Bob Wanderer wrote:
>
> ISO 9000 is simply a European scam to denude America of its
> trees (and its dollars).
>From my own experience, this conclusion is a very near-sighted and
parochial interpretation of what ISO9000 strives to achieve. While the
observation that ISO9000 merely forces a business to comply with its own
procedures is partially correct, the fact is that it does force the
business to *have* procedures. Thus, the business operation must be
understood well enough to create the procedures. Further, there are
minimum requirements in ISO9000 that any audit will verify.
I am the engineering manager for a large, high-tech sensor manufacturer.
We are both ISO9001 and QS9000 registered. ISO9001 (not ISO9000) is
required when the business also does design work. If the business is
only for manufacturing, then ISO9002 applies. QS9000 is the quality
systems specification for the automotive marketplace. You don't do
tier-one business with any automotive manufacturer (domestic or
international) today without this QS9000 approval. QS9000 is very much
like ISO9001 on steroids.
The current ISO9000 standard has been rewritten and will in the future
be known as ISO9001-2000, for the year in which the revision was
released. There are major changes, focused on verifying that continuous
improvement actually happens, not just that there procedures which are
followed. Businesses have three years to upgrade to the new standard.
The auditing to verify compliance with these standards varies with the
registrar which did the original certification. Truth is, some are
tougher than others. Our registrar audits us three times a year, each
audit taking about four to five days. These are very serious audits, and
are taken very seriously. Recent new guidelines do severely limit the
ability of the auditor to interpret non-conformances as "minor" or to
identify some non-conformances as "opportunities for improvement." The
teeth are indeed being applied to these registrations.
Bottom line is, it is my opinion that continued registration to ISO9001,
and the required upgrading to ISO9001-2000, will in fact be indicative
of improved quality. If I were buying a tower today and I had a choice
between two manufactures with equivalent products but only one was
ISO9001 registered, then I would certainly opt for that ISO registered
manufacturer. This is based on my own experience dealing with a wide
spectrum of suppliers to my own company.
We Americans are often narrow-minded and believe that we are the best at
everything. We ignored Dr. Demming, who was trying to get us to improve
manufacturing quality through statistical methods. Ignored here, he
brought these ideas to Japanese automotive manufacturers who fully
embraced them. In turn they captured a very large fraction of our US
automotive market, not because their products were less expensive, but
because their products were simply more reliable. Only much later did
American automotive manufacturers realize their mistake and undertake to
learn about and implement Demming's ideas.
If these same quality processes are being applied to radio tower design
and manufacturing, you can bet that a better product will result and we
will all benefit.
--
Best wishes,
Larry McDavid W6FUB
Anaheim, CA (20 miles southeast of Los Angeles, near Disneyland)
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