Rumors are flying around the Internet that British Petroleum is considering removing Tony Hayward from the company’s top post. Apparently investors like the idea, as BP’s stock price has steadily risen since the rumors began.

People may feel like it’s a good start, as Hayward seems to have become a greater liability than an asset to the oil giant. However, one grand, symbolic gesture — one more sacrificial lamb — doesn’t get to the root of the problem. We have much further to go. Hayward is at the top of the company but the failures that led to the oil catastrophe have not nearly been all his or his company’s doing.

BP’s failure was part of a systemic failure: there is plenty of blame to go around. Rather than blame everybody (which helps no one), we have to correct the system in which this fiasco occurred or devise a new system.

Where to start?  We might take care of the problem this way:

• Compile lessons learned and share them with the industry.
• Rewrite industry (and other) standards to put a greater emphasis on safety.
• Enforce existing regulations before writing new ones.
• When writing a new bill (and this goes to any bill, not just those dealing with oil and gas), the legislature cannot be allowed to hide laws by combining them, related or not. One bill for one issue.
• Spend money on enforcement (i.e., hire qualified people, train them well, and pay them what they’re worth).
• Break up the MMS and organizations like it. The Materials Management Service has been responsible for gathering rights fees, etc., and they’ve been responsible for enforcing oil-and-gas-related statutes and requirements. Often, these two work at cross-purposes: as we saw, the MMS didn’t want to enforce laws that might put the brakes on revenue. Those functions have to be kept separate so there’s no confusion about what’s important.
• Restore “reinvestment in the company” as a business tenet. Paying out profits to shareholders and executives while infrastructure and technology lag isn’t sustainable.
• Fine anyone or any organization that misled anybody at any point (misinformation, late or no information, deflecting blame, covering up problems, etc.). This alone could raise enough money to put the issue behind us.
• Get the world on the same standards. It’s too easy for a company to say, “We don’t like the tax laws here, so we’re moving offshore” or “It’s cheaper to operate “over there”, so we’re going over there.” Artificially low wages and taxes, as well as lax standards and enforcement, relocates the problems and potentially intensifies them. Relocating a problem doesn’t solve it and it can create more.
• Accept responsibility. Management can certainly do its share but so can the rest of us. We need to find our collective moral compass and use it all the time.

Do you have any suggestions or ideas for preventing a recurrence of this unfortunate situation? What would your corrective or preventive actions be? Should compliance with ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 be required of all oil and gas companies (and their subcontractors)? Should policies and procedures be transparent?

Thanks for your time.

I wonder how many of our clients, on receiving our policy-and-procedure manuals, have asked themselves what in heck they got themselves into. (“There’s a lot of stuff here…where do I begin?”) Well, like a lot of things, it’s probably not as difficult as it looks initially. First, you took a step in the right direction by using our templates to develop your company policies and procedures. It’s always easier to start with some of the work already done for you, rather than you having to start from scratch.

Now, how do you proceed?

Understand Why You Need Policies and Procedures

You don’t need policies and procedures merely to comply with regulations or industry standards (like ISO 9001). Sure, there’s nothing quite like the threat of fines, legal action, and the scorn of the business community to motivate you, but that’s far from the best reason. Much better reasons for developing policies and procedures include:

• Communicating your business goals and priorities;
• Standardizing processes, behavior, and results;
• Training your employees consistently; and
• Identifying acceptable and unacceptable behaviors (and encouraging or discouraging them).

Prioritize Your Needs and Set Goals and Timelines

Now that you understand “why”, you need to decide “what”.  Of the policies and procedures you could work on, you have to determine which one(s) are going to provide:

• The biggest bang for the buck;
• A quick return on your investment; and/or
• The greatest good for the greatest number.

Only you know what you need.  I can offer you suggestions (like “start with a fairly simple process”) but only you have the intimate, day-to-day knowledge of your organization. It’s your company: you decide.

So, decide which process you’re going to document first.  If you have absolutely no idea (you have no metrics and no historical basis for evaluation), try any Bizmanualz policy or procedure.  Document your initial design and development process and use it as a baseline for further development.

