Imagine replacing hours spent walking to get water with having children play on a seesaw and the water is brought to you. Thinking differently can create new possibilities from challenges!

In honor of Earth Day, this Throwback Thursday I share with you an incredibly unique reforestation project in Las Gaviotas, Columbia.

Gunter Pauli led a group of international experts on a tour of Las...

Why Remote Audits?

Remote audits are not new. The international standard for doing management systems audits, ISO 19011, has included remote auditing options for many years.

Now, remote auditing is getting more attention and wider use due to COVID-19 and limitations on in-person work.

Have you already had experiences with remote auditing? Have they been good experiences or poor ones? We would...

We tackled personal behaviors of auditors in a prior blog post. This one focuses on essential auditor skills. We will discuss knowledge in a future blog post.

Only one word is needed to describe essential auditor skills: communication. One simple word for a very complex answer. Imagine an octopus. You can imagine all the “arms,” right? Did you know that each arm is self-controlled?...

What does salmon running have to do with ISO? How can this enhance high school graduation rates?

Throughout my career of training, consulting, and auditing organizations and processes, it was common to see weak corrective action systems. There was acceptance that the problem was a part of life (problem blindness) and disbelief that the problems could truly be fixed. Band-aid solutions abounded....

Are you an experienced internal auditor who longs to be more effective?
Have you been asked recently to be an ISO internal auditor and are unsure whether you have what it takes?
Were you “voluntold” that auditing is a new duty in your job description and are scrambling to understand what is involved?
Are you thinking of volunteering for the role to contribute your talents?

Many...

Problem blindness is when we accept the way things are. We do not recognize that there could be a better way. It is a way to justify not taking action. 

If you are human, you are concerned by the arrest and murder of George Floyd and the long list of the other mistreated and murdered people of color. This means you are beginning to recognize the problem. It is upsetting to me that without...

Are you wondering how you will complete your internal audits? Or what you need to do to for your 3rd party registrar audits?  Well, this blog contains some official documents to help you sort out fact from fiction so you can make a plan that works for your organization and is within the international "rules."

First, let's explain that the International Accreditation Forum (IAF) is the...

Have you noticed many people and organizations are becoming superheroes to help out during this pandemic? In this unprecedented time, we can all use a little help. We want to make sure you know that ISO, the publishers of thousands of standards, is doing their part too. 

ISO standards can typically cost hundreds of dollars, but in response to the COVID-19 crisis, the International...

With our new reality of social distancing, can internal audits be effective? Do we need to throw out the audit program schedule, or is it possible our audits might even improve? Let's explore some options to help us keep our audit programs functioning.

In reviewing hundreds of audit programs and audit reports, it is sad to say that many of these reports were superficial evaluations of the...

This is the third in a series of blog posts covering the content of our October 2019 ASQ Audit Division conference presentation sessions: "Revitalizing Your Audit Program Using Engaging Audit Reporting Practices". This post goes behind the scenes to show the mechanics of creating charts from checklists in Word or other text document or spreadsheets.

Skip this post if you already:

• use...

This is the second blog post covering the content of our October 2019 ASQ Audit Division conference presentation sessions: "Revitalizing Your Audit Program Using Engaging Audit Reporting Practices".

In Part 1 we introduced several factors that often have limited visibility yet impact the effectiveness of audit reporting. Part 2 focuses on types of findings and visual...

The American Society for Quality Audit Division Conference was held in Orlando October 17-18th, 2019. Professionals from across North America gathered to share and learn best practices in management systems auditing. Our two-part presentation was "Revitalizing Your Audit Program Using Engaging Audit Reporting Practices".

This is the first in a series of blog posts that will cover the content of...