What is ISO 9001?
ISO 9001 is a Quality Management System (QMS) standard that is recognised across the entire world. Its purpose is to help businesses meet the needs of their customers and stakeholders. This is achieved by creating a solid foundation that provides consistent quality when providing goods and services to customers. The standard is embraced by tens of thousands of listed companies across the world and sets the bar for quality management systems.
The standard is based on a number of quality management principles. This includes:
- Customer focus
- Leadership
- Engagement of people
- Process approach
- Improvement
- Evidence-based decision making
- Relationship management
There’s no priority to these principles. ISO 9001 focuses on all of these principles being important, but their relative importance can depend on the organisation and current industry circumstances.
What is a quality management system?
Some readers might not be fully aware of what a QMS is. At its core, a quality management system is a guideline for standard operating procedures that is used to ensure that your business is delivering a quality experience. You can think of it as a collection of documented procedures and policies that your employees are expected to follow when delivering products and services to customers. It focuses on quality control to ensure that you can offer a consistent level of customer service at all times.
Every QMS is different and is defined by the company itself. However, the ISO 9001 standard provides a set of guidelines to help you design and implement a QMS that works best for you. Having a QMS alone doesn’t qualify you for ISO 9001 certification but it is a requirement.
Why businesses aim for ISO 9001 certification
Obtaining ISO 9001 certification is a clear way to let your potential clients know that you provide an exceptional level of customer service. It also lets your staff know that your business is based around providing excellent customer satisfaction. There are many key benefits to ISO 9001 certification that you should be aware of.
- Improves your credibility. When an organisation looks for partners to work with, having ISO 9001 is essentially a requirement before they even contact you.
- Excellent customer experience. Since ISO 9001 focuses on meeting the needs of your customers and stakeholders, it trains your company to provide an excellent customer experience at all times. This boosts customer confidence in your ability to deliver products and services with minimal disruptions.
- More revenue. Having ISO 9001 certification allows you to win more tenders and contracts. The focus on customer service also means you improve their satisfaction and thus have a higher chance to retain clients.
- Improved decision making. ISO 9001 certification helps to train your business to detect, identify and solve problems in a much quicker fashion. This allows you to take steps to avoid mistakes in the future.
- Drastically improved operating efficiency. Following ISO 9001 standards and practices can help improve the quality of your business while simultaneously reducing costs.
- Better relationship with suppliers. By using the best practices in business, you can improve your relationship with partners to help establish efficient supply chains.
- Improved employee management. Using the best industry practices means that you’ll improve internal communications between employees. This helps to encourage happy and productive staff members which results in a more efficient business.
As you can see, there are lots of benefits to obtaining ISO 9001 certification. It improves your business in a number of ways by focusing on many different aspects of your business. It’s all about improving the customer experience and presenting yourself as a professional business that goes above and beyond to ensure every client is taken seriously and treated as an individual with their own needs and preferences.
How does ISO 9001 benefit our customers and clients?
The ISO 9001 standard is important to have because it also shows your customers and clients that you understand how to accommodate their needs and preferences. Many businesses will only work with companies that have an ISO 9001 certification because it offers peace of mind knowing that they’ll be working with a company that focuses on customer satisfaction at its core.
From a customer’s standpoint, they’ll have the following benefits when working with an ISO 9001-certified company:
- Improved reliability from the company in terms of scheduling, delivery and minimising mistakes that could cause disruptions.
- Peace of mind knowing that the company will provide quality products and services.
- Assurance that the company will do everything within reason to accommodate the customer’s needs and preferences.
- Better communication from the company to keep them informed regarding large projects or continued services over a longer period of time.
These are just a few of the benefits that customers can expect to receive when working with a company that is ISO 9001 certified.
Why choose Encore Business Group?
At Encore Business Group, we value the relationships that we create with our clients. We’re a trusted ISO 9001 Registered Value Add Company that specializes in a number of fields such as assembly, packaging, quality inspection and kitting services for many different industries.
We operate with a quality management system that meets the most recent ISO 9001 standard. This proves that we’re a company that understands the importance of client relationships and shows that we place our customers first. We work at an efficient pace that doesn’t sacrifice the quality of our services. Instead, we exceed client expectations and we’re proud of the work we do.
Contact Encore Business Group for more information
Encore Business Group is proud to offer our customers and clients a reliable service that exceeds standard expectations. We take pride in the quality of service we provide to our customers and we routinely put our customer’s needs first.
If you’re interested in learning more about our services, don’t hesitate to get in touch with Encore Business Group for more information.