Give the first procedure a fair evaluation.  Don’t look at your first policy-and-procedure development, point out all the flaws you can find, declare the project an abject failure, and pull the plug.

Introduce discipline into the development process by setting clear and meaningful (aka, “SMART“) goals and timelines.

Analyze Your Existing Procedure

If you already have a de facto¹ procedure in place, don’t throw it out in favor of so-called best practices that may or may not work for your firm.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” (Anon.)

Now is as good a time as any to document your process.  Diagram it quickly in any manner and medium with which you’re comfortable. Simple is best (“Don’t make a big production out of it!”, Mom used to say).  Next…

Compare Your Process with Bizmanualz Best Practices

Bizmanualz has already looked at many companies’ procedures, blended them together to describe “best practices”, and reasonably modeled these procedures on the Deming, or “Plan-Do-Check-Act”, cycle. You may find that your procedure already looks very much like the PDCA model:

• You develop a set of objectives and a plan (process) for realizing those objectives;
• You implement the plan and immediately start collecting process data (in-process, end-of-process, etc.);
• You routinely analyze the data, to see if the process is performing in line with expectations; and
• You make changes to the process (procedure) in order to improve it and improve your results.

If that’s the case, you don’t have far to go at all. Next…

Make Our Procedure Your Procedure

Make the obvious and necessary changes to the Bizmanualz policy and/or procedure.  We wrote them generally, like ISO standards, so they’d have the widest possible application.  Any resemblance between our procedure and your process is coincidental; that is, you’ll have to customize our procedures – make them your procedures.  For example:

• Change every instance of “Bizmanualz” or “the company” to your company;
• Where you have an existing form (e.g., purchase order, customer order, invoice), use it – and make sure field names, etc., on the form and in the procedure agree;
• Change job titles in the “Responsibilities” section and in the procedure itself to reflect your circumstances;
• Change diagrams² as needed;
• Add visual aids – they add impact and meaning and they complement verbal descriptions very well (especially when they come from your office, your shop floor, your staff, etc.); and
• Leave out what you don’t need.  An entire procedure or just part of one — if it doesn’t apply to your situation, delete it.  Make your policies and procedures simple and direct.

Verify and Validate the Procedure

The people responsible for implementing the procedure have to put it to the test.  Oh, you could write a procedure and thrust it on an unsuspecting workforce but until it’s subjected to “real world” conditions, the results you see may not be the ones you want or expect.

And there’s more to it than procedure verification and validation. Some people call it “getting buy-in”. Whatever you call it, recognize that your employees are stakeholders in the company. They have a vested interest in the company, too – if it does well, they do well. So, keep them in the loop on matters that directly affect them, to ensure their understanding and cooperation.

Even if they’re not directly impacted by the procedure in question, keep all employees informed of this — and most — company matters.

Implement the Procedure

Now, publish the tested-and-verified procedure.  Distribute the procedure to those responsible for executing it, analyzing it, and training employees.  NOTE: A document management system, or DMS, will help you address publication and distribution, as well as improve document control.

Hold a training session on the procedure – make sure trainees are not only capable of doing the work, but that they understand the process and the objectives, as well.  Finally, execute the process.  Collect the data from measuring devices and routinely analyze it.  Look for anomalies and trends in the data, evaluate the process, and aim for continual improvement.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, it’s just that simple! Any questions?

NOTES

¹Just because you haven’t documented it doesn’t mean you don’t have an effective process in place.  Example: my wife and I came to a quick understanding some time ago that I would clean tubs, showers, and toilets and balance the checkbook. It’s very effective, plus there’s no point in documenting such processes because (a) they’re easy and (b) she won’t ever do them.

²We’ve been using Microsoft Visio to build diagrams. Unfortunately, Visio is not automatically included with any version of MS-Office, so far as we know. There are many alternatives to Visio, though – any search engine will help you find them – so your organization need not be constrained by a lack of Visio³.

³No, that’s not a typo.

Policies and procedures provide the framework and direction for addressing many common business problems your organization might face.  Let’s look at the top ten business problems solved by Policies and Procedures.

