Objectives in Quality Policy

[Randy]

Recipe for disaster of the umpteenth degree. There are more variables, and issues and potentialities they can't be easily measured and forget monitored.

 

[normzone]

I had to address a "quality policy" like this one once. The newest company president wrote it when he saw the "boring" policy I had the organization operating with.

His work was identified in an internal audit as not meeting the standard, and when he balked at changing it the issue went to corrective action. He indicated his displeasure and blew a lot of smoke about how we could meet the standard under the statements he cobbled together as a policy.

It was really more of a buzz-speak paragraph. I've seen even the biggest aerospace players do the same thing.

Our external auditor wrote it up as a nonconformance and we had to do it over again.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

Our external auditor wrote it up as a nonconformance and we had to do it over again.

And, after that, the system performance improved ten fold....,oh the sarcasm. A quality policy statement is, totally inconsequential. If the leadership of the organization is serious about customer satisfaction, a policy statement is redundant; if leadership is derelict, the policy statement is useless.
It is about time ISO saw the archaicness of this requirement and acted accordingly. Having a requirement for XXX Policy in the ISO HLS is utterly useless as there are much better means for leadership to demonstrate its commitment.

 

[normzone]

I can see the the good intentions of the practice - for the derelict cases you mention it compels the outfit to identify, measure and attempt to improve SOMETHING pertinent to the situation, even if it's only on time delivery and meeting specification.

As for leadership, my encounters with that in the wild have been few. Usually I have to bring some with me when I go Quality Adventuring.

 

[Big Jim]

I take a slightly different view of this.
since these 'objectives' are in the quality policy and reading what they are, they sound more like mission statements (directional and aspirational) rather than hard and fast goals for critical measures of success. I would look for SMART goals in the annual goal statement or something like that not in the policy. The policy might outline what smart goal looks like and how often they are set or reviewed, etc.

of course all words have multiple meanings...

In support of keep in mind that not all objectives need to be quality objectives.

 

[normzone]

" Not all objectives need to be quality objectives. "

Currently working through a mess of that nature - Quoted and added to my "Gems" file - thanks.