Quality Policy Document as a Level 1 Document

[kgott]

When I set up our QA documentation I said our documentation was structured around 6 levels.

I have seen a number of posts in this forum where there are 5 or 6 levels of documentation. In all I noticed that the Quality Policy is not mentioned as a level one document and I agree that it should not be because its a corporate requirement and does not need to be an allocated a document level of its own. The trouble is that this same argument could be made about other documentation.

In recent days I have had a koo-day-ta perpetrated on me and now the management and the safety function have agreed to rename the documentation levels with the policy as the level 1 document.

I have no idea why this has occurred and I was not consulted/involved in the consultation process about this change but a special meeting was convened to obtain my 'buy in' to this at which I did my quince and very nearly walked out of the meeting.

I am aware that management can structure documentation any way they wish and I'm aware that 9001 does not state how documentation will be structured and in this sense it should bother me at all, but it does and I'm not exactly sure why. Ego is a strong suspect but I'm sure there is a good reason for not including a policy statement as a level 1 document.

Can anyone come up with a better reason than the one I have given as to why a policy document is generally not included as the first level documentation.

Thanks in advance

Thanks

 

[somashekar]

First is that I feel there is a lot of difference between a quality policy and policy document. Quality policy is a statement. Quality manual is a document, and mostly quality policy finds a place in the manual which sets directions to the objectives of rest of the processes. Quality manual as a level 1 document is most common.

There can be several other corporate policy documents that again become the first level documents of its own domine, like the HR policy document, Internet and computer use policy document and such other.

 

[howste]

Can anyone come up with a better reason than the one I have given as to why a policy document is generally not included as the first level documentation.

I see no reason why not. If you look at the definition of management system in ISO 9000, it seems like it might actually be a good idea:

3.2.2 management system
system to establish policy and objectives and to achieve those objectives

Based on this, the whole system is there to support what is in the policy and objectives.

In recent days I have had a koo-day-ta perpetrated on me...

I think the phrase you were looking for is coup d'état.

 

[Big Jim]

I see no reason why not. If you look at the definition of management system in ISO 9000, it seems like it might actually be a good idea:

Based on this, the whole system is there to support what is in the policy and objectives.


I think the phrase you were looking for is coup d'état.

I agree with Howste, in fact I have a client that has the quality policy at the top of their document structure.

It is a common thing to describe QMS documentation with four levels. It is a wide spread practice. However, there is no requirement that drives that approach.

So your company is free to define it however you want, and like Howstee, when I found a client that did so, I also thought it was a good idea and "why not?".

 

[Jim Wynne]

When I set up our QA documentation I said our documentation was structured around 6 levels.

I have seen a number of posts in this forum where there are 5 or 6 levels of documentation. In all I noticed that the Quality Policy is not mentioned as a level one document and I agree that it should not be because its a corporate requirement and does not need to be an allocated a document level of its own. The trouble is that this same argument could be made about other documentation.

In recent days I have had a koo-day-ta perpetrated on me and now the management and the safety function have agreed to rename the documentation levels with the policy as the level 1 document.

I have no idea why this has occurred and I was not consulted/involved in the consultation process about this change but a special meeting was convened to obtain my 'buy in' to this at which I did my quince and very nearly walked out of the meeting.

I am aware that management can structure documentation any way they wish and I'm aware that 9001 does not state how documentation will be structured and in this sense it should bother me at all, but it does and I'm not exactly sure why. Ego is a strong suspect but I'm sure there is a good reason for not including a policy statement as a level 1 document.

Can anyone come up with a better reason than the one I have given as to why a policy document is generally not included as the first level documentation.

Thanks in advance

Thanks

There was a time when a "pyramid" system of documentation made sense, but that train left the station a long time ago. Putting documents into a defined hierarchy makes little sense, and has a tendency to create a bureaucratic sinkhole such as the one you find yourself struggling to get out of at the moment.

If your company were to declare today that the quality policy is a Level 23 document, it would still be the quality policy.

 

[dsheaffe]

I have to agree with Jim, don't worry about the levels and what document sits at what level, in the end it doesn't really matter. I had worked with a company that was adamant that they must have procedures which linked to work instructions and no matter how hard I tried to convince them that they could just have procedures with differing levels of detail they wouldn't change their mind - so I left it the way it was - my point, it doesn't really matter.

On the other hand, I would too be peeved (and it may not be just ego) that discussions/decisions on the structure of the quality system didn't involve the person who appears to be intimately involved in it.

 

[kgott]

The idea is to establish levels for administrative/educative purposes and to make it easier for users to understand the structure of the system but then I don’t want to get into a position of documents having the level contained in the title or something like that either, as per Jims post.

We have a rigid system of document naming here. Company branding requirements extend all the way down to internal procedures, if some are to be believed. We have the ridiculous situation where a three page procedure ends up 8-9 pages due to “the company branding requirements” but after doing my quince I had a small win, Now procedures only need an introduction and not a purpose, scope, definitions etc etc.
If I create document it’s a quality document, if the safety person creates a document it’s a safety document. Same with projects. All of which have different file extension naming requirements. I have tried to get the powers that be to use a wiki after reading Pancho’s post on this forum which will fix all this kind of rubbish but slowly, slowly catchy the monkey I suppose.