1. Accounts Receivable procedures to reduce accounts receivable (A/R) aging and ensure even cash flow.  Every company needs Strategies for Writing Accounts Receivable Procedures.  Your accounts receivable process is the heart of your cash cycle.  Salespeople can find plenty of customers but without cash-paying customers, you can’t pay your bills, which is part of your Strategies for Writing Accounts Payable Procedures.

2. Sales procedures to standardize sales pipeline management and ensure a consistent sales pipeline.  Sales procedures allow you to take control of the sales and marketing cycle.  Developing measurements, sales assignments, and target markets are all important elements of your sales process.

3. Disaster Recovery procedures will assist in an orderly and timely response to emergencies your company may face, as well as control the inevitable chaos that occurs.  Every company needs to effectively respond to disasters or emergencies in a timely manner; if not, they could be out of business.  In recent months, we’ve had ample opportunity to learn the lessons of the Gulf oil disaster, such as “having a disaster recovery plan before the need arises”.

4. Human Resources procedures ensure non-discriminatory practices; specifically, well-defined employee hiring and termination practices will help you avoid costly litigation.  Human resources procedures address diverse topics such as recruiting, hiring, training, retention, termination, and — most importantly –complying with local, state, Federal, and even international employment laws.

5. Quality procedures (nonconformance, corrective action, and auditing) improve product and process quality.  The ISO 9001 quality standard addresses quality control, quality assurance, and quality management practices.  Learning how to meet quality standards with ISO 9001 will help your organization reduce costly rework and overtime, thereby improving quality, satisfying customers, and contributing to your competitive advantages.

6. Customer communications procedures, like collecting data from customer feedback and complaint handling for process improvement.  ”Poor customer communication” is the root cause of much customer dissatisfaction.  If you know what your target customer wants, your business has all the information it needs to satisfy the customer. Implementing communication procedures will help you act on your customers’ wants, improving sales.

7. Shipping and receiving procedures are needed to track materials purchased and sold.  Most of shipping and receiving revolves around inventory or assets, which requires processes for handling, inventory management, asset acquisition, and asset disposition.  Specific supplier requirements — and the policies and procedures that flow from them — ensure that you receive what you want, when you want it, in the quantity you want, and with quality built in.

8. Management procedures can improve poor meetings, poor internal communications, and poor reporting.  Management is really about communication — that’s why improving internal communication benefits the whole company.  One of the best ways to improve communications is to develop, document, implement, and monitor a procedure for communications.

Also, it’s important that management shows its commitment to the highest standards, whether those standards have to do with internal processes or processes that directly involve your customers.

9. You also need compliance procedures to ensure your company conforms to the requirements of various regulations, statutes, and standards.  This is where policies and procedures can help your organization.  Compliance is one of the primary problems solved with policies and procedures.

10. Accounting procedures ensure that you fulfill your fiduciary responsibility to your shareholders.  Accounting is a process to track transactions of items, cash, and information.  Accounting procedures help to ensure consistency, reliability, and accuracy of those transactions, which (in turn) helps to build trust in your financial statements.  What Are the Top Ten Accounting Policies and Procedures?

Prewritten policies and procedures from Bizmanualz help solve many of these common business problems.  The Top Ten Core Business Policies and Procedures you will need can be found in the Bizmanualz CEO Company Policies Procedures Manuals bundle.

Top 10 Business Problems Solved by Policies and Procedures

1. Accounts Receivable procedures, to reduce A/R aging and ensure even cash flow.
2. Sales procedures, to standardize sales pipeline management to ensure consistent sales.
3. Disaster Recovery procedures, to control the response to chaos in an emergency.
4. Human Resources procedures, to ensure non-discriminatory employee hiring and termination.
5. Quality procedures, to improve quality.
6. Customer communications procedures, to collect data from feedback and complaint handling for process improvement.
7. Shipping and receiving procedures, to track materials purchased and sold.
8. Management procedures to improve poor meetings, communications, and reporting.
9. Compliance procedures to conform to regulations, standards, and laws.
10. Accounting procedures, to fulfill your fiduciary responsibility to your shareholders.

