Winter Haven FL — Oxebridge Quality Resources International is now scouting South American locations where it will open an office to serve that continent. Initial offerings will be Rapid ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO 22000 for food safety management.

“We feel that Oxebridge is uniquely suited for serving South America, as a US company with access to the most influential committees responsible for the development of these standards, while providing services at affordable rates that can be met by companies operating in these economies,” said Christopher Paris, VP Operations and Founder of Oxebridge. “Other US consultancies are simply too expensive and inflexible to serve anywhere outside of the US or Canada. Oxebridge’s Rapid programs allow us to reduce costs per client and still remain profitable, while providing a high quality service to our clients.”

Multiple cities in South America are being looked at, and no formal announcement has been scheduled at this time as to which city may be selected.

In 2008, Oxebridge researched opening an office in Mexico City, Mexico, but the current economic climate and problems with increasing violence in that country have led to a corporate decision by Oxebridge to wait for any presence in that country. “Unfortunately, Mexico is becoming unstable for American businesses, and that is worsening in recent months,” said Mr. Paris. “We need to take a wait-and-see attitude when dealing with Mexico, but we have not ruled it out.”

Oxebridge will employ local, Spanish-speaking engineers and specialists in the area it decides to settle in, creating jobs in that area. The company plans on updating its website to provide bilingual content soon.

“This step will mark an important phase in the growth of Oxebridge, taking us to the next level,” Mr. Paris said. “Successful companies must work internationally to remain competitive and to ensure growth, and this is as true for Oxebridge as it is for any other organization.”

Watch this news page for more information regarding Oxebridge’s South American operations.

=====

Oxebridge Quality Resources International está explorando lugares de América del Sur donde se abrirá una oficina para servir a ese continente. Oferta inicial será rápida ISO 9001, ISO 14001 e ISO 22000 para la gestión de inocuidad de los alimentos.

“Sentimos que Oxebridge está especialmente bien preparado para servir a América del Sur, como una empresa de EE.UU. que tienen acceso a los comités más influyentes responsables de la elaboración de estas normas, mientras que la prestación de servicios a precios razonables que pueden ser satisfechas por las empresas que operan en estas economías”, dijo Sr. Christopher Paris vicepresidente de operaciones y fundador de Oxebridge. “Otras asesorías EE.UU. son demasiado costosos y poco flexibles para trabajar en cualquier lugar fuera de los EE.UU. o Canadá. Oxebridge los programas rápido nos permite reducir los costes por cliente y seguir siendo rentable, mientras que proporciona un servicio de alta calidad a nuestros clientes.”

Varias ciudades en América del Sur se están estudiando, y no el anuncio formal se ha programado en este momento en cuanto a que la ciudad puede ser seleccionado.

En 2008, Oxebridge investigado la apertura de una oficina en la Ciudad de México, México, pero la situación económica actual y los problemas con la creciente violencia en ese país han dado lugar a una decisión corporativa de Oxebridge que esperar a que toda presencia en ese país. “Desafortunadamente, México se está convirtiendo en inestables para las empresas estadounidenses, y que está empeorando en los últimos meses”, dijo Sr. Paris. “Tenemos que adoptar una actitud de esperar y ver qué actitud cuando se trata de México, pero no lo hemos descartado”.

Oxebridge ingenieros del empleo local, de habla española y especialistas en el área que decida instalarse, la creación de puestos de trabajo en esa área. La compañía tiene en la actualización de su sitio web para proporcionar contenido bilingüe en breve.

“Este paso marca una etapa importante en el crecimiento de Oxebridge, que nos llevan al siguiente nivel”, dijo Sr. Paris. “Las empresas de éxito deben trabajar a nivel internacional para seguir siendo competitivos y para garantizar el crecimiento, y esto es tan cierto para Oxebridge como lo es para cualquier otra organización”.

Mira esta página de noticias para obtener más información sobre las operaciones en Sudamérica de Oxebridge.

AS9100 is an international quality system standard for aerospace manufacturers and parts designers, and is seen as a more stringent and elite certification than ISO 9001, the generic quality system standard. Oxebridge is targeting RaeTech for a Rapid AS9100 Implementation, with the intent to complete the implementation within a few months; typical AS9100 consulting firms often quote companies such as RaeTech implementation programs lasting 9 - 16 months.

RaeTech was founded in 1978 and services such clients as Allied Signal, Honeywell and Ducommun Technologies. The company is a member of the Arizona Tooling and Machining Association, and the National Tooling and Machining Association (NTMA).

For more information on RaeTech, Inc., visit the company’s website at www.raetechinc.com.

For more information on Oxebridge’s Rapid Aerospace implementation programs, including AS9100, click here.

Stevenson elected to contract with Oxebridge for its on-site Rapid CMS program,which required only five days of on-site work by Oxebridge. The work was done by Oxebridge during the week of April 19th, and Stevenson arranged an expedited survey by ACHC for the week of May 18th, which resulted in a successful accreditation after only one month of starting the program with Oxebridge.

