With regard to the 2015 changes to the ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 Standards, there are some very strong proposed improvements which will make them even more relevant to Construction. Leadership, context and risk have been addressed separately; other changes and increased emphasises pertinent to construction, which have been raised and commented on during the change process and may well make it into the final Standard, are:

  • Planning of Changes and Control of Changes – whilst this involves changes to the management system itself, this also has obvious implications for the control of project variations to everyone’s benefit including the main contractor;
  • Design and Development of Products and Services – likely to be more prescriptive in determining a specialists overall response to their main contractor customer;
  • Control of externally provided products and services – increased emphasis on evaluation of a specialists contractor’s suppliers and labour only fixers for example;
  • Post-delivery activities – likely to be an increased emphasis in 9001:2015, with obvious implications for the construction industry and supply chain management;
  • Continual Improvement – this has always been a fundamental ISO concept but now there will be a requirement to demonstrate actual improvement and results. Again, this reinforces Foy Certification’s central message that businesses should secure ISO certification not only to assure their customers but also to improve their business!
  • Knowledge Management – a new one! This involves the identification and maintenance of the knowledge needed to ensure that an organization can meet its requirements.
  • Additional Changes Specific to ISO 14001
    • That need to demonstrate an increased importance attached to environmental management within the company’s strategic planning process;
    • A new addition of “proactive initiatives” to protect the environment from harm;
    • There is an addition to improve environmental performance
    • A new requirement for lifecycle thinking when considering environmental aspects

Foy Certification still has limited availability for our programme “Guaranteed ISO Certification by Christmas”

This is for specialist contractors, starting in September 2015, and guarantees Triple ISO Certification by Xmas 2015 for those committed to do so.

Please register your interest via andrew@foycertification.com or laura@foycertification.com