ISO 9004 - Guidance for success

When ISO 9004 was first published around three decades ago, the document focused on providing concrete assistance for users of ISO 9001 in implementing the standard's requirements. Over the years, however, the guidance has become increasingly detached from the quality management standard and is now primarily aimed at an organization's sustainable success and performance.

CONTENTS 

• A helpful classic for an organization's quality
• ISO 9004 is less well-known today
• Changed benefits of ISO 9004
• ISO 9004 - A guidance with its own structure
• ISO 9004 Guidance - Conclusion
• DQS - Pioneering role in the certification of management systems

A helpful classic for an organization's quality

Since ISO 9004 no longer focuses primarily on the quality of a company's products and services, but instead on the quality of an organization as such, i.e. the ability of the organization to be sustainably successful, the quality management guidance has moved off center stage.

The reason: with the new direction of the revision in 2009, ISO 9004 was no longer directly linked to the day-to-day business of ISO 9001 standard users. The guidance was technically revised again in 2018. The fourth edition now applies to every organization regardless of size, type, and activity. The guidance to achieve sustained success in a complex and constantly changing environment is available from the ISO website:

ISO 9004:2018 - Quality management — Quality of an organization — Guidance to achieve sustained success

ISO 9004 is less well-known today

In fact, the level of awareness of the ISO 9004:2018 guidance is rather limited worldwide today, partly because many standard users are not particularly aware of its potential benefits. The most recent revision in 2018 has therefore provided more visible (user) benefits, for example, by using a similar language to ISO 9001 and embedding its topics in the context of sustainable success, as the German Society for Quality (DGQ) put it in 2018 given the new publication. This was achieved primarily by adapting concepts and terms used in ISO 9001:2015.

Changed benefits of ISO 9004

What specific benefits can top management and managers at all levels gain from applying the ISO 9004 quality management guidance? First of all, certification in accordance with ISO 9004 is not possible because it is a set of guidelines, not rules. The document's core is aimed at systematically improving the company's overall performance. The guidelines are in line with the seven principles of quality management from ISO 9000:2015, which ISO 9001:2015 takes up in terms of content.

In Annex A, the guidelines provide a self-assessment according to the maturity model to identify the organization's strengths and weaknesses as well as best practices. The results of such a self-assessment should enable the organization to prioritize, plan, and implement appropriate continuous improvement actions as required. The intention behind this is to significantly increase the organizational performance of the management system.

While ISO 9001 is primarily aimed at quality management officers who are to implement or maintain a quality management system, ISO 9004 is more of a tool for further developing an existing management system or for setting up an integrated management system. ISO 9004 also focuses on excellence models such as EFQM or TQM and can, in principle, also be used entirely without the ISO 9001 standard.

ISO 9004 - A guidance with its own structure

The structure of the ISO 9004 guidance does not follow the High-Level Structure (Harmonized Structure), which is a strong indication of the document's independence. However, some of the key requirements from the main clauses refer, at least indirectly, to ISO 9001:2015. For example, Clause 4,"Quality of an organization and sustained success," requires the application of the quality management principles from ISO 9001, particularly with regard to customer orientation and relationship management, the keyword being "interested parties."

However, ISO 9004 goes one step further than the QM standard ISO 9001 and requires organizations to attempt to "anticipate the needs and expectations of interested parties ".

The content of the other clauses in ISO 9004:2018 is also very similar to that of ISO 9001:2015. Although they are numbered differently and are less oriented towards day-to-day operations, they are more in-depth and contain comparatively more detailed explanations.

This can be seen very clearly in Clause 6, "Identity of an organization," where the focus is on terms such as the mission, vision, values, and culture of an organization and, among other things, a corresponding policy, strategy, and objectives are addressed, taking into account internal and external issues. Clause 7, "Leadership," also goes into more depth than the corresponding standard requirements in ISO 9001:2015, which perfectly illustrates the nature of the guidance as a good aid on the way to an organization with sustained success.

ISO 9004 - Conclusion

ISO 9004 can be an invaluable guide for companies of all sizes and industries when top management and executives are looking to improve their organizational quality and strive for sustainable success by applying its quality management system.

However, even after its revision in 2018, the document is no longer a practice-oriented guide to implementing the standard requirements of ISO 9001, as it once was in the 1990s.

DQS - pioneering the certification of management systems -

DQS, the "Deutsche Gesellschaft zur Zertifizierung von Managementsystemen," was founded in 1985 by DGQ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Qualität e.V.) and DIN (Deutsches Institut für Normung e.V.) as Germany's first management system certification body.

We are the only major certification body to focus on management systems and processes, and we have played a pioneering role in this for many years. In 1986, DQS issued Germany's first certificate in accordance with ISO 9001, the world's most important standard for management systems.

In 1991, DQS was the first certification body in Germany to be accredited for ISO 9001/2/3 by the then TGA GmbH (today: Deutsche Akkreditierungsstelle GmbH, DAkkS). Today, our range of services covers around 200 international regulations and national standards. Our claim always begins where checklists end. Take us at our word!

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