Quality Management Principles Working Group

[John Broomfield]

Yes, I know. But I look at Principle 7 as data, measuring and decision-making activities. You can include any measuring activity as you wish.

Stijloor.

Stijloor,

I agree. And I have changed principle 9 to "consider velocity" to avoid any apparent repetition of principle 7.

John

 

[tyker]

A couple of years ago I was asked, at a job interview for an auditing role, which 2 of the principles I rated the most important. I went for customer focus and leadership. I toyed with continuous improvement but felt that wouldn't happen without the other two.

The only time these principles have been discussed with me were at that interview and as part of the ISO 9001:2000 lead auditor qualification process. So how important and relevant are they to commerce? As has already been pointed out, they're only tenuously linked to ISO 9001 and, even if that link were strengthened, it would be a brave auditor who raised a nonconformity about lack of leadership or inappropriate decision making. In developing and implementing systems in my current organization I consider the requirements of EN/AS 9100 and lean principles but have felt no need to refer to ISO 9000 or these 8 points - laudable though they may be. Don't good managers learn principles just like these at management school without having to buy a copy of an ISO?

I accept that they represent good practice but who's using them and would there be any significant change in the field of quality if these points along with large chunks of ISO 9000 and the whole of ISO 9004 were quietly dropped?

 

[John Broomfield]

A couple of years ago I was asked, at a job interview for an auditing role, which 2 of the principles I rated the most important. I went for customer focus and leadership. I toyed with continuous improvement but felt that wouldn't happen without the other two.

The only time these principles have been discussed with me were at that interview and as part of the ISO 9001:2000 lead auditor qualification process. So how important and relevant are they to commerce? As has already been pointed out, they're only tenuously linked to ISO 9001 and, even if that link were strengthened, it would be a brave auditor who raised a nonconformity about lack of leadership or inappropriate decision making. In developing and implementing systems in my current organization I consider the requirements of EN/AS 9100 and lean principles but have felt no need to refer to ISO 9000 or these 8 points - laudable though they may be. Don't good managers learn principles just like these at management school without having to buy a copy of an ISO?

I accept that they represent good practice but who's using them and would there be any significant change in the field of quality if these points along with large chunks of ISO 9000 and the whole of ISO 9004 were quietly dropped?

tyker,

I agree with you. I used to think of guidelines as where the ISO-process placed a good idea that was not yet widely accepted enough as good practice to become part of a requirements standard.

The conveyor belt from guidelines to requirements seems now to be broken as the makers of standards (all of us) leapt ahead to seize the moral highground of social responsibility and sustainability.

Meanwhile, many users of the standards are too busy improving their ways of determining and meeting requirements to spend much time with guidelines.

Perhaps we should be looking more closely at:

• Education and competence to fill the gap between guidelines and requirements; and
• The power of the Management Representative to ensure the necessary processes are in place and part of the management system to fulfill the organization's objectives.

John

 

[Sidney Vianna]

If you were able to influence the principles that underpin the ISO 9000 series of standards what would you want to have and why?

BorisS, after giving some thought to this, I would want to create a 9[sup]th[/sup] principle:

Monetary benefit of quality

Organizations depend on profits to prosper. Financial difficulties invariably lead to resource constraints, affecting the organization's ability to satisfy customers. Demonstrating the monetary benefit of quality will assist top management understand the importance of and support the quality system.

Key benefits:

• Clear connection to one of top management's primary concern.
• Quality being perceived as a profit source, rather than a revenue drain.
• Increased top management interest in the operation of the quality system.

Applying the principle of monetary benefit of quality typically leads to:

• Quality system performance reporting encompassing monetary data.
• Risk management of customer satisfaction and product integrity being supported by monetary considerations.
• Quality management being perceived as an important component of the business processes.
• Top management interest and involvement with the quality system.

 

[Stijloor]

Sidney,

If I may add a few words...

Monetary benefits apply to not only to business owners, but also employees, suppliers, and the community at large in which the organization operates.

Stijloor.

 

[Sidney Vianna]

Monetary benefits apply to not only to business owners, but also employees, suppliers, and the community at large in which the organization operates.

The difference is that for the business owners, there is a DIRECT connection and benefit, while, for the remaining stakeholders you listed, the connection is much more tenuous.

In my mind, a quality system that does not make the connection with the organization's financial performance will always struggle for top management awareness, involvement and support. The percentage of enlightened senior managers who understand the intrinsic connections between business results and QMS performance is very small, in my experience.

 

[Paul Simpson]

Thanks for the posts, guys. Rather than reply to individual points I'll attempt a general reply.

