The next stages in the evolution of ISO 9001
The latest version of ISO 9001 was released two years ago (2008) with very minor changes to the requirements. This is in contrast to the he previous version of the standard (released in 2000) which resulted in significant changes including the introduction of an entirely new concept of a process approach. At QPRC we wanted to know what to expect from the next stages in the evolution of the requirements of ISO 9001, and invited Dr. Gary Cort who currently chairs ISO Technical Committee 176 to answer our questions: QPRC : When ISO 9001 will be updated again? Dr. Cort : If the past is any guide, then we should expect a six to eight year update cycle, which would have the next revision coming on line around 2015. While many of us in ISO Technical Committee 176 believe that we could reduce this time by half (at least), to do so will require fundamentally restructuring the standards writing process, which is completely serial today. Imagine separating the standards writing proc...