Consultant Auditing Qualifications Requirements

[PRI]

We are a small plastics manufacturer that has made the decision to become registered to ISO9001:2015. We have found a consultant to help us become registered.

My questions are:
Since the consultant is training us to do our internal audits should the consultant be a qualified auditor? does the ISO9001:2015 standard require that the auditor trainer be a qualified auditor? If so what are the qualifications?

We had another person tell us that the consultant must be a formally qualified auditor.

Thank you in advance for your help.

 

[AndyN]

should the consultant be a qualified auditor?

Depends on what you understand that to mean. Better that they can show you the results of several implementations and know what internal auditing is about. What you were told about being a formally qualified auditor is totally bogus. There are "trained" auditors who couldn't audit their way out of a paper bag... Get them to provide some evidence of their audits. To give you a bench mark, I know of someone who discovered $8M US in an afternoon of internal auditing. Take a look at their training materials to see if it a) follows ISO 19011 and b) follows the process. Being good at training is important, not necessarily being good at auditing, trust me!

 

[Ronen E]

@PRI To broaden your scope a little, that auditor/trainer is a supplier, and as such should be evaluated and qualified as an approved supplier (because their "supply" significantly affects the quality of your products). As such you should go through a process of defining essential requirements and then assessing whether the (potential) supplier is able to meet them. These may include (or not) formal qualifications, experience and whatnot, as long as there's a rationale in place. Your evaluation may address that supplier's attributes related to auditing, training and anything else you decide is relevant. And of course all this has to be documented.

Note: I come from medical devices and thus more used to ISO 13485 than to ISO 9001. Maybe the general attitude under the latter is a bit more lax - hopefully ISO 9001 experts will tell us if so.

 

[Golfman25]

We are a small plastics manufacturer that has made the decision to become registered to ISO9001:2015. We have found a consultant to help us become registered.
...

The IATF (automotive) standard has some specific auditor training requirements. Plain old ISO does not. It would be nice, and probably helpful, if your consultant had some internal/external auditor experience (many do) but it is not required by the standard. Good luck.

 

[skb76]

(just opinion)

... at the end of the days, the minimum requirements at least please send a staff to Internal Auditing 'register body' course

and (show them External Auditor (the certificate) AND future audit (assume you're pass your :2015 certificate); that your organization have a 'Qualified /Competent Auditor to run the audit)

 

[AndyN]

at least please send a staff to Internal Auditing 'register body' course

Definitely NOT! That's only if you want to become an external auditor. It's more expensive and fills peoples' heads with all kinds of information totally inapplicable to internal audits.

 

[Randy]

(just opinion)

... at the end of the days, the minimum requirements at least please send a staff to Internal Auditing 'register body' course

and (show them External Auditor (the certificate) AND future audit (assume you're pass your :2015 certificate); that your organization have a 'Qualified /Competent Auditor to run the audit)

I agree with Andy here.

Sometimes that's one of the worst things to do (After teaching a few hundred courses for a "Register Body" I may have a small, small amount of expertise here). More often than not you get either that "RB's" personality or reflected image and policies within the body of the presentation, or a shake & bake instructor with very good "credentials" but not a whole lot of actual, hands on experience across multiple industries/organizations in a variety of audit scenarios.

 

[Al Rosen]

Definitely NOT! That's only if you want to become an external auditor. It's more expensive and fills peoples' heads with all kinds of information totally inapplicable to internal audits.

Andy, I think skb is trying to say, send someone to an internal auditing class given by a registration body, not a lead auditor class.

 

[Jen Kirley]

Since the consultant is training us to do our internal audits should the consultant be a qualified auditor? does the ISO9001:2015 standard require that the auditor trainer be a qualified auditor? If so what are the qualifications?

We had another person tell us that the consultant must be a formally qualified auditor.

Thank you in advance for your help.

Types of "qualifications" vary, and none are required to train a non-accredited course. Training an accredited class requires a set of "qualifications" as per the accreditation rules. I am specifically referring to IRCA and Exemplar. A non-accredited class can be just as good, and an "unqualified" trainer can be just as good. It is, regrettably very difficult to be sure is the trainer and course will be worth your money until you spend that money and take the course. Accreditation is set up to help make sure the courses have a set of structures as well as oversight (I understand a course must be witnessed by a member of the accrediting body before accreditation is issued; a quality assurance step).

I have audited dozens of internal auditors over the years, and have been less impressed with those who have taken Internal Auditor courses than those with Lead Auditor courses. These people's level of awareness may or may not have been about the class they took though. Your consultant might do just fine.

 

[AndyN]

Andy, I think skb is trying to say, send someone to an internal auditing class given by a registration body, not a lead auditor class.

It could be Al - the response is the same. When you are taught by CBs you see auditing only through 3rd party eyes...