What is ISO 9001

ISO - International Organization for Standardization

ISO's purpose is to facilitate international trade
by providing a single set of standards that people
everywhere would recognize and respect.
Derived from the Greek word "isos" meaning "equal" and
is used without alteration in every language in all
countries.
History


ISO was founded in 1946 in Geneva, Switzerland to
develop a common set of standards in manufacturing, trade
and communications
Since 1947 ISO has published over 17,500 standards

ISO 9000 Series
ISO 9000 is a "family" of standards that relate to quality
management systems. The certification process includes an
external audit by ISO.
The number of firms adopting the standards has been growing
consistently. The standard has been revised three times.
What Does ISO 9001 Mean?

ISO in brief means international standard for
sustainable world.
This includes monitoring processes, maintaining
complete and accurate records, checking for defective
output, taking action to correct defects, and continual
internal reviews for effectiveness.

ISO 9001 market evolution
The diffusion of ISO 9001 certification started mostly in
Europe. The European companies pressured their suppliers
around the world to become also ISO 9001 certified and
they sought certification as a protection mechanism.
The next diffusion started to grow namely due to
competitive reason and pressure exerted by downstream
customers.
China - leader in ISO certification and India is in 8
TH

position.
During the last five years the number of ISO 9001 certified
companies has significantly increased.

Empirical research confirms that, ISO 9001 is
successful in building conformance capability and that
by using ISO 9001 practices companies can also benefit
in relation to production economics through improved
process efficiency and to other competitive
capabilities.
By looking into ISO 9001 from the point of view of
operations strategy framework it can be emphasized
that empirical results expected from ISO 9001
implementation are strategy contingent and therefore
this should be taken into account in designing
empirical studies about ISOs benefits.
ISO 9001 motivations
Two categories
Internal motivations
External motivations

- Internal motivations are related with the goal of achieving
organizational improvement.
- external motivations are related with promotional and
marketing issues, customer pressures, improvement of
market share

The other motivations among various countries are:
Improve the efficiency of the quality system.
Pressure from competitors or foreign partners.
To maintain or increase market share.
To meet the government demands.
To comply with the customers requirements.
Quality improvement
Improvements in corporate image.
ISO 9001 certification benefits
Two categories:
External benefits and internal benefits
External benefit is related to marketing and
promotional aspects
Access to new market
Corporate image and market share improvement
Customer satisfaction
Marketing tool
Customer communication and relationship
improvement.
Internal benefit is related to organizational
improvement.
Productivity improvement
Quality awareness improvement
Definition of the personal responsibilities and
obligations
Delivery time improvement
Product quality improvement
Competitive advantage improvement
Personnel motivation

ISO 9001 barriers and drawbacks
ISO 9001 perceived benefits do decrease over time.
Lack of top management involvement
High implementation and maintenance costs.
Lack of auditors knowledge concerning specific
industries.

Impacts on organizational
performance
Quality management systems implementation does
seem to have positive and significant impacts over the
companies performance.
They do differ positively from non certified ones on
- Technological management
- Quality management control
- Causes of poor quality
- Quality control techniques used
Companies financial performance do increases.
ISO survey