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ISO 9001:2000 is expected to be revised in Oct 2008. Lead Auditors were required to be retrained after last revision in 2000. As the changes expected this time are of an amendment and clarifications in nature, do you think it will be repeated this time? [link]

My Answer

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You are correct in saying that TC 176, the ISO 9001 technical committee, has started its review on the next version of ISO 9001. Early reports are that the standard will not be substantially changed from its 2000 version. TC 176, is referring to the intended update as an “amendment” and not a “revision”, indicating that changes from the current ISO 9001:2000 standard are to be minimal. The design specification mandates that “any changes to ISO 9001:2000 for the next release of the standard in 2008/2009 be relatively minor in nature with minimal impact and high benefit to the end user.”

Refer to this project plan

The Design Specification for the ISO 9001:2008/2009 can be found here N730 - ISO 9001 Design Specification.doc (220.5 KB)

As the changes will only be minor this means that the ethos behind auditing which changed with the 2000 version of the standard from a compliance orientation to a process approach will stay intact. The focus will remain centred on:
• risk
• status, and
• importance.

Auditors have to make judgements on what is effective, rather than merely adhering to what is formally prescribed. Refer to ISO 19011.

Shauns answer:

I am a registered Principal QMS Auditor with the IRCA. I also deliver registered IRCA Lead Auditor Training. In order to register as a QMS Auditor or Lead Auditor with the IRCA under the QMS 2000 scheme, an auditor originally certified to the 1994 scheme would have needed to undergo a formal 2 day transition course to the 2000 standard. Please note that these are training requirements and registered auditors could still be incompetent, but that’s another matter.

The word on the grapevine is that the next revision will be substantially clarification in nature and, assuming this is the case, there is unlikely to be the same transition training requirement. Even though, as a trainer, I’d love it if there was. The recent revisions of ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 did not require transition training for auditors and I strongly suspect ISO 9000 will be the same

We must not confuse training requirements to meet the criteria for a certification scheme with competence requirements. My understanding is that your question was about the former.