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Measuring the success of your quality management system Once you have planned, prepared and implemented a quality management system unique to your part of the wool pipeline, from the steps recommended in the Guide to Australian Wool Quality, you must determine a method or system of measuring the effectiveness of your quality improvements. A good quality system will include rigorous auditing, which can be either internal to monitor process improvement and meet customer specifications, or external for the purposes of accreditation and certification. There are a number of quality standards which companies can use to give assurances if they choose not to develop their own. The ISO 9000 series is the best recognised internationally, although there are other systems. The advantage of using someone else's system is that the main standards are widely recognised and there is also usually documentation available to assist in implementing the system. What is ISO 9000? The ISO 9000 series of standards were developed by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) which has its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. The ISO 9000 series is designed to assure consistency of product quality be establishing minimum requirements for quality assurance and quality management systems. The standards are non-product specific and apply to both the manufacturing and services sectors. There are five production standards which are available for different purposes. An environmental standard (ISO 14,000) is currently being produced. The Guide to Australian Wool Quality lists the elements covered by the ISO 9000 Series of quality system standards. |
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