The year is now 2015 and with it comes an update to the ISO 9001 standard. If you are a business that is seeking to leverage this tried and true measure of quality management performance, then you may also be thinking of hiring a third party service to conduct internal audits and help you prepare to meet the revised certification requirements.
So Why Outsource?
When you are a small or medium sized business that doesn’t have in house options at your disposal, you can either put out a classified ad to find someone, or you can partner with a third party service provider that can provide the services you need. Think about your shipping needs. Do you have a fleet of vehicles that deliver your products to your market or supply chain partners? Probably not. It’s likely that you instead rely on services like FedEx, UPS, DHL, or perhaps even the good old fashioned United States Postal Service. You pay your rate and your products are insured and delivered on time, and you can login to an account an track where your packages are.
So apply that same philosophy to your quality management. Yes you can hire an expert and have them in house or train one of your existing employees to become a quality manager, but there are pros and cons to that approach. For one hiring a new person means adding to payroll. Employee expense is typically the number one expense that small and medium sized businesses must take on, and if you are planning on hiring a qualified applicant then be prepared to shell out some dough because good quality managers are in demand.
Consider the difference versus hiring a third party service. You pay a set amount per month based on agreed upon services and then come and go as needed. You don’t have to add that expense to your payroll either. The cost of consultant can be as much as ten times cheaper than an in house option though costs can vary depending on the level of service you need and the size of your business. If you hire a reputable third party consulting company, then you can easily expect to trim your cost to the bare minimum while maximizing the impact of the role of the quality management professional. In other words you can expect to have better quality when it comes to your quality management.
Getting Ready for 2015
If you are like many other companies right now, then you are probably focused on implementing ISO 9001:2015 within the next few years. If you are then no doubt you should consider whether to hire an ISO 9001 consulting service. Chances are the rewards outweigh the risks and you will soon find that by entrusting your QMS needs to qualified third party will help your company not only pass certification but gain a system that truly benefits your organization.
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