Wondering About How Long to Get ISO 9001 Certification for Your Organization?

Are you wondering what will be the right way to improve your business process? Well, obtaining an ISO 9001 certification may help you. The ISO 9001 standard is globally acknowledged for QMS (Quality Management Systems). Implementing the ISO 9001 standard in your business procedure shows that all the services and products your business delivers are safe and high-quality, meeting customer demands. Getting your organization ISO 9001 certified can benefit it in numerous ways. But how long to get ISO 9001 certification?

Well, if you’re considering leveraging the full benefits of the ISO 9001 certification, you may think about how long it needs to achieve and maintain it. Many businesses fail to achieve the ISO 9001 certification because they fear the process might be longer than they expect. Though the process for obtaining an ISO 9001 certification involves lengthy consultations, they all depend on your business process.

Want to know more about how long it’ll take for your organization to get ISO 9001 certified and if you can shorten the period? Let’s dive into the following blog post and learn more.

What are the factors determining the length of the ISO 9001 certification process?

Getting your organization ISO 9001 certified depends on numerous things.

The biggest one among them is how your organization is preparing for the audit process.

Obtaining an ISO 9001 certification involves different components, including building your QMS, implementing that across your organizational levels, and documenting everything about that.

Many organizations wonder about how long it takes to complete the entire process.

Well, it’d depend on lots of factors, including the following ones:

1.Your current QMS

To understand the status of your organization when implementing the ISO 9001 standard in your business, measure your company’s QMS against the ISO 9001 standard by conducting a “GAP ANALYSIS.”

It’s an audit performed to check what parts of the ISO 9001 standard your organization is already complying with and where the shortcomings are.

It can further help you plan the timeline for your ISO 9001 implementation project.

2.QMS scope complexities

The more complex your business’s QMS scope is, the more time it would take to implement the ISO 9001 standard.

Since the ISO 9001 standard is engineered to be implemented in every organization regardless of their types and sizes, there’s a possibility that not all parts of the standard apply to your organization and can be excluded (with a proper justification) during the implementation process.

If this is the scenario, it can eventually reduce the ISO 9001 certification time.

Alongside that, documentation is another factor.

If the paperwork for your brand is larger and more complex, it can make the ISO 9001 certification process lengthier.

3.Number of sites

The number of locations your organization has can also affect the time of ISO 9001 certification.

The more locations, the more time it’d take.

However, you can decide what locations to include in your QMS scope, but ensure not to exclude something just because you can do it.

You must carefully check the integrity of the management system beforehand.

4.Internal resources

Internal resources are also a big factor affecting the ISO 9001 certification time for organizations.

It includes the time your personnel can dedicate to specific tasks and projects surrounding your QMS.

If you can determine what internal resources you’ve got to implement the ISO 9001 standard in your organization, it’d give you a better idea of the estimated timeline for the process.

Employee training will also be beneficial to get the employee familiar with the ISO 9001 standard.

5.Assistance and tools

Looking for specific tools and assistance can also help you make the ISO 9001 certification process more effective and efficient.

A professionally documented and designed ISO 9001 QMS can save you lots of time that you might have to spend designing your QMS through several trials and documenting the system.

6.Availability of the registrar

Lastly, the availability of the registrar can also affect the time of the ISO 9001 certification process for your organization.

Usually, a certification body requires about 3 months of documentation to evaluate whether the QMS is running sufficiently or not.

Can you get your organization ISO 9001 certified within a short time?

Most companies wonder if they can shorten the estimated timeline for their ISO 9001 certification process.

Well, the short answer is, YES, YOU CAN.

However, you must meet the following conditions to speed up the ISO 9001 certification process for your organization:

1.Your business procedures must be relatively straightforward, not excessively complicated, as complex procedures take more time to implement the ISO 9001 standard.

2.The smaller the business, the less time it would take to implement the ISO 9001 standard.

3.Providing unrestricted access to all your personnel by allowing them to walk around the organization, develop, review, and implement the QMS without any interruptions and/or delays can also speed up the ISO 9001 implementation process.

4.Ensuring that the senior management team of your organization is totally committed to quality management, customer focus, obtaining the ISO 9001 certification, and continual improvement of the business process.

5.If the business is currently operating only from one location, it won’t take much longer to obtain the ISO 9001 certification. But if it has more than one operating location, it’ll take time to get ISO 9001 certified.

6.Conducting the ISO 9001 stage 1 and stage 2 audit processes consecutively can also reduce the time of the ISO 9001 certification process. However, to do this, the auditor must be confident in the QMS design of the company and ensure that it meets the latest ISO 9001 requirements without non-conformances.

7.Ensuring that your employees respond on time to any requests for information the ISO 9001 auditor may have, including the review and approval of documentation and updating applicable documentation with information specific to employee training or equipment tests.

8.If the certification body has an auditor available at short notice to conduct a certification body audit for the ISO 9001 QMS to check compliance, then it’ll be faster for you to obtain the certification.

9.Lastly, if your ISO 9001 auditor is ready to work after hours or on the weekends to review documentation, internal audits, and review meetings, then it’d be faster for your business to obtain the ISO 9001 certification. However, working without rest can also lead to errors!

Take away

Are you wondering what would be the right way to improve your business process? Well, getting your organization ISO 9001 certified by passing the ISO 9001 audit process may help you. The ISO 9001 certification can also benefit your organization in numerous ways. However, you should also consider how long to get ISO 9001 certification and the factors that might affect the estimated period for the ISO 9001 certification process for your organization. We hope this blog post can help you understand that.