One year ISO 9001:2015

Due to the major revision of the ISO 9001:2015 standard, companies must make adjustments to their quality management system. The simplification and greater practical orientation has led to a more structured standard, which gives organizations more freedom but also more individual responsibility with regard to rules and specifications. What are the key points of the revision and how can a smooth changeover be achieved?

Customer satisfaction as a competitive factor
A quality management standard describes - in addition to general instructions on how processes are managed and company operations are designed - which requirements a company must meet in order to be able to offer its customers quality services in the long term. In this way, the standard creates customer satisfaction and trust - the decisive success factors in today's global competition. The smoother a customer's request runs through the complex system of an organization, the more satisfied and ultimately often more loyal the customer is. This is also the intention of the audit: it does not want to be a burden, but rather a supportive contribution to optimal business operations.

Key points of the revised ISO 9001:2015 standard
Since its first publication in 1987, ISO 9001 has undergone several revisions: First, quality assurance was added as a management task, and later the process-oriented approach was introduced. The current 2015 version strengthens the responsibility of management by declaring quality management a "matter for the boss" and calling for a risk-based approach, which is about identifying risks and taking appropriate measures to deal with them, but also about successfully exploiting opportunities. Another key point is to know your interested parties and how to deal with them. The process approach is also being further developed by describing the requirements for process-oriented management in a more binding way. A challenge is also posed with regard to the handling of the organization's knowledge. Finally, a uniform basic structure and terminology will be used in all future ISO management system standards, which will enable a better understanding of future ISO standards and allow a simplified integration of interacting ISO standards.

Conversion to the new 9001:2015 standard
It is estimated that around 40 percent of the content has changed since the last version, and companies certified to ISO 9001:2008 have three years to convert their quality management to the new standard. Experience shows that this process can take around one year. The Swiss Association for Standardization (SNV) offers support for the changeover to ISO 9001:2015. It has set itself the task of making standards comprehensible to companies of all sectors and sizes and their users, including through education and training, and of showing how they can be implemented in practice.

A seminar on the topic of "ISO 9001:2015 - Implementation in the company" will be held on 19 May 2017 in Winterthur and offers help in interpreting the changes correctly and implementing them easily in one's own company. In addition, there is the possibility of becoming a member of the SNV. This enables companies to actively influence the standardisation process, to be informed first-hand about technical developments and to benefit from discounts on products and services.