If you are trading in consumer goods and wish to maintain a superior brand, having a stellar quality management system is key. China hosts the most consumer goods and manufacturers. However, there have been some concerns over the quality of some of its products over the past.
Most businesses are now going global, which will increase their need to source international suppliers, especially from China. While they can procure internal quality management systems, they may not effectively inspect the quality of imports.
This is why companies need to invest their resources in a reputable third-party quality management system provider.
What is a Quality Management System?
A Quality Management System, often denoted as QMS, refers to a set of rules defined by policies, responsibilities, documented information, and records for achieving quality delivery of products and services. The concept began following the American response to the Japanese quality revolution.
A company’s quality management system needs to be relevant and product or service-specific. Therefore, organizations tailor their quality management systems based on the product or service and their objectives.
However, there is a set of international standard guidelines, with the most recent being ISO 9001:2015. These general guidelines help to ensure that even as organizations tailor their quality management systems based on their objectives, they do not alienate the elements of a good QMS. A comprehensive quality management system should address all the requirements set out in the ISO 9001 guidelines.
The Principles of a Quality Management System
According to the most widely accepted international QMS standards, ISO 9001:2015, a sound quality management system is based on a set of seven principles. These principles are also reflected in the preceding quality management systems standards and include:
- Customer focus
- Leadership
- Engagement of the people
- Process approach
- Continuous improvement
- Evidence-based decision making
- Relationship management
Customer Focus
The main objective of quality management is to meet and exceed the needs of customers. However, if the QMS will achieve the goal, it should first focus on determining these customer requirements and concentrate on improvement. Customer focus paves the way for the attraction and retention of customers by creating value for them.
You can measure and monitor the level of customer satisfaction, take action on improvement, and communicate customer expectations to its entire team. The company should understand that profitability comes from customer satisfaction, thus identifying its direct and indirect customers and their requirements.
Leadership
The top management must establish the right environment, sense of direction, and unity to motivate its team to develop quality objectives.
The move improves communication within your organization and facilitates the coordination of processes.
The organization and its people can better deliver expectations and increase the effectiveness of quality delivery.
Leaders should assume the tasks of creating a culture of integrity and trust in the organization and encourage commitment to quality product and service delivery.
Engagement of the People
The people are the most critical asset of your organization, and the entity should ensure they are competent and continuously empowered. Qualified personnel enables the organization to achieve its quality objectives. Individuals at all levels should be recognized and involved in the management of the organization.
Engagement of the people improves their understanding of organizational quality objectives and enhances their creativity, personal development, and satisfaction. You can purpose to recognize individuals’ contribution to improvement and conduct satisfaction surveys.
Process Approach
Every activity that requires inputs and generates output is a process. The input and output do not always have to be physical. The inputs of one process are usually the output of another, so what’s important is to understand that consistent results are realized by understanding and managing all interrelated processes.
An efficient QMS will comprise different processes and will thrive on understanding their interactions to optimize its overall performance. The organization should define the QMS’s objectives and the underlying strategies for achieving them.
Continuous Improvement
A company can only survive the industry if it takes effort to get better continuously. Therefore, your company’s quality management system should focus on improving their product and service delivery over time. Improvement helps the company maintain its level of performance top-notch and also unleash opportunities.
The organization can focus on training and education of personnel at all levels and support improvement objectives. These improvement initiatives should have track times and review the results.
Evidence-based Decision Making
Decisions made in quality management systems are usually based on facts and evidence. Data should be understood, analyzed, and evaluated for better objectivity and confidence in the ultimate decisions.
The organization should make necessary data available, monitor and measure the key performance indicators, and analyze data with competent people and valid methods. This principle helps to improve the decision-making process and the ability to reconsider or challenge previous decisions.
Relationship Management
Organizations thrive on the efficient management of their relationship with other interested parties. Your organization can foster and sustain success by forging healthy relationships with suppliers and optimize their impact on quality product and service delivery.
Relationship management ensures there is a common goal with interested parties and a flawless supply chain.
Why You Need a Third-Party Quality Management System Solutions
While your company can set up a quality management system based on the seven principles, it may not achieve a third-party QMS solution’s quality standards.
Your company’s quality management system is an internal audit and mainly focuses on the company processes and quality management rules. Therefore, if you rely on international suppliers and source goods from China, your internal audit system may not help your company achieve its quality objectives.
A third-party quality management system provides you with the industry standards for quality control. These companies have teams of objective personnel experienced across diverse product lines, which helps your company have an added value for quality issues.
Contracting these companies comes at a cost, although ignoring these significant expenses could even cost your company more. Low-quality products can negatively impact consumer relationships, soil your brand name, and high operational costs.
According to the Consumer News and Business Channel’s 2019 findings, between 5-10% of goods bought in stores are returned, and the percentage rises to between 10% and 15% for online purchases.
Further, the delivery costs of returns in 2017 in the United States amounted to $350 billion. By that time, the figure was projected to be increasing consistently, and the estimates indicated that it could be $550 billion by 2020.
Another research indicated that companies without proper quality management systems incur low-quality costs of up to 20% of their total sales.
Although there have been quality concerns about Chinese goods, importing consumer products from China can save you millions, provided you do not ignore your responsibility of finding a reputable quality control solutions company.
What Should You Consider When Choosing a QMS Solutions Provider?
It will help if you are sure that the company can guarantee the delivery of quality supplies. Therefore, an initial evaluation is inevitable. The review should look at the aspects of:
Compliance
You should confirm that its quality management system is compliant with the current international standards (ISO 9001:2015). Ensure that the system complies with the accepted statutory standards and it is relevant to your product or service.
Experience
Choose a company that has extensive experience helping other businesses import their supplies from China. They should have strong recommendations, including for your product category.
The Personnel
The quality management system of a company is as good as the people running it. The quality checks will not be sufficient if the people behind it lack adequate training. Ensure they have necessary training on critical areas such as the control plans, process maps, certification requirements, policies, and procedures, among others.
Many quality management system solutions can help you ensure quality supply from Chinese manufacturers, but none can quite outdo Jonble.
Conclusion
In international trade, investing in a sound quality management system is invaluable. Your company can develop its quality management system based on the current ISO 9001:2015 standards. However, such a quality management system best suits the company’s internal quality control processes.
China is home to thousands of manufacturing companies and a hub for international trade. As a result, many businesses import goods from the country. With the belief that some manufacturers do not meet the required quality standards, Chinese third-party quality control solution becomes a necessity.
Therefore, every international trader needs to find established quality control companies and select one based on their critical aspects such as experience, compliance, and training.
However, you can’t go wrong if you choose Jonble.
Our team is experienced and industry-trained and committed to efficient feedback and privacy.
Contact our team of experts today to learn more about how we can help you in quality control.