Integration of standardized management systems: Searching for a recipe and ingredients

Abstract

The ever-increasing demand for the development and implementation of effective Management Systems (MS) in the areas of quality, environmental, safety and corporate social responsibility has resulted in the proliferation of generic standards that attempt to describe such systems. Examples of Management System Standards (MSS) include ISO 9001, ISO 14001, OHSAS 18001 and SA 8000. Since the similarities among these MSS, particularly with respect to their structure and underlying concepts, are overwhelming and undeniable, integration of standardized MS stands to reason in most organizations. However, the road to develop a fully Integrated Management System (IMS) is full of roadblocks. This paper discusses the issue of methodology for the integration of internal, function-specific and standardized management systems. Specifically, the "ingredients' (which elements to integrate) and the "recipe' (how to integrate them), are addressed in detail.