What is a management system?

What is a management system?

A management system describes the set of procedures an organization needs to follow in order to meet its objectives.

In some small organizations, there may not be an official system, just "our way of doing things", that is mostly kept in the heads of the staff.

But the larger the organization, the more likely that procedures need to be recorded to ensure everyone is clear on who does what. This process of systemizing how things are done is known as a management system.

Keeping it simple

Many ISO management system standards have the same structure and contain many of the same terms and definitions.This is particularly useful for those organizations that choose to operate a single (sometimes called “integrated”) management system that can meet the requirements of two or more management system standards simultaneously.

Management system standards

ISO management system standards provide a model to follow when setting up and operating a management system. Like all our standards, they are the result of international, expert consensus and therefore offer the benefit of global management experience and good practice.

These standards can be applied to any organisation, large or small, whatever the product or service and regardless of the sector of activity.

The benefits of an effective management system include:

• more efficient use of resources
• improved risk management, and
• increased customer satisfaction as services and products consistently deliver what they promise.

Audits

Audits are a vital part of the management system approach as they enable the company or organization to check how far their achievements meet their objectives and show conformity to the standard.

In order to help the auditing related to these standards, ISO has released ISO 19011:2011 providing specific guidance on internal and external management system audits.