If your organisation follows a management system, it needs a systematised and well-structured Quality Management System (QMS). However, implementing a QMS is not always a walk in the park. It takes data, input from employees and senior leadership, and a methodological approach.
At its core, a quality management system is all about customer satisfaction. Satisfied customers can significantly impact your business’s bottom line. As such, implementing a quality management system is a great way to guarantee customer satisfaction and continuous improvement of products and services.
Here are important steps for the effective implementation of a QMS:
Define Your Processes
Analyse your business and define key processes that influence customer satisfaction. These processes and procedures should outline the scope, purpose, and responsibilities. It’s also important to plan your approach by establishing the required resources. Perform a gap analysis to evaluate the existing processes and see if they need change.
Establish Your Quality Objectives
Any effective quality management system should have quality objectives, which must be measurable and incorporated throughout the organisation. Some critical success factors may include financial performance, customer satisfaction, product quality, employee satisfaction, or process improvement.
Develop Metrics
System metrics help keep track and check how the processes are working. Review processes and procedures regularly to monitor compliance with policies and certification requirements. Continuous process audits help identify errors and ensure continuous improvement.
Identify Non-Conformances
Process non-conformances refer to defects that occur due to a process’s deficiency or product flaw. These defects should be defined, measured, and corrected as soon as possible to prevent further problems. When defining defects, ensure you determine operation volume, create a process to record defects, and outline a process to report non-conformances in a specified format.
Support Documentation
Information documentation is critical in quality management. Create document information for every business model, including quality policies and procedures, work instructions, and training materials. Ensure your documentation is kept in good order for easy document control and management.
Define Quality Process
It’s also crucial to define your quality procedure, including preventive and corrective action processes, management reviews, internal audits, and communication processes.
Employee Training
Determine the training needs of employees and top management. If you decide the new processes are necessary, inform your team about them and provide the relevant training. Training can be done on the job or through online programs. Popular training areas you may want to consider are corrective action training and internal auditor competence.
How Best Practice Biz Can Help
Best Practice Biz offers an exclusive ISO 9001:2015 QMS training designed to teach you the basics of implementing and auditing a quality management system in your firm. This course will teach you how to create, implement, and improve a quality management system. It will also give you lifetime access to ISO 9001 information and sample templates.
Enrol now for this course, or contact us to discover how our team can help you implement an effective quality management system in your organisation.
