Many people think ISO is an acronym that stands for the developer and publisher of International Standards — the International Standards Organization.  But that ISO organization is actually called International Organization for Standardization or IOS.

Since the IOS is an international organization, it would have a different acronym in different languages.  Hence, the ‘ISO’ in English versus the ‘IOS’ in Swiss or the ‘OIN’ in French (Organisation internationale de normalisation).

The ISO standards are not named after an acronym.  ISO comes from the Greek word ‘isos’ for equal.  All ISO standards use the name ISO to mean ‘isos’ and not to mean an acronym.  So now, no matter the country or language that ISO is used in, the ISO standards are always pronounced the same.  It is not an I.S.O. standard as many people think.  It is an ISO standard. ISO is one word.  No pauses.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009, is the fortieth World Standards Day.  Every World Standards Day has a theme — this year’s is “Tackling Climate Change Through Standards”.

What Is World Standards Day?

In 1946, representatives of twenty-five countries gathered in London, England, to create an international organization focused on facilitating standardization. ISO was formed one year later but it wasn’t until 1970 that World Standards Day was first officially observed.

Organizations primarily responsible for World Standards Day include the:

• International Organization for Standardization – ISO;
• International Electrotechnical Commission – IEC; and
• International Telecommunication Union – ITU.

These and other organizations developed World Standards Day to raise awareness among regulators, businesses, and consumers about the importance of standardization to the world economy.

Each year, ISO determines a theme for World Standards day based on one key aspect of standardization.  Last year’s theme was “Intelligent and Sustainable Buildings”.  The year before that, it was “Standards and the Citizen: Contributing to Society”.  This year, it’s Climate Change.

The environment has been a recurring theme of World Standards Day (1990, 2001, 2008, and again this year).  In addition, this year’s WSD serves as a lead-in to the upcoming UN Climate Change Conference taking place this December 7-18 in Copenhagen, Denmark. ISO, ITU, IEC and others have been working to ensure that Climate Change conference participants are aware of the solutions offered by existing — and future — International Standards, such as ISO 14001 and ISO 9001.

Do you plan to take part in the UN Climate Change conference? Are you doing something special to observe World Standards Day? Or, do you have a question about standards or how to implement them?  In any case, I’d like to hear from you.

There is a bill making its way through the US House of Representatives – House Resolution 875, the “Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009” (meanwhile, a similar piece of legislation – S 3385 – is being kicked around the US Senate).  HR 875 is a well-intentioned response to recent food safety problems in the US, ranging from Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease coming from tainted meat, to melamine in milk and pet food, and on to E. coli and salmonella found in spinach and nuts.

Representatives seem to believe the FDA is incapable of policing the nation’s food production and distribution systems – ironic, considering that Congress holds the purse strings and has saddled the FDA with an increasing number of enforcement obligations while reducing the FDA’s budget and head count.

Rather than strengthen the FDA’s hand, the House proposes to create yet another agency, the Food Safety Administration, under the Department of Health and Human Services.  The idea is ostensibly to take a more straightforward approach to food safety – to do away with a “patchwork food safety system”.  Great in theory, but if history tells us anything about Congress, it’s that they’re not very good at paring, streamlining, or simplifying anything (see “pork”, “earmarks”).

It’s not that we don’t need a food safety management system.  What we need is a practical, manageable, fair, and effective system – something I don’t see us getting from Congress.

Alternatives such as the ISO 22000 food safety management standard don’t seem to get nearly as much consideration.  Why do you suppose that is?  Do you think legislation is the way to go?  Could we hear from some farmers and others in the food supply chain?

That’s right we successfully passed our ISO 9001:2008 certification audit today.  We will now be the proud holder of an ISO 9001 registration.  It has been an exciting experience and we have learned a few things along the way.

So, now what do we do with it? 

The ISO organization produces standards and guidelines for a living so of course they have a PDF publication for publicizing, communicating, and promoting your registration called Publicizing your ISO 9001:2000 or ISO 14001:2004 certification. This is a great place to learn about how to market our new registration.  Inside there is an “In brief” section that summarizes what we can do with it.  Surprisingly, it lists more of what you can’t do than what you can.

