During the second half of 2009, Clearmake Waste Water Treatment and Recycling Solutions will achieve accreditation for the international standard for quality management systems – ISO9001:2008.
Quality
For any business starting down the road of Quality Management, it is possible to feel that quality, cost, timeliness and productivity are entities which frequently conflict with one another, necessitating trade-offs.
Certainly, it is possible to improve quality if more money is spent. Every engineer knows how to improve quality through greater expense. We can lower the cost of the product by cheapening it. We can get to market sooner if we skip a few steps (at the expense of quality), or spend more money to speed up certain activities.
In the current economic climate, many businesses are trading off quality, for reduced cost and timing, believing this is a necessary evil in order to remain competitive. While some trade-off is acceptable, the present view of some industry participants is somewhat myopic.
At Clearmake, we see this as a time to implement a long-term quality management strategy which can be integrated with our current product offer.
The vision is to use an accredited quality management system to produce water treatment and recycling systems of a consistently high quality, at prices which are acceptable to the market.
ISO9001:2008
An entire industry has been developed to support the implementation and accreditation of the ISO9001:2008 standard. Once implemented, the standard sets requirements across an entire business:
- Document control Management responsibility
- Resource management
- Product realisation
- Measurement, analysis and improvement
While any quality system, on its own, will not lead to automatic improvement, it is a proven means by which a more systematic approach to business improvement can be developed.
Quality Management
An accredited quality management system is one which seeks to evaluate how and why things are done within a business. It consists of an organisational structure together with the documentation, processes and resources used to achieve quality objectives and to meet customer requirements.
While implementing a quality system costs time and money, it should be viewed in the same way as any other investment. For Clearmake, a quality management system will provide the means to improve the systems of the business as the business grows. Therefore, the investment of time and thousands of dollars is a function of the ability to maximize the potential of the growth which the company is currently experiencing.
Improvement to the bottom line may be the most desirable of outcomes, but this cannot be possible without providing an improved and accredited product to our clients. Promotion of ISO9001:2008 accreditation can be summarized as improved effectiveness in the enhancement of customer satisfaction by meeting customer requirements.
For us at Clearmake, there can be no trade-offs or compromise. ISO9001:2008 accreditation will form part of a reason for Clearmake to remain respected as an industry benchmark and a reliable supplier to the businesses of their clients.