Stevenson Industries provides home patients with various medical supplies, including CPAP masks, tubing kits and nebulizers, including the maskless CPAP Pro product.

“The Stevenson contract proves that a good, and accreditable CMS program can be put in place very quickly,” Chris Paris, Oxebridge VP Operations said. “Most clients choose to use Oxebridge’s off-site option for CMS Accreditation Prep, which also has a 100% success rate, but which moves much slowly. The Stevenson implementation proves there is a reliable option for those DME or HME companies that need CMS accreditation quickly.”

Third party accreditation to standards released by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) are now mandatory for any company selling home medical equipment (HME) or durable medical equipment (DME) or medical supplies, if they intend on seeking Medicare reimbursement.

For more on Oxebridge’s CMS Accreditation programs, visit www.cmsaccreditation.com.

For more on Stevenson Industries, visit www.nomask.com.

The ISO 9001 User Group’s direct link is http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=109599275742378. It is open to all companies and individuals with an interest in ISO 9001. Members will be allowed to promote their companies and services, although repeated spamming will be moderated.

“To date, Facebook hasn’t had much ISO 9001 or AS9100 content,” Christopher Paris, the founder of both Oxebridge and the Facebook group, said. “It’s a great platform for social networking within quality management, and a great way to discuss ways to improve, promote and just chat about the standards.”

A similar AS9100 Users Group has been established, with its own link here:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=114089528620102

For both groups, users may post files (within copyright and trademark restrictions), discussions, photos, videos and more. All such posts must be on topic.

As with all Facebook groups, admission is open and free. A Facebook account, also free, is required.

In the software world, under a contract from the Department of Defense, Carnegie Mellon University launched a quality management system for software developers called the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), and then gave administration rights to the CMM to the Software Engineering Institute (SEI). Years later, this model was improved and renamed the CMMI (Capability Maturity Model Integration).

Not accidentally, the CMMI looks a lot like ISO 9001, but on steroids. The requirements for attaining CMMI are much more complex and rigorous than ISO 9001, and based on a tiered model which assesses a company’s capability maturity level. Most companies start at CMMI Level 2, indicating they are just a tad above being totally chaotic and ad hoc. Companies then strive to increase their CMMI level to prove higher levels of quality maturity.

Yes, this is a grossly understated explanation of the CMMI, but suits the point of this article.

There are a few problems with CMMI. First, it is run solely by SEI and therefore has all the problems of a monopoly - it’s massively expensive, with implementation services starting in the six-figure range easily, and with only one approved auditing body and auditor training provider - SEI. Yes, they perform both services and no one has called foul on the obvious conflict of interest, as they have in the ISO 9001 world, where auditor trainers and auditing bodies must be separate entities.

In short, nothing goes through CMMI without SEI. And there are no allowable competitors.

Secondly, it is very, very complex. Organizations without serious resources and the willingness to study - hard - will find implementing CMMI nearly impossible. A demand for CMMI to a small, underfunded company could well put them out of business.

But it may be inevitable. CMMI does not only apply to software developers and related areas of the software industry. With its popularity increasing, CMMI Level 2 requirements are popping up in more and more government contracts, even if the subcontractor may not really be a provider of software.

SEI has grown into three “constellations”: the original CMMI for Development, CMMI for Acquisition (CMMI-ACQ), released in late 2007, and now CMMI for Services (CMMI-SVC) released  in February of 2009.

Even the original CMMI for Development may apply to any type of design and manufacturing organization, and likewise now the Services and Acquisitions adaptations. This means CMMI has already expanded outside of just software development.

Expect ISO 9001 to face stiff competition from this new “Cadillac” on the lot, even giving the cost and difficulty of CMMI. In the software world, it is already true that ISO 9001 is seen as “quaint” in comparison with CMMI. How long will it take for that thinking to seep into the automotive or aerospace industries?

(Answer: it already has. More and more NASA contracts are beginning to “suggest” CMMI.)

As far back as 2003, I saw this writing on the wall and gave a series of free lectures to ASQ chapters and anyone else who would listen, called “Ten Steps to Save ISO 9001.” You can download the original presentation as a PDF file here (675 kb).

This talk presented my statistical analysis of the official ISO Survey data, and proved that the adoption rate of ISO 9001 was declining (something ISO still refuses to acknowledge or report, even though we are now in negative territory, meaning more companies are dropping ISO 9001 than picking it up.) Along with that data, I presented a solution: take the best of the CMM / CMMI and create a new framework for ISO 9001 based on it.

In short this meant making ISO 9001 a Management Maturity Model. I then proposed “The M3 Initiative” - breaking ISO 9001 into two or three maturity levels, so that small machine shops with little oversight by their customers could put into place only key elements of ISO 9001 (say, inspection, testing, manufacturing controls, calibration), while more “mature” companies would implement additional requirements (internal auditing, management reviews), and fully mature companies adopting the entire standard (including preventive action and continual improvement.) A possible ISO 9001 “Level 4″ would adopt Baldridge criteria. The market would drive what level would be best for each organization. This would have the twofold effect of making ISO 9001 more palatable to smaller companies who wanted less documentation and rigor in their QMS, thus increasing the adoption rate of ISO 9001 worldwide. Large contractors would then mandate certain levels of ISO 9001 to its suppliers, driving them towards the highest level they felt they needed of their supplier, thus doing away with the binary “certified or not-certified” nature of ISO 9001 which leads to a lot of very bad companies brandishing an ISO 9001 logo with aplomb.

