ISO 9000 and Organizational Learning LO14403

Andrew Wong Hee Sing (andreww@petronas.com.my)
Fri, 18 Jul 1997 12:04:41 +0800

Replying to LO14391 --

As Gray Southon has put it:

"I agree, the logic of ISO 9000 is very compelling , but so is the logic
of a whole host of ideologies that have besett the busess community over
the past few years. Is seems that mankind, and managers in particular,
have a strong tendency to be taken of compelling logics, many of which
don't work out in practice"

It is a confusing world, with many confusing little little compelling
logics, floating everywhere.....

He further wrote:
"Can you provide information or experience that ISO 9000 does really
enhance innovation and learning in a significant number of organizations
that take it on, rather than the exceptional few. "

I wish to highlight the main differences of ISO 9000 from the rest, from
the point of view of a) System Philosophy b) Management Principles, c)
Quality or Learning Loop , but NOT from implementation perspective (which
shows excessive misuse, confusion and bureaucracy....)

a) Sound and practical Management Principles contained in ISO 9000
framework for application in any entity (organization)
b) System Philosophy hence System thinking can be applied
(provided users can be creative and pro-actively applying
the system thinking discipline)
c) Quality or Learning Loop is present, though not well
structured (as compared with ISO 14000 PDCA loop)
(hence dependent again on users and management committee
to ensure Learning Loop of issue / problems to Spiral
Organization Learning loop of System in its entirety.
d) Externally imposed discipline from Quality Auditors,
(provided organization engages qualified auditor to add
value in term of Learning for Organization, not pleasing
the auditors to maintain the certification.)
e) Due to above Framework, other equally compelling logics /
program, e.g. LO, ReEngineering, Benchmarking, 7-habits
can be "housed" for effective implementation and
genuine Learning to take place.

Regards

Andrew Wong
Organization Observer and Thinker
Homepage http://www.geocities.com/Athens/5621

-- 

andreww@petronas.com.my (Andrew Wong Hee Sing)

Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>