In ISO 9001 terms there is this requirement for “Management Commitment”. Quite right, you may say. What hope for the QMS if the top level support is not there? Well, I’m with you so far. Management can make things happen, they can also make sure they don’t, or can’t. That’s why their support is so important. For stuff that matters anyway. Not so important for stuff that doesn’t

The only problem is, as soon as ISO 9001 is put on the table, it is amazing how this criteria of “Management Commitment” gets assessed, with radically different interpretations of how that commitment must materially manifest itself. For example, is the failure of the Quality Policy Statement to be signed by the Top Guy (or Gal) a fatal weakness? Is it necessarily a weakness at all?

Clearly the contributors to this thread would argue the case for the prosecution. However, let’s be grown up about it for a moment. What actually happens as a result of this “weakness”? Will it affect the ability of  “the workers” to achieve their objectives? Wooooah!!!! Hold on a minute (some might say) if they can’t be bothered to sign the statement that will probably be the thin end of the wedge.

They’ll probably not participate actively in management review, they will probably under-resource quality projects and and and …. and they probably eat babies too! ….. (and then laugh about it later)

Well, wooooah yourselves. If some of those secondary issues are true then that would certainly constitute a lack of commitment that could easily affect the QMS in a detrimental way. However, the fatal weakness is the failure of the management review and resource allocation process. The policy signature “problem” pales into insignificance in the face of these bigger sins. In the same way if we see active participation in objective setting, management review and resource allocation, then the lack of a signature on the policy (again) pales into insignificance. It does not matter one jot either way, If we look at it in a grown up way, which, as it’s ISO 9001, we might not want. Then there is the punchline.

Despite what a lot of third party auditors would have you believe, a signature on the Policy is not even a specific ISO 9001 requirement. Check clause 5.3 yourselves. It may well be assessed through custom and practice as though it is a cornerstone of the standard and some sort of critical success factor, but it is a myth. And (for once) there’s a good reason that it is omitted as a specific requirement and that reason is, from a business risk perspective ….

IT DOESN’T MATTER

Tags: ISO 9001:2008, management commitment

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 1st, 2009 at 3:48 pm and is filed under Certification schemes, Leadership & Management, Quality Improvement.
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