ISO 9000 Quality Assurance
ISO 9000 is a set of standards developed by the ISO (international organization for standardization) for quality assurance systems. It was first published in 1987 and the standards were modified in 1994. ISO 9000 serves as a true base for organizations to improve their quality assurance systems.A quality assurance system involves the organizational structure, duties, procedures, processes, and materials for applying quality management. It is designed to help businesses assure their services and products, and please customer hopes by meeting their specifications. Quality assurance covers all activities of a product?s life cycle, including planning, controlling, measuring, testing and reporting, and improving quality levels.ISO 9000 quality assurance models view an enterprise as a network of interconnected processes. For a quality system to be ISO-compliant, the processes should address areas known in the standard and should be documented and practiced as described. Documenting a process gives an organization the opportunity to understand, control, and improve its process network.ISO quality assurance is a management activity that contains auditing and reporting actions. These two functions assist the manager to verify the efficiency of the quality system. ISO 9000 expresses quality assurance resources in general terms that can be used by any organization irrespective of the products or services provided. However, ISO 9000 does not explain how a business should apply these quality system elements.Most companies first attempt to get certified to one of the quality assurance system models in the ISO 9000 series. For this, the company?s quality system and actions are audited by third party auditors for conformity to the standard and for effective operation. Upon successful certification, the company obtains a certificate from a certification body represented by the auditors.