ISO 9001 and Lean Friends, Not Foes, For Providing Efficiency and Customer Value

ISO 9000 is a comprehensive set of international standards for quality management and quality assurance. These standards ensure that companies effectively document all aspects of their quality management to show transparency and efficiency within all processes. They are not industry specific and pertain to organizations of any size.

Continuous improvement is a key facet of the ISO 9001 standard (the particular standard that specifies requirements for a quality management system), but it does not explain how to implement or maintain this improvement. Lean production methodologies surely provide this crucial and tactical information. Adding Lean production methodologies to quality management systems effectively focuses these improvement activities. In the long run, it will save companies much time and money.

This book, written in the novel format, discusses the symbiotic relationship between ISO 9001 and Lean as both can be seamlessly integrated. It shows how Lean provides the process improvements that are required by the ISO 9001 quality management system ? Lean is crucial for identifying and removing waste from your processes, which ultimately creates greater customer value. In addition, the book shows the crucial financial benefits of this integration. This novel clearly illustrates that these two systems can function effectively is one understands the complex balance of standardization and change. ISO 9001 is clearly controlled and audited while Lean is often empowering, less meticulously audited, and rarely controlled.

While presenting interesting characters and interactions, this fictional story embeds real-life manufacturing speak with a message of the importance of successful synergy between Lean practitioners, production leaders, and quality departments.

About the Author. Preface. Chapter 1 AOP: Acronym-o-phobia. Chapter 2 The Real Issue. Chapter 3 ISO What?Chapter 4 Lean on Me When You’re Not Strong. Chapter 5 It’s Not Always Bad to Bring Work Home with You. Chapter 6 One for All and All for One. Chapter 7 Friends at Last. Chapter 8 Keep Things Rolling. Chapter 9 Letting off Some Steam. Chapter 10 Getting Total Leadership Buy-In. Chapter 11 History Repeats Itself; Historians Repeat Each Other. Chapter 12 Excellence in Leadership.

With over 30 years in manufacturing, Doug has had the privilege to work for three different Fortune 500 companies, with an array of leadership roles in most all areas of manufacturing, engineering, purchasing and supply chain, including over five years of landed experience in mainland China. With a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering and a Master of Science in Industrial Manufacturing Systems Engineering, he has been fortunate to be able to implement these systems and tools studied into a wide variety of industries -- automotive, electrical/electronics, film, industrial, medical and bio-processing industries. Clearly improving processes in a controlled manner in these industries is utterly essential.

Whether as a 3^rd shift Supervisor in a Union environment inspiring his team to enthusiastically implement the Theory of Constraints, a Manufacturing Manager driving plant layout and one-piece flow, a Supply Chain Manager implementing factory worker visibility and leadership of inventory conditions in each warehouse, or a Vice President opening up a greenfield ISO-13485 manufacturing site in a foreign land, he knows the value of employee engagement combined well with a system that helps make sure we do what maintains the integrity of our defined processes.

Doug is a native Iowan, an avid fan of StrengthsFinder for over 20 years, a professional photographer, a cancer survivor, and a Christ follower. Doug has had leadership roles in a variety of other institutions, including church planting and eldership, a stint as a public Charter School Board Chairman, and is a husband and father of a bi-racial family with three wonderful children.