Experienced auditors can often tell within minutes whether a quality management system (QMS) is genuinely embedded in the organization or simply polished for audit day.
The ability to actually change things is what many people working in quality ultimately want from their careers, argues quality mentor Ekaterina Potemkina.
Implementing ISO/IEC 42001:2023 for the first time can involve technical, organizational, and emotional challenges, as shown in a personal account following the effort to build an AI management system inside a regional technology company.
Employees often ignore management systems not out of resistance, but because the systems are disconnected from real daily work, writes quality coach and mentor Ekaterina Potemkina.
Critical and analytical thinking remain underdeveloped skills in many audit environments, writes Jörg Westphal, managing partner at Hellmund Die Personalberater.
Organizations certified to ISO 27001 information security management systems (ISMS) may already have much of the governance structure needed for ISO 42001 AI management systems (AIMS) in place.
If certification bodies worked like grocery stores, with auditors sitting ready on shelves whenever needed, life would certainly be easier for companies.
ISO 19011:2026 could have a bigger practical impact on companies than the upcoming ISO 9001 revision because it will reshape how organizations prepare for audits and prove their management systems are effective.
Certification audits can either challenge and strengthen organizations or simply help them tick the box, and concern is growing that the latter is becoming more common.
As layers of requirements grow, audit results are becoming less consistent across organizations and markets, moving standards away from their original purpose.
Expectations of a quality role can shift sharply within the first 100 days, as early confidence gives way to the realities of how organizations actually operate.
A question raised by Kyle Chambers during a podcast prompted Michael Mills to explain how large, complex organizations can be certified to standards like ISO 9001, pointing to the need to carefully define the scope of certification.