What do you think? How quickly could your most urgent problems be solved by implementing effective policies and procedures?

Remember when Ford’s tagline was “Quality Is Job 1″? No? Well, maybe this will jog your memory.

Back in the 1980′s, Ford, GM, Chrysler, and AMC¹ were quickly losing ground to Japanese automakers². Rumors that U.S. auto workers were deliberately sabotaging cars on assembly lines gained traction; these rumors were alleged to have been started to divert attention from the obvious and growing inequities between American and Japanese vehicles.

Fact is, American car buyers were turning away from domestic cars simply because their Asiatic counterparts were cheaper to buy and much cheaper to operate. The bad reputation American cars were saddled with then — a consumer perception of poor quality — persists to this day, even though Toyota — which leapfrogged all American automakers in 2007 to become the world’s #1 vehicle producer precisely because of its reputation for quality — has turned out to be the modern-day emperor with no clothes.  It looks as though quality took a back seat to profits.

Then there’s BP, whose failed wellhead in the Gulf of Mexico “will live in infamy”³, mainly because it appears the company would not spend a little on safety because that might eat into profits. This story has been thoroughly covered in the news, on blogs (including ours), and in company emails.

Now add the computer maker Dell to the list. Dell is now in court for allegedly selling millions of defective computers from 2003-2005 — computers that it supposedly knew were defective — hurting companies that relied on its reputation for quality manufacturing and customer service.

What’s the common thread running through all of these cases? Corporate hubris? Maybe.  A message running throughout these companies that “quality be damned — just get it out fast and make a big profit”? Quite possibly. Is their profit more important to you — the consumer – than a quality product and your satisfaction?

When do we, as consumers, demand that quality be placed before price? It catches up with the producer — eventually — but why wait for the inevitable? Why chase the elusive promise of “newer and better”? (Look at what Apple’s going through with the iPhone 4.)^{4, 5} Also, when do we, as corporate citizens, begin to see that our responsibility to give our customers quality isn’t incompatible with healthy profits?

It’s often said that we get what we deserve. If you think you deserve better, demand — and hold out for — quality.

Notes:

¹ Yes, they were still around, though not for long. AMC was put down for good in 1988.

² Except for body rust; that problem plagued Japanese auto makers for decades. My first two new vehicles were Japanese-made and I logged 18 years and several hundred thousand miles between them. If not for the severe case of “car cancer” they both caught, I believe they would’ve given me 20 or more years, combined.

³ My apologies to the late Franklin D. Roosevelt only.

⁴ http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/apple-iphone-hit-class-action-suit/story?id=11066239.

⁵ http://news.cnet.com/8301-30677_3-20008919-244.html.

Further Reading/Viewing:

1. Enderle, Rob, “Dell and the Cost of Cover-Ups“, IT Business Edge post, 30 Jun 2010.
2. Evans, Joel, “Is Apple Covering Up the Real Problem with Its iPhone?“, ZDNet blog post, 4 July 2010.
3. “Product Recalls“, Back in Black, The Daily Show, 6 July 2010.

Much has been made of procedure writing, both here at Bizmanualz and around the Internet, but very little is said about an equally important part of the design and development process — procedure review.

Many problems with procedures that crop up after they’ve been implemented are traceable to inadequate or no review. Let’s say a procedure as written describes an ideal process, performed under ideal conditions (i.e., real-world conditions aren’t taken into account). If this isn’t caught in a procedure review, the end product will meet requirements only through luck. Luck being notoriously unreliable, inconsistent, and uncontrollable, you’re clearly better off with a review.

Why do you review anything? To ensure the accuracy and completeness of whatever it is you’re reviewing and to make sure everyone has the same understanding of the policy, process, or situation. In short, to ensure effective communication, which will lead you to the desired outcome.

Effective communication is a big reason why the international quality standard, ISO 9001, mandates design and development reviews (clause 7.3.4).  If you don’t review, you risk missing any number of product requirements, both stated and unstated, and you risk losing customers.

