Different Aspects Of The ISO 9001 For Small Businesses

By Sonya Riley


ISO 9001 is collection of standards which relates to quality management of different management systems. The standards are designed to help the organizations meet the expectations of a number of classes of stakeholders. Standardization of such systems also ensures that different groups of shareholders have improved levels of confidence in their organizations. The ISO 9001 for small businesses is a special family of standards which defines the regulatory and statutory requirements relating to products being produced.

There are many international bodies which are entrusted with the role of implementation of the standard platforms. The International Organization of Standardization issues all the platforms that are then implemented across the board. The standards define the level of quality which must be attained by the products before they can be retailed in different trading blocks.

For commercial enterprises, quality certification is very important. This is used as a threshold of measuring the levels of quality achieved within the internal and external production environment. Independent parties are used for the analysis and audit of these environments. After the validation of these internal conditions, the necessary certificates are issued.

A global system of the quality certification is adopted for various reasons. This is mainly for the producing and supplying organizations. The holders of the certificates have attained a specified level of quality within their systems. This means that they can be trusted to produce quality packages of goods and services. There are financial benefits associated with holding such certification. The audit costs are down since most of the processes are already assessed, audited and well-analyzed by system specialists.

Superior financial performance is often associated with the certified organizations. Customers tend to buy products from the certified companies since their products are of very high quality. As a result, their sales are stimulated. Increased sales mean more revenue turnover. Costs tend to reduce with every level of new certification attained. The system audit fees are reduced since most of the systems are already assessed. Reduction of operating costs and increase in revenues optimizes the profits.

There are very critical processes that ought to be audited form time to time. These are mainly those dealing with the human resources and the infrastructural management. Customer relations processes also ought to be carefully analyzed. System specifications are defined before the audit processes. This ensures that the internal operating environment is carefully analyzed.

The running of an organization is done by the management. The senior managers make the strategic decisions. They collect data and information from various sources. These pieces of information facilitate the process of deciding which business to venture and the general direction that an organization will take. Most of the focus is on building a strong relationship with external stakeholders of an organization. Once the strategic decisions have been made, the middle level managers take over the implementation process.

The ISO 9001 for small businesses focuses on improving the business integrity. It ensures that there is a quality policy that relates production and marketing. The quality policy has to be linked with various needs of the customers. These policies have to be regularly audited for continuous improvement of system effectiveness.




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