- The Case Against ISO 9000 – out now!
- The Vanguard Standards available FREE
- Is this a U-turn?
- Vanguard Standards being translated in to Japanese
******* Special issue – ISO 9000: 2000 *******To coincide with the launch of ‘The Case Against ISO 9000’ and ‘The Vanguard Standards; and in advance of the publication of ISO 9000: 2000, this issue is devoted to the Standard – please bear with me, normal service will be resumed next month.***
The Case Against ISO 9000 – out now!
‘The Case Against ISO 9000’ was published by Oak Tree Press in the last week of October. You can buy it from the Vanguard site, Amazon.co.uk and, as they say, all good bookshops. This, the second edition, contains a critique of the year 2000 revision – both its process and the result. It also contains new material on the history of ISO 9000 (‘where did we go wrong) and more recent case studies.
‘The Case Against ISO 9000’ is currently being translated in to Japanese by Takaji Nishizawa (see later). Discussions are being held about translations to other languages.
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The Vanguard Standards available FREE
The Vanguard Standards are a systems thinker’s interpretation of ISO 9001 and ISO 9004. They have been written for people who want to take a systems approach to interpretation and use of ISO 9000. The Vanguard Standards follow the same structure as ISO 9001 (2000), so it is easy for the user to compare the two. These standards have been written with the help of lead assessors who have sympathy with our views on ISO 9000. We have no doubt you will be able to influence your assessor to assess you against this application – but you will have some explaining to do because the ideas are unfamiliar to the traditional assessors.
If you want to replace the ‘specification and conformance’ philosophy with an ‘understanding and learning’ philosophy, use The Vanguard Standards – they are available for FREE.
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Some will think that the fact that Vanguard has published guidance on ISO 9000 represents a U-turn. It is not, our advice remains the same – avoid registration to ISO 9000. But the fact is that market-place coercion – ‘you comply or we won’t buy’ – is driving ISO 9000 registration. So for those who feel they have no choice, I would encourage them to use the Vanguard Standards.
ISO 9000: 2000 still contains bad theory and guidance – a summary of our main criticisms is to be published by Quality World in December and will be put on the Vanguard web site soon after.
But the new Standard does provide greater scope in interpretation, giving the user the opportunity to take a different and better (systems) approach.
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Vanguard Standards being translated in to Japanese
As well as translating ‘The Case Against ISO 9000’ in to Japanese, Takaji Nishizawa, a leading industrial consultant in Japan, has been asked by his publisher to is prepare a Japanese guide to implementing ISO 9000: 2000. This will include a Japanese translation of The Vanguard Standards. Coals to Newcastle (an English joke!)!!