• You can’t use or modify ISO’s logo… it is ISO’s brand and intellectual property.
• You can’t say ISO 9001 or ISO certified… You must spell it out. We are ISO 9001:2008 certified; we are not certified by ISO or by ISO 9001.
• ISO 9001:2008 cannot be listed on your products or used in literature to imply product certification… It’s not a product certification it’s a company certification.
• You must be careful with your scope description so it properly depicts your certified activities and geographic locations. For Bizmanualz it includes are manual products, training and consulting services from our St. Louis location.

So what can you do?

You can use the fact that your company is ISO 9001:2008 certified in your marketing.  Your management system and its processes have been certified to ISO 9001:2008 so you do want to talk about your successful registration to ISO 9001:2008 just as long as you do not suggest that your products are certified or that you are certified by ISO, which is what ISO certified implies.

Bizmanualz has been certified by Platinum Registration to ISO 9001:2008 and it was a great experience.  Next, we plan to communicate our success to our customers and fans.  We passed with no nonconformances and the auditor did note a number of exemplary practices that our Lean ISO 9000 QMS exhibited.  Yes a lean ISO system is possible and now we have the audit results to prove it.

If you are thinking of preparing an ISO 9000 Quality Management System (QMS) then where do you start?  We start with a Gap Analysis to determine the gap between your current management system and an ISO 9000 conforming QMS.  A Gap Analysis is used to assess an organizations scope, readiness, and its resources for building the system.  It also provides us with the data to develop a project plan for ISO implementation.

The first question we need to answer is Scope?  Your QMS scope applies to what product lines, ISO 9000 clauses, and facilities that you are planning on registering to ISO 9001.  You do not have to register every product line.  At Bizmanualz, we are preparing for our own registration audit that will include our manual products, consulting and training services.  That means both our products and services will be included in the registration process. 

To define the scope within the Gap Analysis we look at what processes need to be included and described within the ISO QMS.  The output is a draft process map.  Next we examine each clause of the ISO 9000 standard.  There are 136 “shall” statements that we count to see which ones apply and how an organization may be conforming.  These shall statements include 21 required records, six required procedures, a Quality Manual, and many process requirements that must be fulfilled, but there is a lot of leeway on how you might fulfill those requirements.

For example, collecting customer feedback is a required process or that processes must be measured is a requirement, but how you do this is totally up to you.  You do not have to write a procedure for this or  keep a record of measurements.  As odd as this sounds you have to free your mind of paper solutions and think of visual or electronic methods that could accomplish this.

The output of the ISO Quality “shall” count is a histogram that shows you how your organization stacks up, clause by clause, and a list of possible exclusions of areas within clause seven that may not apply.  Each exclusion claimed will require a proper justification within the Quality manual.  In the Gap Analysis phase we should be able to give you an idea on possible exclusions.

With the Gap Analysis complete, we write up what we saw and deliver to you a draft process map, scope with exclusions, a histogram that lists your conformance by clause and a set of implementation milestones to meet your target date.  An ISO Gap Analysis is basically a full systems audit but instead of audit findings you get consulting advice on how ready your organization is for ISO 9000.  If you are thinking of preparing an ISO 9000 Quality Management System, then an ISO 9000 Gap Analysis will provide the answers to your scope, budget, and implementation questions that management will be asking.

Have you ever wondered how to get rid of old ISO quality procedures originally designed for ISO 9000:1994?  Many of those old legacy procedures are no longer required by ISO 9001:2000 or the current ISO 9001:2008 standard.  In fact, those procedures may be so out of date that many people aren’t following them, anyway.  If your ISO 9001 QMS contains too much documentation and/or much of it is outdated, this workshop is for you. 

Using Lean Thinking, you can reduce your organization’s reliance on procedure documentation.  Using a visual workplace you can perform trending and analysis that generates buy-in for change.  How about a lean Corrective & Preventive Action Kaizen Process that engages your workforce and communicates the latest improvements to your employees? 

Using lean, you’ll understand how to conform to the minimum document and record requirements and reduce the bureaucratic waste commonly (and unfairly) associated with ISO 9001.  Now’s the time to learn how to “lean out” your ISO 9001 Quality Management System.  Attend the ASQ St. Louis Spring Quality Conference at the Crowne Plaza in Clayton on April 2-3, 2009, to learn about lean and other great quality topics.