Latest Management System News & Information

ISO 9004 : 2009

ISO 9004 : 2009 was published on the 30th October 2009 with the title ‘Managing for the sustained success of an organisation - A quality management approach’

Discerning customers nowadays look beyond an organisation’s quality management system. Financial stability, the ability to grow, environmental attitudes, disaster recovery planning, health & safety risks and information security have now become areas of concern.

The new ISO 9004 refers to overall business sustainability and provides a structure and framework to ensure that an organisation can respond to changes in economic climate and can respond to any changes that may occur.

As before, due to the wide ranging content, ISO 9004 is not intended as a certifiable standard but as a model on which to design and develop a quality management system in preparation for assessment against the requirements standard ISO 9001.

The previous version was designed to be used in conjunction with ISO 9001 as a ‘consistent pair’. This is no longer the intention but the structure is still in line with ISO 9001 i.e. requirements clauses 4 to 9 with similar titles but wider ranging. Improvement has been taken out of clause 8 and becomes a new clause 9.

Clause 4 on managing for sustained success now addresses the operating environment and interested parties

Clause 5 covers a wider remit of management responsibility in that mission, vision, values, strategy and policy are included.

Clause 6 on resource management covers a wider scope than the section in ISO 9001 and addresses additional resources including finance, knowledge, information, technology and natural resources, all of which are required to deliver conforming product, but are currently not included in ISO 9001.

Clause 7 on process management is more generic than its equivalent in ISO 9001, ‘product realisation’, and much wider in scope as it applies to all the organisation’s processes including those that are outsourced. The importance of process responsibility and authority, sadly lacking from previous standards, has been acknowledged and a separate subclause has been assigned.

Clause 8 is confined to monitoring, measurement, analysis and review (improvement is addressed in a new clause 9). The requirements encourage the organisation to look over the fence and monitor what is going on in the outside world that could impact the organisation. Additional topics include self-assessment, key performance indicators and benchmarking.

A new clause 9 goes beyond the improvement provisions of ISO 9001 and addresses innovation and learning, two very important concepts for any organisation aiming to sustain success.

Annex A provides a very useful self-assessment tool where an organisation can assess itself periodically against each subclause of ISO 9004. Five ‘maturity levels’ are described for each subclause ranging from a base level (Level 1) to best practice (Level 5). The results of self-assessments could be used to identify areas for improvement, analysing trends over time or benchmarking (within the organisation or against other organisations).

Widening the scope of the standard to cover several diverse issues that are concerning most organisations will make ISO 9004 : 2009 a welcome addition to any senior managers bookshelf.

New EU Accreditation Regulations

New regulations coming into force in 2010 will allow only one Accreditation Body in each EU member state. In the UK this will obviously be the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS). This will prevent non-UKAS accredited 'certification bodies' claiming that they are accredited by 'someone else'. At last, a positive move to limit the activities of non-UKAS accredited certification bodies!

ISO 9001 : 2008

The long-awaited updated was published at the end of 2008. There are no new requirements. Many of the changes were made purely to aid translation. Follow the link below to access a PowerPoint presentation produced by certification body SGS.

ISO 9001 : 2008 PowerPoint presentation

OHSAS 18001 : 2007

The latest version of this standard was published in July 2007. It places greater emphasis on 'health' and the policy now has to be communicated to 'persons working under the control of the organisation', not just 'employees'. Follow the link below to access a PowerPoint presentation produced by certification body DNV.

OHSAS 18001 : 2007 PowerPoint presentation

Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) Assessments made easy

The HSE have introduced a new website www.coshh-essentials.org.uk
All you need to produce a documented COSHH Assessment is access to the applicable Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) containing all the information required by the Chemical Hazard Information and Packaging for Supply (CHIP) Regulations. These MSDSs are usually obtainable from the manufacturer’s or supplier’s website.

The COSHH Assessment website prompts you to provide details such as; chemical name, physical form (solid, liquid or gas), and task that is undertaken (e.g. ‘transferring’ or ‘mixing’). You are then asked to state the relevant Risk Phases (R-Phases) obtained from the MSDS.

Various other physical parameters will then be requested based on the physical form (e.g. boiling point, flash point etc.) obtained from the MSDS together with the operating levels of these physical parameters.

The website then requests a quantity category of ‘small’ (ml or g), ‘medium’ (l or kg), or ‘large’ (m3 or tonne).

The final details required relate to frequency and duration of use.

The website then provides a printable assessment summary. The website contains a number of guidance sheets and the assessment details which ones are applicable.

The printed assessment and relevant guidance sheets collectively form the documented COSHH Assessment.

As the website is linked to the main HSE website it must be assumed that the resulting assessments will meet the requirements of the COSHH Regulations (providing of course that the guidance sheet recommendations are effectively implemented).

Verification of waste disposal carrier and site licenses on-line

It is a legal requirement for the producer of any waste to ensure that the collection and subsequent disposal is carried out by licensed contractors and facilities. It is often difficult to obtain copies of current waste carrier and site licenses and as carrier licenses expire every three years it is a constant battle to ensure updated copies are available.

But help is at hand. The Environment Agency provide an on-line database of licenses at www.environment-agency.gov.uk/publicregister

This database has various search options e.g. by name, address, post code, licence number etc. and provides details of licenses and expiry dates. This database provides an effective audit trail and is much easier than asking all contractors and facilities to provide copies of certificates.