Management Review IN ISO 9001 Standard

One of the most important factors in determining the success of an ISO 9001 implementation is management commitment and management understanding of what makes a good quality systems. Our turnkey Quality Management System (QMS) gives you everything you need to educate your entire company from top to bottom.

Management review is one of the key elements to building a sustainable quality system. To do this, management must be committed. This means that the management must do more than just say they are committed, they must allocate the resources to make sure that the company can continuously improve quality. Most quality systems fail from the top down! That is why external auditor almost always review the management review documentation every audit. External ISO 9001 auditors look for this commitment by evaluating the management review records. Management reviews should focus on both the quality of the products and the quality of the QMS. In general, it is very simple to maintain compliance of the management review portion of the standard. It can be done with a simple notebook that is maintained as a quality record. The Management review procedure includes a list of documentation that should be included in management review meeting. Management reviews should be done a least once per year and auditors like to see them quarterly.

Under ISO 9001, executive management has defined responsibilities. Although most of the work required to implement and maintain ISO certification is done below the executive level, ISO requires involve of personnel at the top of the organization.

It is the leader of an organization that set the goals and objectives for the quality of the company. It is also the leader that assigns resources (responsibility and authority) throughout the organization. Because of this, the leaders must be kept aware of the status of the quality system and product/service quality so they make good decision.
Much of how the company accomplishes these tasks is covered in the quality manual. Here are the 8 areas that should be address in the quality system to assure compliance to the ISO standard.

Top Management must:

Show A Commitment To The Customer

This requirement includes maintain records showing their commitment to the a customer focus, the quality system and the continuous improvement system. The use of a customer survey program is an excellent way to meet the ISO requirements for a customer focus. It is also an excellent way to keep in touch with your customers.

Make Quality Important

This includes communicating to the organization the importance of meeting the customer regulatory, legal needs as well as their produce or service needs (customer focus). Training and posting quality information around the building can do this.

Establish A Quality Policy

This should include a concise quality statement in conjunction with quality goals and a quality manual. The policy verbiage should include a commitment to continuous improvement. This information must be communicated to and understood by the entire organization.

Establish, Monitor And Update Quality objectives

These objectives should be measurable and should be relevant to all levels of the company. I recommend that they be publicly posted where everyone can see them and their status may also be posted.

Assign Resources

Ensure that resources are available to achieve the quality goals. This is the area where many companies do not meet the requirements but it is very hard to audit this general statement. Resources should be identified and planned. Planning includes manuals, procedure, work instructions and quality plans.

Assign Responsibility And Authority

Ensure that responsibilities and authorities are assigned and communicated to individuals. Responsibilities can be assigned as part of the personnel records ( see training summary sheet). Having authority means that the individual must be empowered to make changes.

Designate A Management Representative

This person will report the QMS status at periodic management reviews and promote awareness of the importance of meeting the customers needs. This is usually the quality, engineering or production manager.

Conduct Periodic Management Reviews

Management review meetings should include inputs from audits, customer feedback, process performance analysis, preventive and corrective actions system, follow-up from previous management meetings and areas for improvement. The output from the management reviews should include resource assignments, action targeting improvement of the products, processes and QMS.

The records for the management review are frequently audited so I recommend keeping a organized notebook with tabs for each management review. The creation of a check sheet (listing all the reports to be shown to top management) will make this periodic task simple to maintain. The check sheet can also be used to keep track of attendance and log feedback that is generated during the meeting.