Management Reviews are an opportunity to evaluate the systems and controls that are in place, to review feedback, make improvements and track corrective action, to assure that changes are monitored, reported and evaluated, and to determine the overall effectiveness of the quality programme (QMS).
The management review should include representation from Top Management, functional managers, facility managers, line managers, process owners, process users and action owners.
Management reviews are required to evaluate the continuing suitability, adequacy and effectiveness of the quality management system. Here's what ISO 9001:2015 is really all about: defining a policy, creating a plan devising with relevant objectives. You then implement the system according to the plan. You then begin auditing, monitoring and measuring performance against the plan and reacting to your findings.
The management review process is a platform for determining and providing the resources needed to implement and maintain the quality management system, to continually improve its effectiveness, and to better meet customer requirements.
By considering each section of the system at the review meeting, Top management can make decisions as to what changes need to be made (if any) to ensure the management system will continue to work effectively.
ISO standards state the frequency or intervals of reviews must be defined in the QMS by the Management Team.
Management reviews are conducted regularly using the data collected from the monitoring and measurement process to identify areas for further improvement.
The process is driven by the continuous assessment of the risks related to internal and external changes and performance-related issues.
Every time management staff convene to review and react to performance, it should be considered as a management review and documented as such, e.g., agenda, minutes or action list. Whether they are reviewing an individual's performance, departmental programmes and production rates, etc., this should be considered as a valid management review.
Performance metrics need be monitored with varying frequencies, some hourly, some daily, some weekly and some monthly. To manage this, some companies have multiple review levels, whereby, each review may require multiple subjects and rely upon multiple metrics as inputs, with the full review cycle of the QMS occurring annually.
Sometimes subjects are reviewed at more than one level, e.g., production numbers might be reviewed by the Production teams during daily production meetings and then by Senior management, possibly during weekly quality review meetings. Top management might conduct weekly meetings in which they review metrics and objectives to determine if any corrective action is required.
The frequency of management reviews might be weekly, monthly, quarterly, six monthly or annually. You may decide to have stand-alone management reviews or combine it with other business activities, e.g., strategic planning, business planning, operations meetings, process reviews/councils or functional reviews. Annual management reviews are terribly inadequate!
It is not a mandatory requirement to document the management review process for achieving ISO 9001:2015 certification, however, we find it useful for the business and recommend you develop and implement a Management Review Procedure that defines:
Customer feedback, audit findings & audit results (using a gap analysis tool or internal audit checklist), as well as Internal and external issues should be discussed by the management team; processes performance, quality objectives, preventive actions, recommendations for improvement - and their potential effect on the strategic direction of the organization.
The management review meetings must address the possible need for changes to policy, objectives, targets, and other elements of the quality management systems (QMS).The management review process must ensure that the necessary information is collected ahead of time to allow management to effectively carry out this evaluation.
All management reviews must be documented. Observations, conclusions, and recommendations for further necessary action from the review must be recorded. If any corrective action or preventive actions must be taken, the management team should follow up to ensure that the action was effectively implemented.
The purpose and final outcome of the management review should be continual improvement of the quality system (QMS) using recommendations for improvement. As your organization’s quality management systems increases in its effectiveness and efficiency, your environmental management performance will likewise increase.
The subparagraphs of ISO 9001:2015 Clause 9.3.2 provide a standing agenda framework for management reviews that should be adapted to meet the QMS, these are expanded upon below. The management review process must ensure that the necessary information is collected ahead of time to allow management to effectively carry out this evaluation.
The results of the analysis and evaluation (Clause 9.1.3) should be made available to the Top management for their review in order to evaluate any identifiable characteristics or trends that could potentially lead to a nonconformity occurring.
Enhanced details for management review input requirements, including those related to cost of poor quality, effectiveness, efficiency, conformance, feasibility assessments, customer satisfaction, performance against maintenance objectives, warranty performance, review of customer scorecards, and the identification of potential field failures through risk analysis.
The above should be considered the minimum information that should be covered during management review; a monitoring system should be in place, with criteria that trigger special unplanned management review activities.
Ideally, review’s facilitators (often the Chair Person or the Management Representative) will guide the meeting but the individual process owners of the topic being discussed should present and discuss the data being reviewed. Following each formal presentation, the participating managers discuss the issues, compare their status and performance with preceding periods, in order to identify areas where improvement is required.
The inputs required for the management review process must be clearly defined in the form of an agenda for each meeting. By considering each section of the QMS at the review meeting, management can make decisions as to what changes need to be made (if any) to ensure the system will continue to work effectively.
The outputs of the previous management meeting (action items) become inputs to the next meeting. Status of actions from previous meeting (open/closed) from previous meeting(s), ageing profile of open actions.
Refer to minutes from previous meeting. For items that are still open, transfer to new actions on last page with appropriate comments.
Changes in external and internal issues that are relevant to the quality management system (Clause 4.1), changes to internal/external requirements, e.g., policies, processes, procedures, methods, instructions, contracts, regulation, legislation, etc. that impact the QMS.
