What is ISO?

ISO started from two organizations’ union – the ISO (International Federation of the National Standardizing Associations) and the UNSCC (United Nations Standard Coordinating Committee).
In 1946 more than 25 nations met at the Institute of Civil Engineers in London to make another worldwide association, where the goal was to ‘encourage the global coordination and unification of modern guidelines.’ From this, the new association ISO started activities in February 1947. The word ISO is derived from the Greek ISOS meaning ‘equal.’
As the International Organization for Standardization would translate differently across different languages, the short form name for the organization would be ISO.
Today the ISO has developed into a confederation of representatives speaking to more than 150 nations and has distributed more than 16,500 worldwide principles. They meet routinely to create new and existing management standards further.

Core Principles of ISO certification

Document Control: Issuing a document with a reference and version number to ensure that the right form is in the right place at the right time.
Record Control: A record is a completed document (see above). Record control is an efficient method of finding individual records. It can also refer to how you file, remove, archive, and destroy personal records.
Internal Review: An in-depth review of your management system to ensure you are on track for your end of year validation audit. This also provides the company with satisfies internal audit requirements laid out in the standard.
Non-Conformance: A non-conformance is when something happens within the business that wasn’t planned. This could be Internal, e.g., Out of date process/procedure, human error, etc. External, e.g., Customer complaints, supplier issues, etc.
Corrective Action: A plan created by management to rectify a non-conformance (see above) and to prevent it from recurring
Preventative Action: An action to clarify and address potential risks to the business to reduce future non-conformances.

Do we really need ISO?

• Are there any areas of your business you would like to improve?
• Would you like to save time and money on recurring problems by resolving them permanently the first time around?
• Would you like to tender for contracts within your sector?
• Would you like better utilization of your time through improved resource management?
• Would you like to enhance the customer/supplier relationship by responding pro-actively to customer feedback?
• Would you like to see an improvement in your internal efficiency?
• Would you like to reduce the company’s on-going permit and insurance fees potentially?
If you can answer yes to any of the above questions, ISO Certification may be for you.

ISO Benefits

Here are the explanations of six main benefits and why they are important:
• Improvement of credibility and image: By adopting internationally recognized standards and best practices, it improves its appearance to the customers.
• Improvement of customer satisfaction: With proper planning and a process-oriented approach, an organization can strive to meet customer requirements. By improving customer satisfaction, you will retain more repeat customers since happy and satisfied customers are the key to keeping customer loyalty. And such customers bring in additional revenues.
• Better process integration: By looking at the overall process interactions through the process-driven approach, you will find improvements in efficiency and cost savings more efficiently by eliminating the waste that can occur when processes are maintained without considering the inefficiencies that can arise process hand-off. The better process flow can also drive efficiencies towards fewer errors and resulting reworks, which can improve cost savings.
• Improvement of evidence-based decision making: By driving evidence-based decision making, you can be more focused on applying resources to the areas that will improve efficiencies and increase cost savings with less trial and error to find the right decision. Besides, by monitoring the process you are improving, you will see how much improvement has happened based on the data.
• Continual improvement culture: By adopting this Continual improvement culture to improve your processes and organizational output, you will find efficiencies and cost savings, including systematic approaches when problems occur to reduce the impact of the problem and increase the speed of recovery. By making this continual, improving year after year, the company can see continuing benefits from this.
• Engagement of employees: Employees involved in the improvements of the processes they work with are happier and more engaged employees. Who better than the people working on the approach to identify the areas that need improvement and test and advance these improvements when implemented? Engaged employees are more productive and will help the company better improve and save, especially when they understand how the process’s quality depends on them.

In order to have more details over a call or face to face, you may write to us at info@primeinfoserv.com