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Abstract
Integrated management systems (IMSs) can already be considered a proven tool to help companies cope with the challenges associated with staying competitive in the face of dynamic stakeholder requirements. The present paper proposes a new instrument designed to evaluate and communicate the maturity achieved by an integrated management system (IMS) for responding properly to the requirements of its reference standards in a consolidated manner. The approach mainly aims to highlight the level of integration achieved on common requirements of the component standards and to determine the extent to which they work together as a whole. At the same time, it is useful to identify the needs for improvement in the system as a whole or in its sub-systems. The proposed methodology uses the transmutation in the RGB color space (red–green–blue) of the process audits’ results achieved under each standard, followed by the analysis of the IMS characteristics, with tools specific to the color space, based on the affinities between the two domains. To sustain the thoroughness of this approach, a case study of an integrated system for an industrial company is presented, analyzing the situation from two different evolution stages of the IMS. The approach is presented as a proof-of-concept, without large scale validation.
Highlights
Behaving sustainably and being part of a long-term and viable economic model are challenges that any modern company faces
To validate the proposed concept, a case study was planned, consisting of an analysis of the integrated quality-environment system in a production company. The authors turned their attention to a simple system with only two components in order to facilitate understanding of the concept, without overloading the presentation from a mathematical and graphical point of view
One must note that the color channels codify the maturity in their dynamics and not in their absolute value, so an Integrated management systems (IMSs) with two sub-systems could be more maturely integrated than one with three sub-systems
Summary
Behaving sustainably and being part of a long-term and viable economic model are challenges that any modern company faces. Management systems, which have developed over more than 30 years to address various issues that faced firms and influenced their competitiveness, can contribute significantly to the sustainability performances of any industry, especially if employed in a consistent and efficient manner. The growing number of standards in this field determines companies to seek either external help in the form of consultancy or quick and powerful instruments, they can use themselves in order to master their implementation and upkeep. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has highlighted, in a relevant number of case studies [4], how the use of standards in general, and especially managerial standards, brings value both to the organizations employing them and to the world economy. ISO’s annual statistics for 2014 and 2015 have identified an average of 1.3 million certifications only for the quality and environmental management standards [5]
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