Highlight any product, process, capacity, or other operational or organizational changes that affect the quality system; and proposes specific actions to update or modify the system in response to these changing circumstances
Information on the performance and effectiveness of the QMS (Clause 4.4), data analysis of trends to identify strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for improvement in:
Customer satisfaction and feedback from relevant interested parties (Clause 9.1.2), e.g., interviews, questionnaires and surveys, report cards, indicators, ratings, complaints and compliments.
Discuss customer feedback, customer satisfaction survey results, staff suggestions, and complaints, including
Quality objectives established through the review period are systematically evaluated to assess progress. Objectives that have been achieved may be upgraded to a higher performance level, or be closed out to free resources for improvement in another area.
When objectives are not achieved on time, the review investigates and determines causes for the failure to achieve the objectives. New objectives are established where it is necessary to improve performance or quality system to fulfil the quality policy or other organizational goals or aspirations. New objectives are documented in the minutes of the review.
Product conformity looks at product defects, error trends, first pass quality and field issues. Process performance and conformity of products and services (Clauses 4.4, 8.6 & 8.7).
Assemble inspection reports, nonconformance reports, and corrective measures. Include corrective action implementation and effectiveness data.
Nonconformities and the status of corrective actions (Clause 10.2), e.g., analysis of nonconformity by type, process, area, root cause, etc.
Review findings for trends and underlying issues.
Analysis of appropriate data (Clause 9.1.3) arising from monitoring and measurement (Clause 9.1.1) in order to evaluate trends in metrics and performance.
Highlight the accomplishments of the goals, their effect within the organization and the improvement it has contributed to the results and any problems encountered in their achievement.
Audit results (Clause 9.2), e.g., achievement of the audit programme, areas of good practice, nonconformity profile (number, type, process, area, significance), status of corrective action, audit close out, external audit findings.
Evaluate all audit reports collectively to uncover trends or OFIs that are not apparent in the individual audit reports, including any results from other audit activities such as third-party inspections, customer visits and supplier audits. Provide a comparative analysis of previous audit results with trends of nonconformities, analysis of the trends, and the top 5 audit findings for the period.
Performance of external providers (Clause 8.4), e.g., dashboards, scorecards, performance indicators, performance trends, right first time, on time delivery, escapes to the customer, complaint profile, returns/rejections.
Discuss issues regarding suppliers of critical materials, hardware or software. Review supplier performance and any quality or delivery issues. Review open supplier corrective action notices issued since last meeting. Note any trends for individual suppliers. Indicate changes of supplier status or restrictions.
Adequacy of resources (Clause 7.1), including people (number, roles, competency etc.), infrastructure (buildings, equipment, systems, transport etc.), working environment (physical and human factors, monitoring and measuring equipment (availability, fit for purpose, maintained).
Consider any changes in the volume and scope of work. Discuss resource needs for each of the following points above.
Effectiveness of actions taken to address risks and opportunities (Clause 6.1), e.g., risk profile, risk register(s), status of open/closed actions, ageing profile of open actions, evaluation of effectiveness.
Opportunities for improvement (Clause 10.1), corrective action, good practice, best practice, innovation, lessons learned, etc.; recommendations for improvement, including customer related requirements, and resource needs.
All management reviews must be documented. Observations, conclusions, and recommendations for further necessary action from the review must be recorded. If any corrective action must be taken, Top Management should follow up to ensure that the action was effectively implemented.
Make decisions and take actions based on evidence, balanced with experience and intuition. Even though process owners should address customer performance issues related to the processes they manage, this requirement gives Top management has the clear and ultimate responsibility to address customer performance
issues and ensure the effectiveness of corrective actions and evidence of decisions relating to:
It is critical that your organization addresses any quality objectives that are not met. These must be discussed during the management review and a resulting action plan with dates of follow-up for checking must be agreed and documented in the management review minutes.
These improvement actions are often formulated as quality objectives with specific measurable targets, due dates, assignments of responsibilities, and allocation of resources for their implementation.
All the Inputs and Outputs are covered in our Management Review Template.
The management review process can be measured by assessing the effectiveness of key decisions/outputs; e.g. budgetary changes, forecasts, revised resources plans or changes to the quality policy or objectives.
Management review outputs are intended to improve your business; certification body auditors will look for evidence that this is being achieved for international standards.
Updated: 09th February 2024
Author: Richard Keen
Richard is our Compliance Director, responsible for content & product development.
But most importantly he is ISO's biggest fanboy and a true evangelist of the standards.
Learn more about Richard
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ISO 9001 Management Review Template
The purpose of this template is to define your organization’s process for undertaking management reviews in order to assess the effectiveness of the application of your quality management system and its compliance to ISO requirements.
This procedure defines the responsibilities for planning, conducting, reporting results and retaining associated records.
Everything you need to prepare for, manage and document your Management Reviews without missing a single input or output.
ISO 9001 + ISO 14001 IMS Management Review Template
Everything you need to prepare for, manage and document your Management Reviews without missing a single input or output.
ISO 9001 + ISO 45001 IMS Management Review Template
Everything you need to prepare for, manage and document your Management Reviews without missing a single input or output.
ISO 9001 + ISO 14001 + ISO 45001 IMS Management Review Template
Everything you need to prepare for, manage and document your Management Reviews without missing a single input or output.
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