Reasons for Implementing ISO 9001 - Findings from a Survey of 326 Businesses

[JaneB]

Interested in WHY other businesses implement ISO 9001, or their experiences with it? Or data comparing the current 2000 version with the old 1994 one?

A report was released recently (Oct 06) from a study conducted by Monash University (Victoria, Australia), in collaboration with JAS-ANZ.

Findings are from 326 organisations, spread evenly between manufacturing and service/non-manufacturing; the majority (87%) were small to medium- sized organisations.

Major findings included:

• The top 3 reasons for getting certification were externally oriented: Enhancing the company image, responding to customer demand, and getting 'preferred supplier' status.
• Top internal reasons were to establish better control over business operations, and to provide a foundation for continuous improvement.
• The major benefits reported were in: relations with their customers, management of business processes, management of business knowledge and information, and in organisation strategy & culture, such as improving their managerial policies & procedures. The area reported as least impacted was supplier management.
  
• The 2000 version of the Standard was found to be significantly easier to implement than the previous (1994) version.
  
• Overall, results validated the 2000 revision of ISO 9001, confirming that the Standard is now much improved in terms of its ease of implementation & simplicity, while still maintaining high levels of impact in business areas.

Some other interesting findings:

• For ISO 9001:2000, the mean time to implement was 8 months compared with a mean of 10 months for the 1994 version.
  
• The role of the 'quality department' or professional tended to be enhanced (not necessarily a great result!)
  
• Of the difficulties associated with implementing ISO 9001, balancing other priorities with the demands of implementation was the greatest one.
  
• The 2000 version was associated with substantially fewer difficulties in implementation across all elements surveyed.

Report: 'The Implementation of ISO 9000 in Australian Organisations', Australian Supply Chain Management Research Unit, Monash University, supported by JAS-ANZ. Dr D Prajogo & Professor Sohal

You can get a downloadable *.pdf copy from the JAS-ANZ website.