Our QS9000 audit team has been using checklists to perform internal audits

Our QS9000 audit team has been using checklists to perform internal audits. Admittedly, it is difficult to get an adequate, understandable checklist. The auditors must "translate" any checklist we use into terms our employees can understand and relate to our procedures.

Our management rep (a registered lead auditor) has been with the company for 6 months. She wants to stop using any kind of checklist and audit directly from the procedures.

Is this a good idea? Personally, I feel a little uneasy about it and am afraid we will lose members of the audit team (I have expressed this to the management rep). Does anyone have any ideas/suggestions?

[barb butrym]

I agree with the mgt rep.. canned BS lists are useless.....but a happy medium is a format that allows for the "marked up" procedure along with an audit trail and a check list that ensures that you have addressed all the issues when you are done. The check list is a memory jogger, not a list of questions to ask as written. the auditors need to think on thier feet, if you will...not just walk in with genegric questions...once a question has been asked, and fixed...what value does it have to keep asking it?

[barb butrym]

forgot the suggestion part.....
have the auditors develop meaningful questions..if put to them properly, they will embrace the project...if they don't them they didn't really want to audit anyway

[barb butrym]

forgot the suggestion part.....
have the auditors develop meaningful questions..if put to them properly, they will embrace the project...if they don't then they didn't really want to audit anyway

[Kevin Mader]

Becky,

I agree with Barb, have the auditors develop their own working papers. Remember that you are accountable for ALL items, ISO Standard items or your own organization's, that you choose to formalize in you Quality Program. Generic working papers (checklists) will not touch on those subtleties within your Quality Program and are, in my opinion, only suitable for performing a desk study of the QP (suitability audit to ensure that the Standard items are present in the program).

Regards,

Kevin

Thanks for the backup. I agree that the canned checklists are not versatile enough to meet most needs. Our audit team has been trying to get the Management Rep to sit down with us and come up with our own questions which would blend the standard with our procedures. We feel that a checklist is a good idea from the point of view of keeping us from going off on a non-productive tangent. However, she wants to avoid using ANY checklist at all, which I feel is not a great idea.

[Kevin Mader]

Checklists have their advantages to. They create continuity from audit to audit, which that to has both up and down sides (they may become obsolete).

Right now we are using the checklists straight from the QSA for the first round of internal audits with 3rd edition in place. The exception are follow up audits that need the verification of effectiveness of any new level two or three documentation that have been put into place. Does this sound acceptable?