It seems to be a month for the Adherents of the Repeated Meme, to borrow yet another Doctor Who phrase. First we discussed the bogus claim that ISO 9001 has “always been about risk management“, then we debunked the meme that “many organizations are seeking integrated management systems.” In both cases, the argument are made without data, in defiance of actual facts and history.
Another such meme making the rounds is that ISO 9001:2015 brings “major changes.” This is made in a number of contexts, most prominently by consultants and certification bodies who hear kaching-ching and see bling-bling by scaring the devil out of everyone. (Here, here, here, here, here and here for starters.) It’s also being made by some who support the work done by the otherwise inept ISO TC 176, those responsible for the 2015 mess draft. In that context, it tries to boost TC 176’s reputation by implying, good gosh, these guys have worked hard on this thing. We can only imagine how many hotel minibars were emptied in this grand endeavor.
Meanwhile, some of us reside in the world of facts. A careful analysis of the Committee Draft of ISO 9001:2015 shows that the overwhelming bulk of work has been on merely rephrasing pre-existing requirements, without significant changes at all. The second greatest amount of work was adding in Annex SL requirements dictated to the TC 176 by ISO’s Technical Management Board (TMB), therefore representing material that TC 176 did not derive on its own. The smallest minority of work relates to the creation of new quality-related requirements, without the mandate of Annex SL.
Taking the CD and cutting out all but the requirements text (clause 1.0 through 10.0), and deleting headers, footers and page numbers, we are left with a total of 5,652 words of content. We can then break down the content into three possible classes:
- Previous requirements which have been left as-is from 9001:2008, or which only underwent wording changes, without new requirements added
- New content added by mandate of Annex SL
- New content derived solely by TC 176
In some cases, changes to pre-existing requirements were made which either coincidentally aligned with an Annex SL requirement, or Annex SL may have been informed by pre-existing 9001 requirements. In such cases, I defaulted to ranking this as “rephrasing” to give TC 176 the benefit.
As a result, here is the outcome:
To present this in an even more easy-to-understand way, I’ve color coded the actual words themselves, applying the same criteria as above. When zooming out, we see the following overall color pattern:
Click to enlarge. In case you are a stickler for detail, the file uses Arial 10 pt font, with default borders for a Letter sized page.
(Obviously I cannot share the resulting color coded file because of ISO copyright, so had to zoom out to enough to make the words intelligible. Sorry, but you have to take it up with ISO’s lawyers if you want to see a higher resolution image.)
What this means is that the huge bulk of time spent on 9001:2015 to date has been merely wordsmithing old requirements, with the rest done to placate the Annex SL mandates. There was never serious consideration given to updating 9001 to include new quality concepts, or adopting new quality management principles. The 2015 standard, which ISO admits will shape the quality world “for the next 25 years,” remains largely unchanged from its 2000 version, while the quality profession and industries move ahead, adding new technologies and approaches that ISO 9001 will forever remain ignorant of, or woefully behind.
Given that Dr. Gary Cort was active in both the project management of ISO 9001:2015 and played a role on the ISO TMB for Annex SL, as TC 176 Chairman the blame must rest with him. Better leadership could have driven TC 176 to new heights of performance, and supplied the world with a remarkable, fresh 9001 standard that addressed new technology and advances in quality thinking. Instead, we have a warmed-over standard that remains muddled on concepts such as the process approach, stuck in an era of printed documents and management-by-objectives, and lacking any appeal to progressive-minded organizations that might adopt it.
Oh, well, Dr. Cort still has his Chinese pals. They have a well-known inclination to rewriting history, so there’s still a chance he could leave a legacy.
Christopher Paris is the founder and VP Operations of Oxebridge. He has over 35 years’ experience implementing ISO 9001 and AS9100 systems, and helps establish certification and accreditation bodies with the ISO 17000 series. He is a vocal advocate for the development and use of standards from the point of view of actual users. He is the writer and artist of THE AUDITOR comic strip, and is currently writing the DR. CUBA pulp novel series. Visit www.drcuba.world
