QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM (ISO 9001) IMPLEMENTATION : CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS

Quality management professionals face enormous difficulty while implementing quality management system in organization where there was  no former existence of QMS. Its's not an easy task to do. 
The most challenging part is to break the existing corporate culture that was built over the years. Employees and in some cases top management are resistant to changes. For employees, new system and related documentation is an added burden and work load. Top management see them as increase in overhead cost and often it is feared that with such activities it will be difficult to achieve production targets.

Let us now discuss in detail the challenges faced and tips to overcome them:
Challenges faced during Implementation: 
  1. Existing corporate culture: This is the most challenging part. A settled practice of work is hard to give up. Employees are habituated to work in a culture which was built over the years and find it difficult to adopt new system and changed style of working. They could not cope up well with changes and this hinders effectiveness.
  2. Resistance to changes: Change is deviation in pre existing practice and methods. This is human nature to keep their practice and methods constant. Employees are not comfortable in challenging status quo and resist introduced changes. They show disapproval expressly even without giving it a try or they may do it implicitly by not accepting changes.
  3. Lack of intent from Top Management: Top Management's lack of intent is another big challenge during QMS implementation. Though it is top management's call to take initiation towards organizational growth and implement QMS but at times they lost focus due to varying priorities. In such circumstances it is very difficult to implement anything which has long term returns.
  4. QMS implementation forced by external pressure: When organization implements QMS by compulsion and not by choice, the achieved results are not encouraging. Organization under external pressure (mainly customer requirement) go for QMS half heartedly with aim to fulfill only customer requirement by doing as little as possible. In such condition, QMS remains on paper only and could not be demonstrated. 
  5. Complex designing of QMS :
  • Quality system being too much conceptual: Often organization make extra effort in order to make ideal quality management system and end up with too much theory which are complicated and could not be linked with practicability.
  • Excess Documentation: Creation and implementation of unnecessary documentation at several steps obstruct the flow of work and badly affects effectiveness of quality management system. Excess documentation may lead to loss of employees interest in quality system.
  • Quality system not being flexible: In order to make robust quality system, quality management professional end up making it too rigid. Employees often find defined policies and procedure way too difficult to follow during actual application.
  • Quality system being too descriptive: Too much detailed documented information contribute towards intricacy of quality system. QMS professional want to include as many details as possible in documents. This ultimately makes it very difficult during practical application.


Possible solutions:
  1. Look at existing culture and determine what to retain and what to change. Define non negotiable set of policies aligned with organization's goals. Do not rush to change as effective changes does not happen overnight.
  2. Emphasize employee participation during implementation process. Take their suggestions to make them feel part of the process and it helps in smoother transition. 
  3. Let top management know importance of QMS in business growth and overall improvement and effectiveness.
  4. Make employees aware about how quality system helps way of working and enhances efficiency and effectiveness.
  5. Keep QMS as simple as possible. Look for minimum changes in existing system that can serve the purpose. Adoption of slight modification in system is easy rather than of a complete new one. In documentation, include minimum details which can bring clarity in system and can meet the standard(ISO 9001) requirements.

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