I understand some of the concerns with proliferation of guidance but the 8 principles is not guidance as to how to meet ISO 9001 but rather is an explanation of where 9001 comes from. As I understand it when they were looking to make the drastic revisions to the format and approach for the year 2000 edition the working group was set up to describe the underlying and underpinning principles first and came up with the 8 we are discussing now. The principles remained unchanged for 9000.2005 and 9001.2008 editions but are up for discussion now. It is unlikely that any of these QMPs will break any new ground but should at least consider developments in quality thinking and maybe even catch up with some stuff that was around in 2000 but that didn't make it in to the 9000 family revision.

Now IMHO the 8 QMPs aren't a bad set (although there are some others that might be added or used to revise existing). My problem is with the visibility of the QMPs in the requirements standard - 9001. One that I think is OK (but again could be improved) is Leadership - there is the whole of section 5 about Management Responsibility. But what about the 'Mutually beneficial' principle - notable by its absence I would say.

Perhaps the monetary side that Sidney would like to see in could be shared between 'Process approach' picking up on the idea of looking after value and reducing waste that features so strongly in Lean Thinking and also should be covered in the 'Factual approach' so analysis of data including the impact of non-conformity etc.

I take the point about 'for the business owners, there is a DIRECT connection and benefit' in linking quality and money but note that in Japanese organizations the focus is on direct measures of rework, equipment effectiveness etc. and financial measures are largely absent from the shopfloor.

Continuing thoughts gratefully received.

 

[tyker]

My problem is with the visibility of the QMPs in the requirements standard - 9001.

Thanks for the clarification, Boris.

If improving visibility of the principles in 9001 entails making them auditable this is going to be a very difficult job. Do we really want to justify decisions to an auditor? What happens with suppliers who don't want to build relationships? How do we address cultural differences; leadership is likely to be understood differently in China, Turkey, the UK and so on?

These are issues which do not sit comfortably with what I want from 9001. I just want organizations that claim compliance to have effective systems that deliver conforming product on time. Dictating how those organizations operate in terms of decision making, business relationships and similar soft issues is unnecessary meddling in my view.

Perhaps the only principle should be that organizations shall be able to demonstrate that they meet their agreed customer performance requirements.

 

[Paul Simpson]

Thanks for the clarification, Boris..

Now the problem with selective quoting is that sometimes bits get missed off that actually mean something. So what I said was:

<snip> Now IMHO the 8 QMPs aren't a bad set (although there are some others that might be added or used to revise existing). My problem is with the visibility of the QMPs in the requirements standard - 9001. One that I think is OK (but again could be improved) is Leadership - there is the whole of section 5 about Management Responsibility. But what about the 'Mutually beneficial' principle - notable by its absence I would say. <snip>

So here I made the point that the 8 aren't bad but you can't really see all of them in the requirements standard - surely only half the job done?

If improving visibility of the principles in 9001 entails making them auditable this is going to be a very difficult job. Do we really want to justify decisions to an auditor? What happens with suppliers who don't want to build relationships? How do we address cultural differences; leadership is likely to be understood differently in China, Turkey, the UK and so on? .

All good points. So if we are saying that 'Mutually beneficial' can't be written in as requirements in 9001 then IMHO it shouldn't exist as a principle. Except I believe it can. So if the requirement under purchasing was that:

The organization shall evaluate the supply chain for risk and opportunity to ensure the type and extent of control applied to the supplier and the purchased product shall be dependent upon the effect of the purchased product on subsequent product realization or the final product.

The organization shall evaluate and select suppliers based on their ability to supply product in accordance with the organization's requirements. The supplier selection programme shall be based on the supply chain risk and opportunity assessment with the aim of building long term partnerships with suppliers.

and perhaps in purchasing information:

In addition to information related to product to be purchased the organization shall provide information to the supplier on the organization's policies and plans for continual improvement and the opportunities for the supplier to contribute to improvements.

These are issues which do not sit comfortably with what I want from 9001. I just want organizations that claim compliance to have effective systems that deliver conforming product on time. Dictating how those organizations operate in terms of decision making, business relationships and similar soft issues is unnecessary meddling in my view. .

This is one reason why Nigel Croft the new chair of TC 176 SC2 has floated the idea of having different 'grades' of ISO 9001 to allow those interested in just conformance to requirements to have their standard and others who want ISO 9001 to be an effective quality / business management model based on improvement to have theirs. He did a presentation at the CQI recently and the slides are here.

Perhaps the only principle should be that organizations shall be able to demonstrate that they meet their agreed customer performance requirements.

Perhaps!

Pl4ease bear in mind that my additional scribblings aren't in standardese - but you get the idea! :truce:

 

[tyker]

The advantage of selective quoting is that I can reply to just one of the points in your post.

I can't really disagree with the draft proposals you make (and now for my favourite word) but.......

Try incorporating requirements for leadership or fact based decision making.

How many organizations do you think would be driven out of the ISO 9001 registration system if these principles were incorporated as requirements? (OK some might go for a lower grade if such a thing were introduced.)

How many auditors (internal as well as external) do you reckon would be up to the job?

Good thread this. I'm disappointed more opinions aren't being expressed.