ISO 9001 Quality management system principles

ISO 9001 is the international standard of quality management systems (QMS),

published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The QMS is a

uniform and well-organized process approach governing quality and control

objectives to ensure continual improvement. ISO 9001 defines the requirements

for creating a quality management system.

At the centre of the ISO 9001 are eight fundamental principles of quality management:

Quality management focuses mainly on meeting customer requirements and doing

your best to exceed your customer’s expectations. You can establish this focus by

attempting to understand their expectations and requirements.

Organizations succeed when their leaders establish and maintain work environments

that enable employees to become fully involved in achieving their unified quality goal

s. You should help your company’s leaders at all levels establish a single purpose

and direction and create conditions to encourage employees to work toward your

organization’s quality objectives.

Engagement of people is one of ISO 9001’s most essential principles. Employees

become more empowered, more competent, more dependable and better able to

help you achieve your top objective—better meeting your customers’ needs.

Engaging your employees means you should respect them as individuals.

Recognize their achievements, help them with their personal and professional

development, and constantly communicate with them. The way for your company to

succeed is to retain competent employees by engaging with them.

An organization will operate more efficiently when leaders manage and control the

business processes, linking them together to form a single system. Adopting this

process approach will help your company achieve more predictable and consistent

results. It will also help people focus their efforts on crucial improvement processes.

The process approach is part of the system approach. That means you have to under

stand, analyze, and manage interrelated processes to develop a cohesive system to

attain your organizational objectives. You’ll continue to be successful when you

manage your business processes as one cohesive quality management system.

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