#198 How communication can make or break your Management System

One of the biggest contributors to a stagnating ISO Management System is a failure to communicate.

This has certainly been true in our experience with implementing ISO Standards for over 18 years, and as a result, we make sure to highlight awareness and communication as an integral step of the Implementation process.

It’s a wasted effort only to have your management system gathering dust in a rarely visited folder on your server. If you want to reap the benefits of ISO implementation, it’s in your best interest to make everyone aware of their role in relation to your management system and its continual improvement.

Today Ian Battersby explains what ISO Standards mean by awareness and communication, why they are so integral to a successful management system and how you can effectively communicate your management system.  

You’ll learn

·      What does awareness and communication mean in relation to ISO Standards?

·      Why should you communicate your management system?

·      The benefits of management system awareness

·      How can you effectively communicate your ISO management system?

Resources

·      Isologyhub

In this episode, we talk about:

[00:30] Join the isologyhub – To get access to a suite of ISO related tools, training and templates. Simply head on over to isologyhub.com to either sign-up or book a demo.

[02:05] Episode summary: Ian Battersby will be explaining what ISO Standards mean by awareness and communication, and why they are so integral to a successful Management System.

[02:30] What is awareness and communication so important?– The success and failure of a management system depends on it’s existence being known and understood within an organisation.

Staff have a key part to play, and they need to know their part in the Management System and how it aligns with the organisations direction.

[03:20] Extra guidance available for awareness and communication – There is a Standard that accompanies ISO 9001, called ISO 9004:2018 – Quality of an Organisation: Guidance to achieve sustained success.

This is a great companion to any Standard, as it provides general guidance on how to properly embed a management system within your business.

It talks at length about people and the need to ensure that they are competent, engaged, empowered and motivated. These are crucial as:

Engagement of people enhances the organisations ability to create value for interested parties.

Empowerment motivates people to take responsibility for their work and the results of their work.

These can be achieved by providing people with necessary information with authority and the freedom to make decisions related to their own work.

People should understand the significance and importance of their role, specifically in creating that value to meet and exceed customer expectations.

[05:30] What should be communicating according to ISO Standards? – Taking ISO 9001 as the example, because it is the basis for most ISO Standards, it has a specifies the following:

5.2.2 Quality Policy - The policy should be available and maintained as documented information, so must be issued somewhere so that people can see it. But it also, quite importantly, must be communicated, understood and deployed within the organisation. It also needs to be made available to other relevant and trusted parties.

5.3 Organisational roles, responsibilities and authorities - Top management have a responsibility here.