that are parallel and similar. But how did you handle the "drama" that came from trying to merge the systems? Did you run into a lot of head-butting?

I know it sounds like a dumb question to ask, and the proper answer is "grow up and deal with it" but you know how it is when you're trying to make a change that involved people are opposed to ...

[mike101338]

No, it isnt a stupid question. Politics in any system, no matter how small or large, are always present. Somehow we need to find the best way of working with them. I was fortunate, I manage both the QMS and EMS so I need not worry what the other person thinks. Most of my head butting was against the brick wall behind my desk.

This may sound like the long way, but I would suggest giving the EMS dominated requirements, environmental aspects, legal requirements, operational requirements and emergency preparedness requirements to the environmental expert to supervise the development and implementation.

The remaining procedures that overlap could be randomly split between the two experts to supervise revision and implemntation. As I said, we did a total review of our system when rewriting our systems. I formed teams of employees to work on specific company procedures. Within those procedures I pulled out the applicable ISO requirements. I left it up to them to determine how to accomplish the requirements.

An example of this was Management Review. Each set of standards has specific requriements that must be reviewed by top management. I assigned top management the responsbility of determining how they want to ensure the information they needed we presented to them. Once they revised the standard, the experts of both systems should review the work the team did as one team. I'm sure you will both need to make changes, but the hard part was accomplished by a group whose sole purpose is that one procedure. Your work as joint management reps is to ensure the revised procedures are in comliance with the standards you are responsible for.

I see no reason why the sytem cant work very well with 2 seperate reps, each responsible for defined tasks. Our system has 2 more national standards we subscribe to. Another employee is responsible for the other 2. We often overlap into each others area. You both just need to realize that many of your moves will have either a positive or negative effect on the others domain. It can work very well.