Ignite
Prepare to Ignite your Quality Journey
Current State
This leads to a number of considerations:
And if all these internal considerations weren’t enough, you also have external considerations that need to be addressed:
You may be experiencing these hurdles today:
The best way to make sure standards are known and followed is by utilizing a successful employee training program. It’s not enough to allow access – you need to be able to track who understands the information. You can’t hold employees accountable unless you provide the appropriate training on the standards. So, now is the time to put a complete training program in place through your QMS. You should be able to tie specific documents to specific training programs – this is a good first step in not only making information accessible but making sure everyone understands your processes and quality goals. With the right level of flexibility, you can make sure each employee has access to information that pertains to them. Bottom line with training: you will have an understanding of who has been trained and what additional actions are required to keep your team fully capable.
Recommendations
Many quality practitioners would not prioritize supply chain quality at this juncture – yet. The goal is to start with a successful project that shows the value of automating your quality processes. With that under your belt, you’ll be able to expand to include other areas such as supply chain quality, integration with enterprise systems, risk assessment, etc.
To ensure everyone is using the same information you need your documents online, and an easy way to ensure basic controls on your information. A QMS offers improved document control, policy access and training. Increased visibility and training will ensure compliance and create a culture of continuous improvement. Don’t limit access, all employees play a role in quality and in managing risk.
It’s time to start looking at a centralized QMS that can put structure around how you create and manage all your critical documents. Develop a workflow that shows how a document gets created, reviewed, approved, and distributed. And it’s not enough to route documents, you need to track who has been trained on your critical policies and procedures. Don’t compromise on quality – today’s investments will pay off in the future.
When you start to automate or expand your quality processes, Corrective Action management quickly rises to the top of the list as a function that can provide significant results. Whether you are dealing with non-conformances, audit findings (both internal and external), or supplier corrective actions, having a system to track the issues and actions becomes critical. If you’ve been audited, you certainly need to show how you are resolving any findings.
Without a system to track audit results, it can be difficult to understand the risks and costs associated with not taking action.
Conducting audits is important for continuous improvement. That is why it is essential that your tools are not only configurable to your processes, but also easy to manage and track. The right Audit Management software will allow users to create specific audit plans with multiple audits throughout the year. Setting up profiles for each audit includes integrated checklists, scoring methods and a comprehensive audit report for all audits within the system.
An essential aspect of a QMS is the ability to show management the impact quality has on the organization. Even simple statistics, dashboards and reports can show the value of the quality team. This builds a culture of quality and continuous improvement. Having analytics can take this even a step further, where you can review current status, drill into the data to uncover detailed insights and even get to the specific situation in your QMS.
There is a growing change in the way organization view the role of quality, according a new survey that ETQ and Salloway & Associates recently completed. Whether driven by growing global competition, a dynamic regulatory and compliance environment, or market and internal forces, companies today view quality as a strategic business initiative and less of a perfunctory obligation.
Many of us grew up with the old-fashioned food pyramid: 6 servings of grains, 5 servings of fruits and veggies, 3 servings of dairy and so on. Today, we have MyPlate, where the basic concepts behind the old food pyramid still appear to hold sway.
The goal of our survey of 300 C-level executives, quality and IT managers in the Life Sciences, Food & Beverage and Manufacturing industries was to better understand the state of quality management today. We also gained insight into how organizations in these industries are investing in quality both in 2020 and the coming 3-to-5 years.
