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Difference between ISO 9000 and Quality Management |
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If you have any questions about our Quality Matrix, or wish to make any comments, please feel free to send a message to us at quality@artige.com. |
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| Overview |
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This analysis is just one of many comparisons that are offered as part of the Artige Quality Matrix, which can be seen here in its original form. The definitions that are used in these comparisons are the ones that we at the Artige Company use internally and with our clients, derived from the research that we perform as a matter of due course. These definitions are derived from natural laws of physics and statistics, in order to screen our work from the effects of the business press. The original article where these terms are discussed appears here. In other words, we like to think that this work will withstand the scourges of time and not be categorized as "management du jour". |
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| ISO 9000 |
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Definition |
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It is one thing to claim that one's firm produces quality products, but it is another for your trading partners to know that this is true. So a bureaucracy was established where third parties could verify a company's claims of quality products. Question is, how do you measure quality? The answer is to document a firm's practices and audit the firm for compliance to its own procedures. |
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This methodology involves administrating a culture of rules and documentation. A natural fit for enterprises that already operate under a bureaucratic culture. The documentation includes not only current practices, but also the methods for implementing process changes. The audit is meant to verify whether the firm follows the documented rules it wrote up. So in other words, ISO 9000 does not ensure that a product or service is has quality about it. Rather, ISO 9000 certifies that certain process were used, and provides for the manner in which the fact that these processes were used will be confirmed. The assumption is that in always following the same method, the same product (of quality or otherwise) will be delivered. |
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| Quality Management |
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Definition |
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We like to use this category as a catch-all for the quality methods that are not founded by obvious cause and effect methods. That is, those methods that are driven more by personalities than particulars. We also like to lump in the traditional quality control methods, as it can be shown that the quality management practices are a result of the original "measure and reject" philosophy of quality control. |
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Quality management is based upon heuristic and ad hoc methods, based on previous experience. Note that there is nothing wrong with that, and it can be deployed very successfully. It is just that certain individuals like a predictable and deterministic methodology, and an ad hoc method does not fit such a constraint. The quality management methodology has its roots in traditional quality control in production, where conformance to requirements is the major point of interest. |
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We use a waterfall method to explain where quality management comes from, which is based upon quality control and quality assurance. This is described by the three definitions below: |
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| QC |
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The main task that the quality control methodology sets out to accomplish is to insure that only good items were acceptable for further production, and bad parts were rejected. To have the concept of good and bad parts means that standards of some type must be in place, so comparisons can be made. The fact that good and bad parts could exist was not the main concern (and is still not) of quality control. Any activity that is related to measuring product parameters against criteria and passing judgment on whether the product can be used or sold based on meeting the criteria is considered a quality control task. This covers final goods, intermediate work-in-progress or services being delivered. |
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| QA |
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Obviously, a regime of rejection will only get a business so far, and could result in an unprofitable situation if most parts are rejected. So the obvious step to take is to prevent the rejections, which is typically done by assessing the processes that are causing the rejects in the first place. This method is called quality assurance. This practice considers all aspects of production, insuring that raw materials are fit for consumption, equipment is operating as desired, as well as maintained properly, and that all the constraints from customers have been collected, documented and integrated back into the constraints used for production. So, activities related to preventing rejected parts or services would be considered part of a quality assurance practice. |
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| QM |
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The next obvious step for the enterprise that is able to prevent rejections is to tighten the constraints, which should result in better financial performance, owing to the fact that fewer resources are being used, with a resulting drop in costs. This is considered quality improvement, and the practice that handles this would be considered quality management. Whereas the two previous practices of quality control and quality assurance have a cause and effect relationship, the prediction and improvement of defects enters an area that is not amenable to a cause and affect analysis. No one set of rules exists that one can deploy to improve a process. |
