Issues management - Reporting problems, planning, recording and tracking action
If they are to function efficiently and effectively, all control systems need feedback loops
- mechanisms to inform them whether and to what extent they are achieving what they set out to.
Compliance and risk management systems are no exception. The design of Qudos System 3 enables
feedback to be gathered from many sources, and on all issues to be maintained in one integrated database - offering great
opportunities for analysis, understanding of trends, and problem solving.
Every major management standard requires organisations to effectively manage corrective
and preventive actions. We have created one integrated, electronic form for recording
customer complaints, problems, accidents, incidents, ideas and planning the necessary
actions. We call this the Action form. Once raised, it may be assigned to
the responsible person - with notification by hard copy or automatic email -
with your email records providing evidence of the notification.
The Problems...
"When we get a problem we fix it - but the root cause is rarely with,
and the same problems recur time and again"
"Employees and customers often suggest good ideas, but without an effective means
of logging them for future consideration - and finding them again! -
they sometimes get forgotten"
"We have numerous incident reports, nonconformance reports and similar records, but
I wish we could run a query on them all at once to find trends and problem areas"
"Actions do arise from our meetings and audits, but there is a tendency for them
to fall into a black hole and not happen"
Issues may be actual or potential - they may occur in various forms: product
or service failure, supplier failure, employee suggestions, customer complaints,
accidents, incidents, tech support requests. One thing is certain, they will occur,
and the smart organisation needs an effective system for dealing with them - and learning from them.
Documented procedures for handling exceptions, and taking corrective and preventive action are a
requirement of just about all compliance management standards.
The Solution...
The 'Actions' module is the main 'engine room' of Qudos System 3 -
offering a powerful tool for handling any exceptions, problems or opportunities for improvement.
It enables you to log and categorise issues, then to plan, assign,
record and track action. This module links together many
other components of the application - For example, an Action form may be raised from
an Audit, a Risk Assessment, Meeting Minutes to name but a few.
Each action may be linked to up to 99 related actions in a parent-child relationship.
These may be used to deal with root cause analysis, and 'project manage' the whole issue.
All actions are logged in a common database, and displayed in the Actions List.
Your database may be queried in millions of user-definable combinations using the
powerful Filter tools to help you understand and report on trends, prioritise
actions and allocate resources.
The "Journey" training presentation provides guidance on business improvement
and the concept of Dr. Deming's PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycle.
Sample procedures for communicating business
rules on corrective and preventive action are included. These may be customized to suit using
MS Word or equivalent.
Screen shot from the versatile Action Form.