ISO 9001 Certification for a Big Government Entity - One Certificate for each Dept.?

[firasali]

Re: ISO 9001 certificates for a big government entity - one certificate for each dept

Firasali, welcome to The Cove.

I sincerely hope that the organization you are referring here has a positive outcome but I am ALWAYS weary of "certification segmentation", i.e., a departmental approach to QMS implementation & certification. In my experience, it leads to ineffective and inefficient systems. All of the departments will have to identify what their "product" is and who are their customers. It is very easy to forget the end customer, the one receiving the services from this governmental institution. So, whenever I can, I would STRONGLY ADVISE against it. It might take longer, be more painful, but it would be sustainable in the long run. Departmental approach to certification, in my experience, tends to lead to more money to consultants and certification bodies, more press releases, more award ceremonies, etc....but less substance. A waste of money and effort.

Nevertheless, I would STRONGLY encourage you to familiarize yourself with the (link) document. In my opinion the document abstract alludes to the need to have a holistic approach to a system implementation. It reads:


Good luck to you.

I totally agree with you regarding the segmentation negative affects, actually I am feeling the heat of it right now!! and unfortunately I can not change it, I tried, but with no success. The mentality of government entities here in the Middle East are little bit dificult to deal with,,, and each department head wants to be the pioneer and to achieve the certificate before others,,, and the top management is liking that as they think this will increase the competition!!! and yeah they do not care about money!!

Thanks a lot for the reference to the IWA, it looks very useful and am going to go through it tonight

As soon as you start asking about a single Quality Policy, Quality Manual, Management Review, etc then it sounds like you are talking about a single system. What is the advantage to multiple systems? It will cost more, take longer, and will likely lead to suboptimal results with each department trying to optimize their results at the possible expense of the others.

Thanks, again I was against it but could not help,,, now I need support on how to proceed with the least pain possible

Why can't they share a 'common' policy?

Have common where it makes sense, have different where it makes sense.

I do second Sidney's view, and to me, it doesn't make sense adopting this 'department by department' viewpoint. BUT it is also possible that we simply don't have the info or the knowledge that the people at the top do who made the 'go individual' decision.

'Department' in a government sounds similar but can mean quite a different thing to its meaning in a corporate environment. Here at least, a government department - at least at the State and Federal level - is perhaps best compared to an entire company which is just one of a number of companies owned and run by a holding group.

nice comparison, any ideas on how to deal with such case? by the was this government entity is participating in the national quality excellence award!

Yes, I too second what Sidney suggested above but as the OP reports, decision reg. deptt. by deptt. certification has already been taken. The idea of not sharing a common policy was based on the assumption that each 'deptt.' will be treated is a separate entity having no connection whatsoever with one another but in reality it may not be correct. Unlike standalone entities, they must be sharing a lot in common, so why not to share a policy or a document in common.

I agree, thanks

 

[Sidney Vianna]

Re: ISO 9001 certificates for a big government entity - one certificate for each dept

and each department head wants to be the pioneer and to achieve the certificate before others,,, and the top management is liking that as they think this will increase the competition!!! and yeah they do not care about money!!

Other than the bit about the money, what you described is very similar to many botched ISO 9001 implementation and certification "projects" that I have seen; attaining certification as a marketing stunt, a brief 15-second photo op, a fledgling, artfully crafted press release, etc...

As I said several times in my ten years of Cove membership, it is really sad to realize that places like Asia, Middle East and the next victim frontier, Africa are destined to repeat the same mistakes and suffer the same problems with management system implementation and certification that started in the UK, progressed to Western Europe, North and South America, Australia, etc...

I wish you guys could do some real "preventive action" and prevent unsustainable practices related to ISO 9001 (and other standards) deployment in the Middle East.

 

[firasali]

Re: ISO 9001 certificates for a big government entity - one certificate for each dept

Other than the bit about the money, what you described is very similar to many botched ISO 9001 implementation and certification "projects" that I have seen; attaining certification as a marketing stunt, a brief 15-second photo op, a fledgling, artfully crafted press release, etc...

As I said several times in my ten years of Cove membership, it is really sad to realize that places like Asia, Middle East and the next victim frontier, Africa are destined to repeat the same mistakes and suffer the same problems with management system implementation and certification that started in the UK, progressed to Western Europe, North and South America, Australia, etc...

I wish you guys could do some real "preventive action" and prevent unsustainable practices related to ISO 9001 (and other standards) deployment in the Middle East.

Well, may be I gave a wrong impression about this entity,,,, they do not want the ISO for the reasons you have mentioned not at all, they want it as a motivation for the several departments to stay in compliance with the policies and procedures, and to improve their level of service, but may be the approach they chose is not advisable that is it,,,

But I needed guidance on how to make sure they will conform to the ISO requirements with the least hassle possible

 

[Sidney Vianna]

Re: ISO 9001 certificates for a big government entity - one certificate for each dept

and to improve their level of service

Thanks for the clarification. If the organization is indeed interested in improving their level of service, EVEN more important to focus on the end user of the service. As you guide the different departments in implementing their separate QMS's, they will have to identify their (internal) customers and monitor their level of satisfaction, but don't let them lose track of the end user, the person/organization being provided with the service by this entity.

I would hope that the entity in question has metrics in place to monitor level of satisfaction with their service(s), so, over time, one can assess if that goal is being achieved or not.

I've seen some organizations using certain metrics instead of actual user satisfaction data, with questionable results. For example, if an organization issues driver licenses, they might want to use an indicator such as

number of days to issue a license after the driver passed the test

and the data showing that they've reduced the number from 25 to 17, they could think that they are making their customers happy. Well, the reality was that the driver's expectations were to receive their license no later than 5 days after passing the test. So, while reducing the length of time required to issue the license has improved (significantly?), it is still way too long to satisfy the average user of the service.

Just one example.

 

[firasali]

Re: ISO 9001 certificates for a big government entity - one certificate for each dept

Thanks for the clarification. If the organization is indeed interested in improving their level of service, EVEN more important to focus on the end user of the service. As you guide the different departments in implementing their separate QMS's, they will have to identify their (internal) customers and monitor their level of satisfaction, but don't let them lose track of the end user, the person/organization being provided with the service by this entity.

I would hope that the entity in question has metrics in place to monitor level of satisfaction with their service(s), so, over time, one can assess if that goal is being achieved or not.

I've seen some organizations using certain metrics instead of actual user satisfaction data, with questionable results. For example, if an organization issues driver licenses, they might want to use an indicator such as and the data showing that they've reduced the number from 25 to 17, they could think that they are making their customers happy. Well, the reality was that the driver's expectations were to receive their license no later than 5 days after passing the test. So, while reducing the length of time required to issue the license has improved (significantly?), it is still way too long to satisfy the average user of the service.

Just one example.

Thx Sidney, actually yes we helped them in developing many KPI's for internal and external customers of course our concern was on the external ones, and we are in the processes of developing the quality objectives based on these measures. I liked the idea about the globe monitoring, I guess this is worth to reconsider.

thanks again