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This category of process design is extremely interesting, in that it is the reason why there are so many other methodologies to handle the process design and quality needs of an enterprise. We cannot emphasize more clearly, "no one set of rules exists that one can deploy to improve a process". All of the methodologies listed in this report are an attempt to overcome this shortcoming. Since there is no cause and effect relationship that can point one in the one and only direction to improve their processes, all of these other processes are acceptable, and can never be proven invalid or unsound in every case. All that one can do is determine which of these processes fits one's way of operating and still be able to meet the criteria set by the customer. |
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Since this is the methodology that brings up the point that there is no cause-and-effect method to improve processes, we like to use quality management as the moniker to point to the ad hoc and people-oriented methods. That is because as the quality improvement concept advanced, this method would be the first that recognized human intervention was needed to improve process outcome. Most of these process improvement ideas came about in an ad hoc manner, just from trial-and-error and previous experience. Since previous experience is such a great factor in promoting prevention and improvement, the practitioners of quality management will always be focused upon people-oriented methods that pull out best practices from the experienced workers. |
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Quality management is also where that concept of announcing the company financials to production workers came about in a big way. The idea here is that education and knowledge of the workforce is important, in order for them to understand where their paycheck comes from, and that they have an input in the processes that allow them to maintain their cash flow. This focus on financial measures then proves to the organization membership that ignoring quality holds a price for non-conformance. |
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Note that the workforce education component is a tricky area. There are two facets to this factor. On one hand one could just announce the data and expect that the workforce will consume the data to everyone's advantage. This also allows certain executives to claim they are open and honest with their workforce. There is another step that is probably necessary. One will need to explain, and even tutor, what the meaning is behind the raw data. In other words, how will the workforce gain knowledge from the financial data? The first option to just announce the data opens the door for misunderstanding and mistrust, which is why the second option is preferred. |
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All of the above tasks would be categorized as incremental in terms of implementing change. |
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| The Difference |
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The Differences and / or Similarities |
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At first glance, one would think that Quality Management and ISO 9000 have a few things in common, in addition to the fact that they both deal with the topic of quality. They are both methodologies that can be used to implement some sort of regime which could potentially instill or improve quality in a firm's offerings. The two methodologies have some overlapping philosophies, but take different approaches. The outcome for both methodologies is similar, in that it will be based upon the management that is driving the methods. |
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ISO 9000 calls for an enterprise to document its processes and verify that the enterprise actually follows those processes. This will indirectly ensure that the enterprise will operate in a quality manner, as it will be doing the same thing over again, in a repeatable and predictable manner. Quality Management also handles the quality problem in an indirect manner. It is based upon the premise that deploying Quality Control, and then regulating the Quality Control regime with a Quality Assurance regime, plus improving the Quality Assurance principles with a Quality Management process will instill an environment of quality in the enterprise. The latter relies solely on the experience and knowledge of the enterprise workers to drive the process changes and improvements. The more knowledgeable the workers, the better the chance to improve quality. |
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Note that in both methodologies the outcome will be an indirect result of deploying management processes. Nothing in their methodologies is mandated what level of quality is expected or desired. ISO 9000 has no provision for improvement, while Quality Management does make a provision that improvement should be attempted. An interesting side note for the ISO 9000 and Quality Management methodologies, Quality Control is typically present in both methodologies. However, it is not required in ISO 9000. Just so happens in practice we have never experienced an organization that did not deploy Quality Control in some manner as part of their ISO 9000 regime. Actually, one could be deploying Quality Management and have an ISO 9000 certification. |
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That brings up a point about the ISO 9000 methodology, that one can be certified by official agencies as being an ISO 9000 practitioner. The Quality Management methodology does not offer such certification, as most of the other quality methodologies do not either. Note that one could document and audit processes that lose money and aggravate customers, but still be certified as an ISO 9000 process, so one has to wonder what the point of certification would be to the company owners. Note also, that indirect methods by definition will have leeway that allows for circumvention of the intent, while still staying within the boundaries of the rules or regulations. |
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In summary, Quality Management uses indirect methods to maintain and possibly improve the quality of business processes. ISO 9000 is another process that uses indirect methods to modify quality. Both methodologies are indirect, so each has no guarantee of having any effect (good, bad or indifferent) on the quality of an organization. |
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