Designing a structure for a quality management system
This section answers these questions:
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Coherency
The quality management system (QMS) should reflect the organisation's structure and purpose, to provide assurance that it will be workable in practice. It should be coherent, logical and well structured. The test of a coherent QMS is where someone unfamiliar with the organisation can find the policy on a particular matter and follow the step-by-step tasks to carry it out. They should also be able to find relevant forms or templates, file documents and carry out related administrative tasks.
The policies, procedures and documents should be referenced using a document ID system. They should also be version controlled to ensure currency of information.
Coverage
The QMS should cover all aspects of the organisation's operations. It should not be limited to how the organisation plans to meet relevant standards and legislative requirements. A simple way to check coverage is to map your processes from end to end and then ask the question: "Are there policies and procedures that explain each step of this process?" It is advisable to also cross-reference the QMS to any relevant standards and legislation to ensure full coverage.
Review
Organisations are always changing and evolving. The QMS must be regularly reviewed to ensure that it remains current. How this is done will depend on the size and nature of the organisation. It is important that there is a plan for review, that it is done regularly and that it is improved outside of formal review cycles.
Example A smaller organisation might have one copy of the QMS in circulation, which is amended manually and updated every six months. A larger organisation may decide to review its full QMS over a number of years. Some parts may be reviewed more frequently and in more depth. New procedures may have a shorter review cycle initially to ensure any teething problems can be rectified. |
Accessibility and usability
The usability of the QMS should be a primary aim. The QMS is the document that anyone should be able to reference for information on procedures. It should be physically and electronically accessible, and staff should know how to find the sections that are relevant to them. Staff should have a way to provide feedback if they find an error or have suggestions to improve a process. A QMS should be relatively simple in structure but not so simple that it fails to explain how to carry out important procedures.
It is possible to have a QMS that meets all requirements of a standard but is not put into practice. On the other hand, an organisation may have very good systems that are practiced but not documented. In either case, the QMS becomes unreliable. As a result, it will not be effective and practices will be inconsistent.
Page updated: 07 August 2007