Going beyond ISO

How to make ISO pay for itself and increase the bottom line

What is the Cost of ISO ?• The ISO Staff• The Mgt Reps • Audits (Internal and External)• Travel • Time to create processes• Time to correct findings• Keeping up the database• Can create an adversarial relationship between ISO and the divisions of the company• Loss of certification

Are findings really helping you do better ?

• Contrary to the requirements for signatures on the Document Control Sheets for written products, several signatures were missing on individual reports throughout all projects.

• Project has intermittent dormant periods. Contrary to procedure cited Note b. of QP-2.1H, no request for waiver of Project Review has been initiated.

Are improvements really “improvements” ?

•New and larger space for the Avionics Shop.

•Improving and formalizing the Hazardous Materials program.

•Improvements in training including a new trainer.

What are some benefits of ISO ?• Contractually needed, thus company can now be a prime or subcontractor for major contracts

• Great corporate asset (Goodwill)

• Shows that company is compliant with an international standard, thus might be considered, “world class”

•ISO mandates a Quality Management System.

What your QMS has right now that can improve return.

1. Your QMS should contain all the critical processes of the company

2. All the critical processes should have some type of flow charts or diagrams illustrating the flow of those processes

3. If there is a process, it can be measured. 4. If a process can be measured, it can be improved.5. If it can be improved, it can add to the bottom line and

can add to achieving higher quality in the organization.6. With metrics, you can measure the baseline Cost of

Quality 7. And you can measure the improvements to the

organization.

Does ISO reduce the Cost of Quality?•Cost of quality is defined as the cost of NOT having quality.

–Product returns–Rework–Product failures–Inconsistent quality–Quality improvement teams–Audits/ISO/QMS !!!

•By attempting to create consistent processes across all divisions of a company, or all sites, ISO standards aim to reduce the Cost of Quality.

Making ISO pay• The Internal Auditing process

– Brings out improvements not in ISO now– Creates opportunities to extend improvements across

divisions– Creates opportunity to meet with the site or division

leaders to discuss improvement opportunities

• Advocating ISO

– Inform all areas of the company what ISO can do for improvement by using brown bag seminars or the Web site

– Encourage Executive participation

The easiest way to get ideas for improvement BEFORE an audit

• Review the pertinent processes and flow diagrams for the area

• Determine where metrics should be in place

• Critically assess where there may be unnecessary processes

• Make a point to address this sometime during the audit with the process owner or your interviewee

The usual processes of an organization

• Business processes– Billing, AP, AR

• Proposal/Project processes– Steps in Proposals, project monitoring, risk assessment

• Engineering processes

• Manufacturing processes

• Shipping/Receiving

Receiving

Export Request

COMMERCIAL SERVICES PROCESS FLOW CHART AR = Account Rep CR = Contract RepCO = Customer

OrderIM = Implemention

Mgr = Process Beg w/time

stamp1B

NO YES

Change to Current Service

CO appears in CR queue

CR adds BUD to each billing item to “Finalize Billing”. ASIMS CO status

changes from “activation” to “verification”

AR approves each CO billing

line item “Approve

Selected” or “Approve All”

CO billing line items queue to

TIBS

TIBS populates billing in

RevChain

Invoices produced from RevChain data

ASIMS CO status changes

from “verification” to

“complete”

ASIMS CO status changes

from “in progress” to “activation”

PL adds Full Beneficial Use Date (BUD) to CO (ASIMS)

Service turned on, programmed, changed or

removed and tested. PCO and Network Orders are created in

ASIMS

TSS_QP-9.12 Service

Implementation

PL assigned to CO by IM

“Notes”

CR enters Contract Rec’d date. CO status

change “pending” to “validation”

CO goes to applicable Service IM (ASIMS)

AR adds SOW to CO. CO status change from

“validation” to “in progress”

CO appears in AR Queue

Original Signed contract to

Contracts Dept

Cancel

Why?

Account Rep to Contact Customer

After 30 days 60 days 90 days

Customer Intends to

Sign

Signed Contracts NOT

Returned

Contract sent to Customer (via mail or email) Date entered into ASIMS

Contract Reviewed by

Contracts

Contracts Creates

Contract with Word

Templates

Proposal NegotiationsGather contract

ReqsCustomer

New

Current

Build Customer in ASIMS

Add “new” Service

Build Customer Order (CO)

Request Contract from Contracts. CO status “new” to

“pending”

Request is queued to Contracts

Dept (aligned by Service)

END

START

1B

1E2B

2E3B 3E

4B

6E

4E

5B5E 6B

Customer Services

The easiest way to get ideas for improvement DURING an audit

• At the end of any interview, even though you may be looking to see that the process is being followed, ask,

• “How would you change the process to make it more effective?”

• “Do you think the process is going well?” • “Do you have any complaints about the

process?”

The easiest way to get ideas for improvement during an audit (cont’d)• What this does.

– Empowers the person. Makes them feel good. – Most of the time gives simple, but very effective

ideas. – These ideas are presented in the closing meeting. – The next audit, a follow up is done to see if the idea

has been implemented. • Take these ideas to your next audit and spread the

word. • Get it into the CPIAR system for all to see• Put it on the QM or ISO web site.

The 2nd easiest way to get ideas during an audit (Internal)

• After the closing meeting, take off the auditor hat…

• Ask the VP or head of the division you just audited if you could discuss ideas.

• Alone. • This is your opportunity to add value to the audit

and to the project. Discuss what improvement ideas you have heard, and ask for any from him/her.

The 2nd easiest way to get ideas during an audit (Internal)

• Then, as the lead auditor, you do what??

• Follow up? See if the idea is implemented and …..

• EFFECTIVE!!!!!

So what about the bottom line???

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__________________________________________________________________Does ISO reduce the Cost Quality?

You better believe it!!• ISO can highlight opportunities for improvement• ISO can instill the improvement mentality by

aggressively pushing it during the audits and follow up

• ISO can take those improvements and push them across the organization

• ISO can create the metrics that can measure those improvements.

• ISO can show the executives that it is a Value Adding organization.

Spreading the word to your company executives

• Hold training sessions on improvements• All improvements from audits go onto the ISO or QM

web page• Quality is given or assumes role for monitoring all ISO

improvements for return on investment and quality improvement

• Quality becomes process improvement leader in company.

• Can lead to creation of Six Sigma or a Process Improvement division, apart and separate from Quality.

Let’s Recap…• ISO processes can provide the basis for

improvement• Auditing is one key task that can create

opportunities for improvement that would not be known previously

• Advocating ISO and it’s improvement process will instill improvement into the company

• These steps will give ISO a more positive role in the company’s improvement

Some improvements….• An easier way to retrieve QDRs from the

database (Saves average ½ hour per day for a QC inspector, company wide 10 hours per day)

• A credit card purchase order system created in MS Access leads to quick retrieval and instant tracking (Saves average 1 hour per day for each analyst, company wide will save 5 hours per day)

• Common maintenance procedures throughout company for same machinery.

• In the future, working on reducing variance in 1-off parts by determining common processes across company and finding best practices.