Minor Nonconformity for Lack of Job Descriptions in ISO 9001

[sliebman]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

I shouldnt have said "fight", i am hoping it wont be. We have been with this registrar since the beginning, 2001, but we have had 5 different auditors in the last 5 years....I know they have had issues with turnover (not sure if it is an industry thing or not), and with finding auditors for us.
We have alredy discussed researching other registrars, any we may yet change. Maybe you guys can answer this for me, if we were to switch, would we have to go thruough a complete recert with a new company? I figured we would, so i was thinking we may postpone looking until we are due for our next recert.
I do believe that we are going to contest the finding, just gathering evidence and supporting docs for our case......

 

[J0anne]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

Yes, you would have to go through a complete recertification with a new company. You would also transfer any outstanding NCs. It may be an idea to wait for the sake of cost savings.

Also, being allocated different auditors all the time, isn't a bad thing.
Having the same auditor over long time periods can become unhealthy.

 

[John Broomfield]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

Outside auditor, it was for our full recert audit. We are ISO 9001, with exception to the design elements. This is a new auditor to us, and he usually audits Aerospace.
He cited 6.2.1 ISO clause, and his finding was
"Base level job descriptions should be developed to meet the requirements of a specific job to show the competency needed on the basis of appropriate education, training, skills and experience in accordance with 6.2.1 General of ISO9001:2008"

Keep in mind, that we do have shop floor employees job descriptions writen in much detail for all employees....plus an org chart....plus a large matrix which lists all employees, and about 20 different catagories/skills that we review every year....

sliebman,

Who among your organization agreed this nonconformity statement with the auditor? Talk to them.

If this person has authority then he or she may have said they require job descriptions (in which case the auditor should have included their name in the nonconformity statement).

ISO 9001 alone does not specify job descriptions. Better to have team-based or process-based descriptions which are also known as procedures per 4.1c and 4.2.1d (and 5.5.1).

The abilities, skills and knowledge required to do work which affects quality may be displayed for all to see in a matrix (spreadsheet) showing who is competent, who is being trained and who is competent to train others.

Job Specifications can however be useful when the manager wants someone who has the innate abilities (and the maximum skills and knowledge available) recruited by HR. These come from the manager analyzing the procedures, authorities and responsibilities related to the vacant or soon to be vacant job title perhaps aided by HR.

John

 

[Marcelo]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

True, job descriptions are not specifically required by ISO 9001:2008, something akin to it IS REQUIRED.

6.2.2 a The organization shall . . . determine the necessary competence for personnel performing work affecting conformity to product requirements . . .

The note from 6.2.1 cited by others provides some illumination here.

NOTE: Conformity of product requirements can be affected directly or indirectly by personnel performing ANY task within the quality management system (emphasis added).

You are correct, but this is part of the quality system planning, and job descriptions are usually results of planning.

First you define your processes, then you define the product characteristics that can be affected (the reason the note is really weird because it seems to read that you do not need to do this because all tasks WILL affect, not CAN), then you determine the competence requirements.

This can all be part of a quality plan, turtle diagram or whatever you use for process analysis.

Then, if you want to, you can write job descriptions as a result of this planning/analysis (I would say that job descriptions are more related to job searching than anything else).

 

[sliebman]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

The President and myself were the ones speaking with the auditor, we never once said that we required job descriptions. The auditor brought that up by himself, he asked us to see our job descriptions.
I agree job descriptions are useful, and we do use them for employees not in management, but we shouldnt be required to have them for managment personnel

 

[Marcelo]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

is this worth fighting with the registrar?

Bad auditors/registrars are much more costly in the long term because they do not add value, just bureaucracy.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

Bad auditors/registrars are much more costly in the long term because they do not add value, just bureaucracy.

Brilliantly said, Marcelo.

If the CB and their respective auditors are not:

• adding value to the registrants by reporting actionable findings which will make the system better, when acted upon, AND
  
• adding value to the real users of the QMS certificates (the registrant's customers) by providing them with confidence in the certified system's performance in minimizing non-conforming product and maximizing customer satisfaction,

they are not deserving of being in business. Just like in any other profession, we must find ways to weed out the people and organizations that are not adding value.

 

[John Broomfield]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

The President and myself were the ones speaking with the auditor, we never once said that we required job descriptions. The auditor brought that up by himself, he asked us to see our job descriptions.
I agree job descriptions are useful, and we do use them for employees not in management, but we shouldnt be required to have them for managment personnel

sliebman,

Then you have to write a letter to the Registrar providing the facts and making it clear that you seek an auditor who reports nonconformity so each statement includes a description of:

A. The applicable requirement
B. The evidence of not meeting the requirement
C. The nature of the nonconformity

Auditors also seek agreement of any nonconformity. They listen to the auditee and include in the Audit Report the reasons the auditee had expressed for not agreeing A, B and/or C of the nonconformity statement.

Accept no advice from your auditor. No more time wasting and no more fluff. I blame the notion of value-adding auditing for this. Instead of adding value by reporting well-crafted nonconformity statements; the auditor thought it meant making suggestions. In a way I feel sorry for the confused auditor.

John

 

[jsn80]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

Although I agree that this is not a well written nonconformance, the auditor is not completely off base.

True, job descriptions are not specifically required by ISO 9001:2008, something akin to it IS REQUIRED.

6.2.2 a The organization shall . . . determine the necessary competence for personnel performing work affecting conformity to product requirements . . .

If you choose to use some other way than job descriptions to define the competencies for management, you can do so. Make sure that any written procedures you may have on the topic don't pin you down though.

The point is that you do have to define the needed competencies for ALL employees that have anything to do with the quality management system.

This is exactly what I thought of when I read the initial post.

We use job descriptions to identify the required competences for the each position. A person's skills are compared to this to identify what training is needed (6.2.2 b) and the evaluations are checked back against the job description to ensure the employee it competent and capable for the position they are in.

 

[Big Jim]

Re: Nonconformity for lack of job descriptions in ISO 9001

The auditor has not said what the NC is and has offered a solution on how things should be done. This is not the job of an auditor.

What I was pointing out is that there likely is a nonconformance here even if the auditor went about it wrong and stated it poorly.

Organizations DO need to determine what competencies are needed for ALL positions, INCLUDING MANAGEMENT.