Q: "I know there is a benefit to becoming registered to ISO 9001, but I am not able to convince top management. What methods do you use to convince top management ISO 9001 will provide a benefit worth the time and effort to prepare for registration?"

Christopher Paris of Oxebridge Quality Resources, Inc. (www.oxebridge.com): "Just adopting ISO 9001 can provide proven means for any company to increase revenue through correction of process deficiencies, improvement in products or services, and greater customer loyalty, while simultaneously reducing expenses associated with scrap, human error, employee turnover and deficient training.

Taking ISO 9001 to the next step -- registration -- simply provides the world at large documented, accredited evidence that your company has implemented ISO 9001 and is practicing it properly. Without registration, any company could claim ISO 9001 compliance without so much as having even read the ISO 9001 requirements. Registration is key in preventing abuse of ISO 9001 compliance claims, and ensuring your claims of an ISO 9001 system are backed by a trusted, internationally recognized third party. Furthermore, registration gives both customers and company employees the knowledge that someone is holding them accountable to the ISO 9001 requirements over the long term.

Adopting ISO 9001 without registration may be beneficial to the company, but is worthless in the marketplace when not backed up by verifiable, accredited, third-party oversight."

Chuck Richardson of Performance Quality Systems, Inc. (www.performancequalitysystems.com): "Your top management has probably heard about ISO 9001 registered companies whose performance did not improve. Explain that these failures are more the result of a poorly designed and implemented system than evidence of a problem with ISO 9001. ISO 9001 requirements provide a structure to help the organization focus on planning, performance, and improvement.

Make sure your top management understands ISO 9001 emphasizes performance in meeting customer requirements much more than creating documents. ISO 9001 does not require the organization to create lots of documentation. In fact, the standard only specifically requires six documented procedures. Additional documents needed and the amount of detail included in the documents is up to the organization to determine based on their customers, products, personnel, and their processes.

Get your top management to read and understand clause 4.1 of ISO 9001. It is only about a half page of text, but it really explains the heart of ISO 9001. This clause asks you to identify all the major activities your business goes through until a satisfied customer has your product. It also calls for you to plan how these processes will be performed, criteria to be met, and to understand how each process interacts with the other key processes. Clause 4.1 also asks the organization to provide the resources and information needed for each process to work properly. Finally clause 4.1 asks the organization to monitor or measure and improve these processes. These things may seem like common sense, but many companies don't do them well. What top management wouldn't be interested in a tool that helps them to accomplish these things more consistently?

Obtaining registration by an accredited third party registrar should provide confidence to your customers that you have a system based on ISO 9001 requirements. The registration and surveillance audits can also help increase the vigilance of people in the organization to maintain and improve the system. Emphasize to top management the importance of careful evaluation of the registrars so you find one that tells you what you need to know and not just what you want to hear."

Bob Pilot of Pilot and Associates, Inc. (www.pilotandassociates.com):"I assume that I'm addressing middle-management such as a company's Quality Manager. The first question is 'How do you know there are benefits to ISO registration for your company?'

For this discussion, bear in mind that top management thinks in terms of money -- philosophies will not work.

There are three major reasons for registering to ISO 9001:
1. Your client/customer base is pressuring you to do so; or,
2. You are out of control and look to ISO to provide a foundation for sound operations; or,
3. You need an operational base to support continual improvement efforts.

In the first case, confirm the need (preferably in correspondence from existing/prospective customers) and, with Sales/Marketing management, present the issues in terms of cost of registration (both internal and external costs) vs. projected losses in sales.

The second case is touchy because top management frequently is a part of the problem. Again, the cost of registration should be compared to projected annual savings such as increased efficiencies, improved customer service, and decreased rejects. Translate these savings into dollars, do NOT, as an example, throw around numbers like 'a 20% decrease in rework'. Use a simple three column table with headers such as 'Is Now', 'Projected', and 'Net Savings'. The one-year savings total should exceed the three year cost of your registration effort. Do not fudge these numbers -- they will be questioned by your peers as you are essentially questioning their current methods.

Considering the third case -- If you already have ongoing improvement efforts being successfully enacted without gross interruptions in operations, you well may not need ISO registration. If, however, improvement efforts cause operational variations, ISO can provide a decent foundation. Again, accumulate appropriate dollarized data to support your case -- here, however, you may have allies in your peer group. If registration (as opposed to ISO compliance) is your goal, be prepared to show why compliance alone won't work.

Good Luck!"

Patrick Hughes of Quality Consultant Management Services (www.pathug.com) has referred us to "Measuring the Cost of Quality for Management," published by the American Society for Quality in the September 2006 issue of Quality Progress magazine. Mr. Hughes explains the article addresses the following costs of quality that can be controlled through ISO 9001 registration:

"Nonconformance; External Failure
-Returned Products
-Billing reduction from complaints
-Field repair call
-Warranty Expenses
-Legal exposure and costs
-Liability Claims
-Poor Availability
-Malfunction
-Replacement
-Poor Safety
-Complaint processing

Nonconformance; Internal Failure
-Scrap
-Rework
-Repairs
-Unplanned service
-Defect removal
-Lost process time

Conformance; Prevention Costs
-Quality Education
-Process Design
-Defect Cause removal
-Process changes
-Quality audits
-Preventive Maintenance

Conformance; Appraisal Costs
-Test
-Measurements
-Evaluations and assessments
-Problem Analysis
-Inspection"

Nick Koumoutzis of NCK Consulting (www.nckconsulting.com):"Top management want to know that the system they are trying to implement will yield results in terms of a competitive advantage, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, improved service, etc. These competitive advantages in return will translate into financial gains for the company.

In today's competitive world, quality is expected. It is becoming increasingly difficult to charge higher prices based on better quality alone! Consumers expect a certain level of quality and they look for other benefits when they chose one brand over another, such as superior service and warranty. Therefore, you need a system to help you maintain that minimum level of quality and also focus the organization in a way that all areas work together to support the strategic goals. ISO 9000 provides that framework. It sketches out the steps to be taken in order to understand how to manage each process and most importantly how to set goals and establish measurements for the processes. By doing that, you can link all the processes together and develop a cohesive measurement system to support the business plan. The ISO standard went through a major redesign in 2000 to make it a tool for the entire business and not just the quality department. It's strength lies in its ability to map the organization into processes that can be linked and managed to produce products and services efficiently and effectively. However, many organizations are still stuck on the old method of: 'Document What You Do and Do What You Document.' That framework produces a system that is cumbersome, counterproductive and gives ISO a bad name. Only by developing a system that translates daily operations into efficient and effective output for the customer and links it to the bottom line you can convince management to support your efforts. There is enough literature on the web to help you make your case to management. I, also, suggest reading 'Jump Start You Process Approach' by Alan Peterson, 'ISO 9000 Auditing Using the Process Approach' by David Hoyle, 'QMS Conversion: A Process Approach' by David Hoyle to name a few.'"