A quality management system (QMS) is a system that documents all practices, procedures, and responsibilities that aim at meeting quality goals and policies in a company. A QMS enables a business to control and organise its operations in order to meet customer requirements while, simultaneously improving its efficiency. A QMS, in other words, helps a business keep the balance between what customers expect and what the management staff desire to achieve.
The importance of quality management systems
There are lots of benefits we can count for QMS in a company. To begin with, implementing QMS promotes high staff-engagement and continual improvement. As quality goals are set, less materials are wasted and consequently the overall costs are lowered. Identifying the staffs’ potentials and facilitating training opportunities are two other benefits of quality management systems. In the long term, the organisation meets all the standard requirements which entails complying with industry regulations and in the most effective way. As QMS always considers customer requirements, you can expect customer trust which generates more sale and profit.
Quality Management Standards
Quality management standards set up a framework for how a given business should manage its activities. They describe the precise way of managing a process, making a product, or delivering a service. The primary goals of Quality Management Standards are:
- meeting customer’s expectations
- reducing costs
- managing internal processes
- ensuring product reliability and safety
- meeting environmental objectives, and
- gaining market success
Requirements of QMS
A good quality management system must address the company’s needs and support the business to achieve its goals with consideration of associated risks. As the company grows and changes in culture, nature, and services, the Quality management System must be adopted and updated to the business new needs.
How QMS is implemented
To implement an effective quality management system, the company must identify and take control of a number of interconnected, multi-functional processes in order to ensure customer satisfaction and continual improvement. The design of the QMS should be influenced by the company’s various goals, needs, risks, products, and services. Being largely based on the plan-do-check-act cycle, this structure allows for constant improvement regarding products/services and the management system. Here are the basic steps of Implementing QMS in a company:
- Design &build: You should develop the structure of the QMS and plan for the implementation.
- Deploy: At this stage, you need to break down each process into smaller subprocesses and provide the necessary means to train and educate the staff.
- Monitor & measure: You should perform regular, systematic audits of the quality management system to seek improvement or deal with any unpredicted problem.
- Review & improve: Finally, the obtained results must be analysed to see if the implementation has been successful or not, and can be continually improved.
The quality of your product can be measured in terms of its durability and performance. Quality is an important factor that differentiates your company from the others. By implementing quality management systems, you can ensure that your company is moving toward world-class standards, which entails higher quality products and, ultimately, higher profits.
How can we help?
IntegPro offers the quickest and the most efficient way of implementing a QMS from start to certification, and beyond following international standards:
- ISO 9001
- ISO 17025
- ISO 13485
- API Q1
- API Q2