Need another reason to review policies and procedures? No one is perfect and no process is perfect. No one will write the perfect procedure the first time, every time.

Furthermore, no one — NO ONE! — can multitask. Your technical writer wears several other hats, right? That person is bound to temporarily lose focus on the policy or procedure they’re writing when other projects and other managers are continually demanding that their stuff is mission critical, “…so drop everything and work on this.” (Now, where was I?)

We all agree, then, that policies and procedures have to be reviewed, right? So, how’s it done? Well, one method that works is based on speech evaluations as done by Toastmasters. For a Toastmaster, learning how to evaluate a speech – or a written document – is as critical as learning how to give a speech or write one.

Objectives

Always start with the objectives or requirements. Were they clearly communicated to the technical writer? Did he/she understand them? Do you? Were the objectives prioritized and categorized? Were they SMART objectives?

Review

Did the technical writer achieve the stated objectives/requirements? (Have a list of the objectives in front of you as you review the document.)

Also, list some important, yet unstated, objectives. For example, correct spelling and good grammar are often taken for granted. Don’t make that mistake. Make up a checklist for often overlooked items, like “Are important terms defined?” and “Is ‘active voice’ used?”

Did the tech writer go beyond the stated objectives? For example:

The procedure mentions a packaging machine that a first-time reader may not be familiar with. The tech writer includes a long shot (photo) of the machine and a closeup of the control panel. The pictures aren’t a requirement; furthermore, they (and additional photos) push the document beyond the stated requirement of “six pages, maximum”.

Which is the SMARTer objective, user understanding or document length?

Reward

In your review, whether its written or oral, be sure to lead with those aspects of the procedure where objectives were met or exceeded. If critical objectives were not, consider possible explanations for that (the writer’s level of experience, competing projects, the amount of information provided them, clarity of the objectives, etc.).

The point is not to let the writer “off the hook” (or to find a hook to hang them on). It’s about encouraging the writer – praising what they did well and asking them to do better. Tell them, “Here’s what you did well.”

Don’t be vague or insincere, either. Don’t fish for compliments — you’re not helping them by telling them that their capitalization was great, or they had all the commas in the right places.

Be truthful, be specific, and give them something to build on.

Respond

Tell the writer exactly what you see in the procedure (ex., will the reader know who’s supposed to do what, when, and why?) Restate the objectives and indicate which were met, which were exceeded, and which weren’t met. Use a numeric scale in your review (rarely is anything “black or white”).

Beyond that, does the procedure “flow”? Did they use the PDCA model correctly? Did she or he use words, voice, style, grammar, etc., effectively? Does the story – and the message – come across clearly?

Tell them what they did well and point out specific opportunities for improvement. Hand the document back to them with another objective: you need the revision back for a “final” review by a specific date.

Remember that policy and procedure review is an integral part of a design and development process. After you’ve reviewed the document, the writer will probably have to make some changes. After the writer has revised the document, review it again.

Don’t review it to death, however. Four or more reviews of the same document should tell you that the review process has broken down…somewhere. It might be time – at least temporarily – to bring in another pair of eyes.

As a reviewer, you’re obliged to:

• Be sure that stated and unstated objectives were met;
• Be fair;
• Be consistent;
• Be thorough; and
• Point out strengths and opportunities for improvement in the document and in the process.

And as one of my favorite sports announcers (Jack Buck) used to say after every broadcast, “Thanks for your time this time. ‘Til next time — so long.”

* * * * *

For more on evaluation, see “The Three R’s of Evaluating“, by David Hobson, DTM (“Toastmasters” magazine, Nov., 2007).

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.

We have heard from several customers about the need for implementing ISO in their unique organizational settings.  Based on this feedback, we are currently developing an ISO QMS implementation guide with tools applicable in different business settings, including service organizations. It will augment our existing ISO 9001 QMS Procedures Manual, and will help answer questions like  ‘How do I get started?’ and ‘How do I roll out ISO in my company?’

