What is an ISO 9001 Quality Manual
An ISO 9001 quality manual is a document defining an organisation’s QMS (Quality Management System). It offers guiding principles for every business area affecting our ability to create high-quality products and/or services, to fulfill the requirements of customers’ and the ISO 9001 standard. These guiding principles outline in what way our department managers will perform measures within the boundaries stated in the quality manual.
An ISO 9001 Quality Manual is a vital instrument for organisations applying for an ISO 9001 (Quality Management System) certification, as it will outline our everyday processes within the QMS.
Contents of an ISO 9001 Quality Manual
The contents of an organisation’s Quality Manual are entirely up to the individual organisation. The ISO 9001 standard does not require a quality manual to be in place, nor does it specify what should be included within it. However, 9 out of 10 companies implementing a QMS, have a quality policy in place.
Before starting to develop an ISO 9001 quality manual, it is beneficial to decide on how to structure it. It can be an advantage to structure it in the same way as the ISO 9001 standard has structured its clauses, as it makes it easy to cross reference. Given other commonly used ISO standards, such as ISO 14001 (environmental) and ISO 45001 (occupational health & safety) are structured in same way, it makes it easy to convert the quality manual into and IMS Manual later if additional standards are considered.
Some common areas that are covered in the quality manual include a reference to the Quality Policy, organisational chart, leadership and support, description of the organisation documentation structure, policy statements for all related ISO requirements and references to operating procedures used as part of the management system.
An ISO 9001 quality manual should be prepared in a way that seems fit for the organisation and in a way that is easily understandable for employees.
Using a Quality Manual Template
Rather than starting from a blank page when developing a QMS Manual, it often is beneficial to a template as a starting point. Given that a QMS Manual is bespoke to a given company, any QMS Manual Template should be edited to fit your organisation. We have both a QMS Manual available which you can use, or an IMS Manual if you have integrated 2 or more standards within your management system.
All of our documents are compliant with the following standards and we offer Management System Packages which include all of the documents required for the below 4 standards.
- ISO 9001 (Quality Management System)
- ISO 14001 (Environmental Management System)
- ISO 27001 (Information Security Management System)
- ISO 45001 (Occupational Health & Safety Management System)
If you have any questions as to where to start with your management system or the documents required, then feel free to contact us at any time.
Alternatively, if you are looking for documentation for a full management system, then you might be interested in our Management System Packages which include a range of documents at a cost-effective price.
