Discovered dishonesty after performing an internal audit

[Mr Roo]

I performed an internal audit of Design.
Concerning design planning, specifically documented evidence of new product design input and approval, the Engineering manager specifically stated in an email interaction that new product design has been "absent" in the past 12 months due to supporting sales. [product renderings, minor product tweeks, customer configuration drwgs, etc].
I accepted his reply and noted it in the IA report.
Three weeks later an entirely new product was released to Sales, product we have not manufactured before.
From my perspective, this is out-right dishonesty with the intent of deception.
I will add that he has never 'bought into" the purpose/goal of ISO-9001, and seems to do the very minimum to comply with the standard.
I have considered notifying upper management, but unless a situation impacts the "bottom-line" they are rather disconnected, and historically there are no consequences.
Looking for peer opinions: How would you manage this scenario?

 

[Ron Rompen]

You are in a tough situation, no matter what action you take. Management failure to 'buy-in' is a common problem, and unfortunately there is no easy solution to it. Too many see your certification as just another 'check mark' to show to customers, without fully understanding the value that can be derived from having a TRULY functional QMS.
Personally, I would schedule ANOTHER audit of the process. Since you are now aware that there IS a new product launch, then you can request to review the documentation for it.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

From my perspective, this is out-right dishonesty with the intent of deception.

Be careful not to jump to conclusions and go back and ask the Engineering Manager when the design development cycle for this newly released product line took place. You mentioned focusing specifically in design planning what takes place early in the cycle. It might very well happen that the planning phase for this new product took place a couple of years ago.

If you do confirm, however, that the Engineering Manager concealed the existence of a recent product design activity from you, I would bring this to the attention of whoever is in charge of the internal audit process and let them deal with the ramifications of the acts.

Good luck.

 

[ChrisM]

Whilst I generally agree with what Sidney has written above, but when you conducted the audit, did you ask to see a register of projects and establish that there were no "new" projects with product names or code names that were new to you? If there was an attempt to hide such a register, that is another area to follow up on; I suspect that a discussion with your audit planner is required, to add an additional internal audit of your design process based on what you have said in your original post. Your Quality Department Head should certainly have been aware of any forthcoming new product since they should have been involved with the Quality Planning and other tasks during the development cycle - check with them if they were previously aware of this "new" product

 

[BradM]

Not to veer too much from the main topic, I did want to say how nice and refreshing it is to see an internal auditor take their job seriously and want to do a good job. By your post, it would seem you neither wrote up something without maybe doing full due diligence, nor did you just say 'meh. Not important. I'll just move on. '

I like when auditors seek to gain some input from other folks on things, to be a better auditor and produce better quality audit findings.