As a publisher and professional services firm (not a manufacturer), we have seen benefits from implementing quality methods. We have clear metrics that we measure regularly and are always looking to improve our measurements or come up with better metrics. It is our belief that an implementation guide will provide practical implementation steps to organizations that want to work on their own with little or no help from consultants.

The initial release of the implementation guide, scheduled to be released in the first quarter of 2010, will include the planning, design and implementation tools we have used for our clients–and for ourselves–to become ISO-certified. We are also adding some additional tools and explanatory materials prepared specially for the implementation kit. The tool sets incorporate knowledge amassed over almost ten years of research, use, deployment at client sites, and publication of quality policies and procedures. Check out our recent article & blog series on process maps and current series on project management for more insights into what will be included in the implementation kit.

More companies will benefit from continuous improvement

ISO has helped Bizmanualz cultivate the belief and practice of continuous improvement. By using the “Plan – Do – Check – Act” methods on which most quality systems are built, we have focused on improving underlying processes and avoiding problems in the future. Our process orientation reinforces teamwork: we’re all in this together to improve the process that will create ever-better, sustainable results not only for our customers. By releasing the tools that we ourselves use  internally and for clients, we aim to help other organizations implement quality systems with equal structural support.

The ISO implementation kit will be as easy-to-use and self-explanatory as possible. To support this goal, we are developing a test program in which we will work with selected companies to test and use our implementation kit. If your organization has immediate plans to implement or improve its ISO or related quality system, please contact us through the Bizmanualz website or by commenting below this post. We will provide the implementation product at no charge for test customers in exchange for regular phone reports and occasional access to your facility so that we can learn from your use of the product.

For now I can recommend our ISO 9001 QMS Manual. While it is written from a manufacturing perspective, the principles, as well as many of the specific policies, procedures and forms, can be generalized for a service business. And it has been recently updated to conform with the ISO 9001:2008 standard.

Are you implementing a quality program at your organization? What will be your first step? How will you get started? What do you think should be in our implementation guide? Would you like to try the guide and let us know how to make it better? Leave a comment below or contact me directly at  dan@bizmanualz.com .

Last week, our Chris Anderson wrote a blog post about the root causes of business problems.  In the post, after he listed ten root causes, Chris went on to write, “People don’t make mistakes. Systems make mistakes.”  One reader (let’s call her Rachael) took exception to that statement.  ”Isn’t it inherent for humans to err?”, Rachael asked.

Rachael is right, of course.  As human beings, we all make mistakes (the statement “to err is human” has more than a grain of truth in it).  The bigger question, however, is this: Does the system have policies, procedures, and processes in place that help minimize the likelihood of mistakes?

The example I provided to Rachael was about writing articles.  In the absence of any policy or process for editing and revising articles, the author might not catch his/her spelling errors or typos (humans err – that’s why newspapers used to have proofreaders).  So when customers read the article — multiply the writer’s two eyes by thousands, maybe millions — the likelihood is great that at least one of them will catch the error.

On the other hand, if there is a process in place where a second set of eyes reads the article and necessary corrections are made (or the central idea is validated) before releasing it, the likelihood of mistakes getting out to the reader are vastly minimized.

That’s exactly the process change we implemented here at Bizmanualz, when we realized that our articles or blog posts were sometimes going live with spelling errors, typos, formatting issues, or a confusing theme.  We installed a WordPress plugin (Peter’s Collaboration E-mails) that lets the author save the post as “pending review”.  Editors get an email alert about the article needing review.  The editor can release the article “as is”, release it with minor corrections, or send it back to the author for more comprehensive changes.

This doesn’t mean that mistakes won’t happen.  (You may recall that Chris’s post states that 20% of all errors can be attributed to an individual).  But here too, the system might have a role to play.  Is the individual in the right place? If writing is a requirement for the job, was the individual properly screened or trained?  Of course, there are situations where the person is clearly not qualified to do the job — here, too, the system comes into play (i.e., is the selection process foolproof?).

Quality standards and tools are there precisely to increase the likelihood of positive outcomes.  You may be surprised at how a simple process change can result in a big drop in error rates.

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?