As an aside, I even proposed a model of core ISO requirements, which could then be augmented with sector-specific requirements, thus doing away with the proliferation of sector standards we now see (AS9100, TS 16949, ISO 13485, etc.) Even environmental or safety modules could be attached easily, making ISO 9001 would truly universal, yet infinitely flexible.

This is, of course, exactly what CMMI is proving can be done, and they are successful with it, while ISO 9001 withers on the vine. But a true Management Maturity Model could be less difficult than CMMI, which is stuck under the monopolistic thumb of SEI, and their engineers. They have no reason to make CMMI easy, since they are the sole provider of training and certification courses. (Even “independent” CMMI consultants must be blessed by CMMI, or they risk trademark infringement and a lack of proper credentials. For auditors, an annual fee — in the thousands — is now being discussed as a requirement.)

The audiences of my presentations — comprised mostly of quality managers in ISO 9001 user companies — were always interested, even if registrars sniffed their noses at the idea, citing it all as too much work. (Never underestimate the laziness of certification bodies.) I decided to bring the discussion to two venues: the International Association of Accredited Registrars (IAAR) and the US TAG to ISO TC 176.

The IAAR is the professional industry group whose membership is comprised of many of the world’s accredited registrars, along with a representative of ANAB and its Canadian counterpart, SCC. My discussion was met with one large “feh”. It was abundantly clear that despite statistical evidence that ISO 9001 was declining, and a prediction of registar door-closing — something that came true just a few years later — no one in the room much cared to save their own jobs. So strange and paranoid was their response, the IAAR actually put me under a verbal embargo, indicating I could not tell or write any articles about my presentation to them. (I am pretty sure that after six  years, that embargo no longer holds.)

When I joined the US TAG to ISO TC 176 - the group responsible for developing ISO 9001 itself, I gave a similar presentation. But it was put on the schedule as an off-agenda item, and was not attended by anyone in any power of the TAG — Jack West, Lori Hunt, etc. were all off doing their own things. So naturally, as shocked as my little audience was to hear that ISO 9001 was dying, and CMMI presented the way to fix it, my proposal never got put on the table as anything to take serious.

An interesting aside, though: my proposal was the initial driver which formed the sub-committee to create a crosswalk between ISO 9001 and the CMMI. I attended the first meeting, but not being an IT professional, I did not take a leadership role and as a result my name appears nowhere on the final document eventually released by SEI. I mention this only as evidence that my little discussion on the impending growth of CMMI and the things we can learn from it, had some impact in the ISO and CMMI worlds.

My appearance at the US TAG was too late to affect the upcoming revised standard which would later be released as ISO 9001:2008. It had already been decided that every other standard would be a major revision, and nothing should be done to tinker with the ISO 9001:2000 too much at that time. I then proposed that we adopt the maturity model concept for whatever would follow ISO 9001:2008 (presumably ISO 9001:2012). I received no support from the leadership, and I suspect that much of this was due to (a) an uncomfortable lack of familiarity with CMMI by the leadership, and (b) the natural tendency of the US TAG to move glacially slow and respond only to the direction given to it by 2 or 3 key members, all who have their own motivations.

In the long term, however, failing to adopt a maturity model to ISO 9001 will ultimately lead to the CMMI eclipsing it entirely. ISO may lose power as well, as there will be no reason whatsoever for SEI to let loose the reins of its monopoly and let ISO start making money selling CMMI standards. The entire US TAG — and the entire TC 176 — will be left out of the development of the next generation of quality management system standards. And what of ASQ? It will be spelled S - E - I.

As it did in 2004, my solution remains the same. TC 176 needs to stop work right now on whatever it is planning for 2012 (which, face it, won’t be released until 2014 at best anyway) — and start talking to smart folks about adopting a maturity model for ISO 9001 that not only re-popularizes the standard, but makes it easier and more accessible to organizations who so desperately need it. If any quality professionals or TAG members want to be purely selfish, they can view it as a way to save their lofty positions and lucrative book contracts.

Take the best of CMMI and apply it to ISO 9001, or CMMI will just take over ISO 9001.

Is anyone listening?

We will find out. A copy of this article is being sent to the International Accreditation Forum (IAF), ISO TC 176 leadership and Alka Jarvis, current Chair of the US TAG.

Anyone interested in a more detailed (albeit boring) model of what ISO 9001 would look like as a Management Maturity Model can download the original “10 Steps to Save ISO 9001″ presentation and jump to page 51.

(Christopher Paris is VP Operations and founder of Oxebridge, having worked with ISO 9001 since its inception in 1988. To date he has personally implemented over 150 ISO 9001, AS9100 and related quality management systems.)