WHY YOUR ORGANISATION DOES NOT NEED AN INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATION FOR STANDARDIZATION (ISO) CERTIFICATION
Frequently, organizations are told what to do and why they need to keep up with the joneses in the form of compliance with regulations, standards, guidelines, and legislations which could be burdensome, but it is also a necessity to avoid legal sanctions, reputation damage, and loss of revenue. What does this have to do with the ISO Standard Certification?
The ISO is a non-governmental organisation that comprises standard bodies from more than 160 countries with one standard representing each member country. For example, the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON) represents Nigeria.[1] ISO members are national standards organisations that unite in the advancement and promotion of international standards for technology, scientific testing processes, working conditions, and societal issues.
THE ISO CERTIFICATION
The ISO Certification is a certifying body’s confirmation that a service, product or system complies with the requirements of a standard.[2] It certifies that the management system, manufacturing procedure, service, documentation process has all the requirements for standardization and quality assurance[3]. Moreso, the ISO Certification is applicable to various industries and sectors such as information security, quality management, business continuity, and risk management.
WHY YOUR ORGANISATION WILL NOT BENEFIT FROM THE ISO CERTIFICATION
- It helps in identifying risks to your business and control them in a structured way. Preparing for risks assists in effective decision making, improved planning, and better relationships with employees, customers, and suppliers.[4]
- Obtaining the ISO Certification enables businesses have records to document issues that have arisen , investigate the root cause, and develop long-term solutions.
- It helps in promoting the quality management of a company that has the ISO Certification and increases sales.
- It improves the control of your business as the ISO Certification requires certified businesses to monitor, measure, analyse, evaluate the effectiveness of its quality management system. This will help your business generate performance metrics to determine the growth of the organization and areas that need improvement.
- It assists small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) gain market access across the globe. [5]
Although the ISO Certification is not mandatory as it is not a legal obligation, in some industries, customers may not work with a supplier that does not hold the ISO Certification. For example, a Fintech firm will require the ISO/IEC 27001 which is for Information Security Management Systems (ISMS) and their requirements. This shows that the firm is managing the security of its assets efficiently such as financial information, intellectual property, employee data and information entrusted by third parties. Where such Fintech organization does not have the ISO Certification, there is the possibility of its customers, vendors, and suppliers to lack confidence in the security of its assets. In a nutshell, it is important that your organization obtains the necessary ISO Certification applicable to boost its confidence as an organization, and the confidence
[1] https://www.techtarget.com/searchdatacenter/definition/ISO
[2] Ibid
[3] https://www.meadmetals.com/blog/what-exactly-is-iso-certified-and-what-does-it-mean
[4] https://www.bdc.ca/en/articles-tools/operations/iso-other-certifications/iso-advantages-quality-management
[5] https://www.iso.org/iso-and-smes.html