Professional Communication Essay

The reasoning behind ISO 9000 certification in manufacturing is to ensure uniformity in processes as an assurance of levels of quality. By creating sets of standards to which the manufacturing process must adhere, only acceptable product is released for shipment or sale. With the development of and subsequent compliance with ISO-9000 standards in mind, it is critical to construct a realistic and effective ISO standard. The cornerstone of this construction is the charter documentation. Just as the ISO standard itself is used as a quality control measure, the charter is a control method for the formulation of the standard itself. Basically, ISO in manufacturing is intended to cover two major areas- people and processes. Without giving personnel the proper training to carry out the standard, the processes will not be reflective of the quality standards brought forth by ISO. For these reasons, charters must be carefully developed in a multi-faceted approach. Charters are typically most effective when driven from the managerial/supervisory level from the beginning. In regard to this managerial input in the chartering process, management should detail their responsibility in the ISO program. This will achieve two very important things- it will be a reasonable assurance that the charter reflects the overall initiatives of the organization as envisioned by management and will show the subsequent lower levels of company hierarchy that this is something that management is taking a part in and not merely issuing a mandate without leadership by example. Just as management has to have a level of responsibility in the charter, the individuals who are involved in more of the hands-on aspects of production need to make a contribution to the charter. The insight that production personnel will be able to provide in the creation of a useful charter is vast. These individuals have seen the best and worst of the actual manufacturing that goes on daily; as such, best practices can be incorporated into the charter from the start. Design control must also have a place in the charter document; from the outset, of course the charter will correspond to existing product; in the case of new product development as an example, designs must fall under the same requirements as does a long-standing product. The same would apply to modifications of existing product. Document and data control are essential elements of the charter; being able to achieve uniformity and quality in the ways that work orders, shipping documentation, product specifications and purchase orders are created and processed will aid in the carry through of quality standards beyond the shop floor and into the administrative and clerical areas of the manufacturing facility. Up to this point, the charter has been considered in terms of how it will correspond to things being done correctly. Just as important is the consideration of what will be done when inevitable errors and problems arise. For these occurrences the proper planning and execution of corrective actions, as well as follow up to assure that the original error does not become a repeat event, can be incorporated into the charter. In this case, malfunctions are accounted for in addition to best practices. After the charter’s collaborators, scope and purpose is in place, the launch of the charter comes into play. The document itself begins with a clearly stated purpose which can literally be understood by those of technical and non-technical backgrounds alike. Not only can the words be understood in terms of what they explicitly say, but also easily lend themselves to adaptability on the part of the audience; in other words, the words can be processed in the mind of the audience and they can then begin the thought process of exactly what the Charter will ultimately mean to their job tasks, and most likely open up a dialogue among the audience members in regard to how they will all collaborate, with the Charter as a framework, for the achievement of quality objectives as required. If looking at nothing else but the intended use and audience of the Charter, the strengths are many. In fairness, however, some weaknesses likewise exist. Audience is perhaps the most important consideration in the production of any technical document, and especially in the case of the ISO Charter, not only because of the fact that this document, by its nature of being a quality control document should set an example for quality and would discredit the ISO process if it was not of the highest quality, but also because of the fact that the Charter is intended to be used by a huge variety of manufacturers, quite literally around the world. Because of these audience factors, the Charter often is interpreted not only according the particular industry that it will be dictating to, but also translated into different languages for different nations, and comprehension levels; for example, an automobile manufacturer in France will be using the same base document, in the form of the ISO Charter, as would a paper mill in Mexico- different industries, different cultures, and possibly even different educational levels and therefore levels of reading comprehension. Because of this, the demographic element of the audience for this particular document deserves additional discussion. The ISO Charter, by necessity and purpose, has to possess a sort of universal quality in terms of its intended audience; as was previously mentioned, the document will at any given time be used by any given industry in any given part of the world, creating operational and cultural variations that must be taken into account. Further, even within one organization itself, the Charter will have to be flexible in its target audience, which is better understood with a brief description of how an ISO Charter may be utilized at varying authority levels in the same operation. Initially, the Charter would be reviewed by the upper management, possibly delegated to middle management, and ultimately to the rank and file. This being understood, it is also important to understand that everyone must be able to interpret it and adapt what it teaches for their own uses if it is to achieve the ultimate goals that led to the adaptation of the Charter in the first place. The close relationship between the charter and the subsequent ISO standards that will branch out from it are much like blueprints from which a finished product emerges. Because the charter has multi-level participation, precise details of how all areas of the manufacturing facility will be involved in the end goal of quality in line with ISO, and controls in place in the event of errors or problems, the charter possesses the unique ability to literally instill quality in the ISO standard itself. While the viewpoint of some manufacturers is that ISO is best used as an effective means to gain competitive advantage merely by the existence of the ISO logo on finished products, the true intention of correctly used ISO standards- continuous improvement, an assured level of quality, and the means to fix whatever may jeopardize that standard of quality- seems to be more palatable to the majority of manufacturers. This is especially so given the dynamic nature of the competition in some industries. Guided by an efficient charter, the ISO standard can be properly formulated and enacted over the long term in pursuit of quality objectives.