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ISO Management Systems
March - April 2005

Training

Special Report

Training: ISO 10015 assures the quality and return on investment of training

To stay in the race, organizations must continuously re-invest in and upgrade the competence of their human resources. However, most managers do not know how to measure the benefits of training and the return on training investment. ISO 10015:1999, Quality management - Guidelines for training, provides answers to the crucial question: does it pay to train?

View point

What about the women? Enhancing quality through gender equality

Roberta Bortolucci, President of Progetto Donna, the Centre for the Study of Equal Opportunities, Italy, writes: "Women are still under-utilized and under-valued in many enterprises today. The result is a waste of resources available to these organizations - the so-called 'non-equality cost'."

ISO Insider

• ISO prepares to launch development of standard on social responsibility
• Details released of 18-month ISO 14001:2004 transition plan
• 'Show me the money!' How quality management systems affect the bottom line
• TC 176 and sectoral QMS standards

International

• Worldwide user feedback on ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 9004:2000

ISO/TC 176 has carried out a worldwide survey of ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 9004:2000 users which reveals that 80% are satisfied with the standards.

• ISO 9001:2000 supports humanitarian aid NGO's expansion in Asia

"ISO 9001:2000 is emerging as a tool for South-South cooperation in international development."

• Achieving telecoms excellence through TL 9000
• Managing Social Responsibility in a systematic way
• National role for ISO 9000 in sharpening Poland's competitive edge

Standards for services

Spain innovates to win over service sector to benefits of standardization

How to persuade service companies that standardization rhymes not with uniformity, but with a general improvement in quality and increased customer satisfaction? AENOR, the Spanish national standards institute, is innovating with pre-standards measures such as focus groups and surveys to target and meet the needs of the service sector and its customers.