Hello,
I work for a company which manufactures and distributes consumer and industrial chemicals. I am responsible for the quality management system.
We form part of a group which has several other companies which deals in the chemical business.
In line with a clustering of these businesses under one hat, I have been asked to look after the QMS the 3 companies and to provide a plan.
Now each company has undergone ISO 9001:2008 certification. Two of the businesses do not have a dedicated quality team. Its more like the production manager looking a bit after quality.
Each of the company has its own quality policy and so on.
So I would like some guidance on how I could go about this.
I already have a meeting scheduled with each of the company MRs to understand their processes and so on.
Please help.
thx
As far as I can understand, there are "different" companies under a group, but the top management of the group wants those to be merged or gathered for quality. Then, I would recommend something different.
As there are three different companies and a headquarters for the group, you will implement 4 different management systems anyway. Whether merged or not, first of all, define the processes of the management system of each company/site. Then, decide to merge them or not. Also, keep in mind that, if the legal status of that three company is different, there may be problems in the clauses ISO 9001. I think, you would consult to the certification body, so ask them if they would accept what you think. Because, the certificate is issued to one legal body. (I m a consultant, and, I just had a similiar case last December. I implemented 3 different QMs, but the procedures were the same. However, the scopes of the companies were identical to each other, in my case. Also, the CB(s) may require different QM for each company, as the legal entities are different at all.)
Anyway, after defining the processes for the three sites and the head quarters, just go on with the usual documentation work. You can consider the HQ of the group as the management department and the other three site as sub-departments in a merged system, or, you can consider the HQ as the main company and the other three as suppliers in the non-merged version. In any case, you would clearly identify the needs of the HQ, and define the processes/inputs/outputs of HQ based on those. Because, (I think

) the HQ/top management will like/see the QMS as a tool for their management activities on the three company, before anything.
And, to make your work easy, I recommend you to act as the quality coordinator, not the QMR of the whole three companies. Authoritize QMR for each company and one for the HQ, and prefer that QMR would be someone different from the top manager of that site (maybe, a sub-manager), then, each QMR would built and implement own QMS and you would coordinate the all work.
Finally, one body would be good for certification of all. However, every audit is also a training. If you have enough resources (especially time and patience

), having audited using different bodies at least for the first two years would help you improve your complex quality system. Yes, you will sometimes find yourself in the middle like the other quality professionals told in previous posts, but every risk comes with its own opportunity
