Questions that auditor may ask during the certification or 2nd stage audit.

[harry]

............................ I work for a small company that is going for its first ISO certification, has passed through the first stage audit, and will be going through the second stage audit in a few weeks. ............................. :

Since this is an initial 'certification audit', you can expect the audit to be quite detail. What questions will be asked or how the audit will be carried out is very much dependent on the style of the third party auditor.

Instead, pay attention to common pitfalls or problem areas (failure modes) - see Marc's post (#7) and for general preparation, Stijloor has a good guide (click on the link) in post #9.

 

[blueboat]

I would suggest that it's not as important to know what might be asked, but what an auditee can do to overcome their apprehension of the audit. It's far easier to let people know a process by which they can 'survive' (it's not that bad, really)

They should introduce themselves to the auditor and what they're job title is.
They should describe what they have responsibility for. It's good to add how long they've been doing it too. At some point, it might be a good time to say, would you like to see what I do? If there's a work instruction, or similar that describes that activity, find it and show the auditor. Have them talk the auditor through their process.

Taking control of the audit interview in this way is critical in building confidence in the auditor. If you train people to have certain behaviors will alert the auditor to the fact they've been schooled and can make them suspicious.

Many thanks for good comment.
PS:
I'm new to this forum.
My English is poor, because I'm a chinese. So maybe many thime I can't express myself correctly or many wrong words exit. But, really appriciate to find this forum which I can study English as well as quality knowledge.
Thanks.

 

[Marc]

These slides are somewhat dated, but things have not really changed that much:

Typical Audit Questions to Expect

General Things to Know and Do

Things NOT to Do

Things to Know

Supervisors should Think About

Last Things to Think About

There are some other odds and ends there if you page through the presentation.

 

[somashekar]

Hello everyone: I am new to this forum and new to the Quality game. I am hoping that those of you with more experience can assist me. I work for a small company that is going for its first ISO certification, has passed through the first stage audit, and will be going through the second stage audit in a few weeks. I am working on preparing our employees, who have worked without written documentation for some twenty years, for the audit. My CEO would like them to know what they will be asked so they can be ready to answer those questions. What kind of questions should we expect?

Thank you in advance for any help you can offer.:truce:

Great tips and leads so far ...
At the operator level where people turn out products or assemblies and have a set activities to DO, they must be aware of and be able to answer :
WHAT is being done by him -- the process or set of activities.
HOW he is doing that -- the logical sequence of the set of activities
HOW he knows what he has done is good -- the ability and training to assess good and defective work by self inspection
WHAT he does if it is defective -- the control of non conforming products / parts, place to keep them, identify them and communicate about them.
As the audit questions goes to higher levels the auditor will be keen to know WHY things are done in the way they are done and how one gets around dealing with non conformance, analysing the data , training the people who work and how they interact between the various processes.
Simple and common sense approach to logical supervisory and management activities, communication, records management and stuff.

 

[alehman]

Thank you so much for all of the great tips and advice. I'm feeling much more confident that we can bring everyone up to speed on what they can expect.

 

[Stijloor]

Hello everyone: I am new to this forum and new to the Quality game. I am hoping that those of you with more experience can assist me. I work for a small company that is going for its first ISO certification, has passed through the first stage audit, and will be going through the second stage audit in a few weeks. I am working on preparing our employees, who have worked without written documentation for some twenty years, for the audit. My CEO would like them to know what they will be asked so they can be ready to answer those questions. What kind of questions should we expect?

Thank you in advance for any help you can offer.:truce:

See this post + attachment.

Stijloor.