The following morals are worth keeping in mind if companies are to be truly more competitive when they obtain a quality certification:
Moral 1: If the ISO 9000/14000 standards establish the "what" and each company decides the "how", an easy way to get a certificate is to set a very undemanding "how".
There is a great danger in those companies whose managers request that no more changes be made than those required by the standard, leaving aside radical improvements that would really achieve the transformation of the company. If when proposing the process-based approach it is determined that there is a problem of structure, regardless of whether the standard does not ask for it, one must have the courage to change the current organization chart, if in this way the company becomes competitive. Many of the "hows" were recommended in previous managerial techniques, philosophies and tools, but it depends a lot on managerial commitment to what effort you really want to take your company.
Moral 2: Did the certified companies improve their quality? In many cases, it must be recognized that compliance with their procedures did not ensure they achieve a higher objective.
If a company does not have a quality control system, it should start with this, then establish a management system as required by ISO. A system is established, without having detected what the quality problems were, as well as knowing the degree of satisfaction or dissatisfaction of the customers. First it is to establish how to improve quality and customer satisfaction, then it is documented.
Moral 3: Obeying only in what the norm requires and in each case doing the minimum, helps to obtain ISO certificates that, if obtained under these conditions, only serve to decorate walls or to deceive the unwary.
At the quality forum recently held by Inteco, we heard its president say that "with the certification we had forgotten what we were managing." It's something we've always said, we fall in love with the model and we forget about the problem. Very few companies present among their achievements after having obtained the certification, that they have obtained a radical improvement in quality. The achievements they mention do not make the company more competitive.
Moral 4: If someone fails to comply with an aberrant procedure, it is a "non-compliance." If someone fails to follow a good procedure, too.
If the procedure is not correct, then the procedure must be changed, the non-compliance should come from not doing the right thing and not from not complying with a procedure that was clearly done to get out of the way, in many cases developed without any commitment to what is being established.
Moral 5: Achieving an ISO 9000 quality certificate does not mean having quality products, much less being a quality company, even if the certificate has that name. For ISO, "quality" means "compliance".
Although it is true that the 2000 version of the standard focuses on continuous improvement, on the constant measurement of customer satisfaction, which was not considered in the 87 and 94 versions of the standard, the emphasis on Certifying companies is still meeting the requirements of the standard. Many companies should be required to comply with ISO 9004: 2000.
Moral 6: It also does not mean that an ISO 14000 certified company does not pollute the air, soil or water. In many of our countries, polluting is not a crime.
The legal requirements are either very poor, or not practiced in many countries. Many companies achieve certification by mentioning that they have an environmental plan, with which they hope to comply with a legal requirement. In many cases, the cost of the changes that companies must make encourages them to make mere palliative efforts that are often accepted by the certifying entities. We recall a maxim from a Swiss investor truly committed to eco-efficiency who said about a plant: "if you can't make it efficiently environmentally friendly, sell it or close it." Several examples around the world show its fulfillment.
Moral 7: The fact that the company has achieved an ISO certificate does not necessarily mean that its organizational culture has changed, that it has increased employee motivation or that it has improved the productivity of the human factor.
Compliance with the standard regarding the work environment is aimed at protecting the products, not necessarily the employees. There is a guideline in ISO 9004 that seeks to go further in terms of employee motivation, but this standard is not certifiable. A company can have the worst organizational climate and still get certified.
Heretic comment: The effect on employees could be limited to the formality of following certain procedures and recording everything. If ISO systems are limited to meeting procedures, then the innovative momentum could be inhibited. The emphasis on compliance can mean doing things the same way over and over again, getting employees to stick to routines conservatively. But that contradicts what we demand of organizations today: Be flexible, dynamic, innovative. If the manuals end up replacing the brains, the manuals must be burned, not the brains.
Moral 8: ISO certificates do not ensure that the company will be operationally efficient.
Although it has been mentioned that ISO 9001 and ISO 9004 are a consistent pair, their approach is different, since the first seeks the effectiveness of the company in customer satisfaction, although not efficient, the second is oriented towards improvement continuous, and efficiency, unfortunately no one is certified in the 9004, therefore companies will continue to be operationally inefficient.
Heretic comment: In many companies, the ISO issue is on different tracks from the operational efficiency issue. The ISO team does not measure costs or performance indicators and limits itself to writing a Manual and ensuring that it is followed. Others, in parallel, work improving processes, shortening times, eliminating errors, reducing costs or automating. And it could happen that what the latter save is spent by the former.
Moral 9: Achieving an ISO certificate does not automatically mean that customers will be satisfied or that they will increase sales or that they will obtain competitive advantages.
Multiple national experiences are known, where customers complain that the company since it was certified has become bureaucratic and they have fallen into a world of paper. I have particularly experienced the new requirements that a Travel Agency requires me to, which before being certified was much more agile. Certified companies also go bankrupt.
Moral 10: A skin delivered a week late may be good for the tribe, but very bad for your client. And quality objectives must be the expression of the voice of the customer. What is the optimal level of quality to be competitive in your markets? What specific quality attributes must you improve to gain an advantage over your competitors? What specific quality attributes should you not improve, because doing so will only increase your costs? What specifically to do to answer these questions?
How many ISO projects have started by measuring expectations and current performance according to major clients?
On several occasions we have recommended the Quality Deployment Function, and Failure Mode and Effects Analysis, valuable and practical tools to be able to establish customer requirements, and also establish the objectives of a quality management system. However, goal setting at all levels is far removed from the voice of the customer.
Last heretical comments:
As long as the ISO issue is limited to drafting a Manual and procedures that meet the minimum requirements of the international standard, then two types of people are required: (a) Law lovers ("clause 6.2 a establishes…") and (b) procedure writers.
As long as ISO audits are limited to verifying whether what is written in the procedures is fulfilled (Process audits, not systems), then the auditors do not need criteria or their own thought: they only need to know if a provision is fulfilled or not fulfilled. They can leave their brains at home.
As long as the ISO issue remains in those hands, quality policies will be a set of good intentions hanging on the wall and quality objectives, another set of non-measurable intentions and detached from the voice of customers. "We aim to meet and exceed our customers' expectations" and "our employees are our most valuable asset" will be common places that, after being repeated, will have lost their meaning.
As long as ISO projects seek to obtain a certificate as a fundamental purpose, the issue of costs will be foreign. Being efficient will be exogenous to the project. And be competitive, even more alien.
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Original version on the 10 Shameful Morals in ISO 9000, we will gladly send you the document at your request.
