ISO 9001 is an international standard that specifies requirements for a quality management system (QMS) . It is part of the ISO 9000 family, which is a set of five quality management systems standards by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) that help organizations ensure they meet customer and other stakeholder needs within statutory and regulatory requirements. ISO 9001 is based on a number of quality management principles, including a strong customer focus, the motivation and implication of top management, the process approach, and continual improvement.
Using ISO 9001 helps ensure that customers get consistent, good-quality products and services, which in turn brings many business benefits. The standard is applicable to any organization, regardless of its type or size, or the products and services it provides. Organizations use the standard to demonstrate their ability to consistently provide products and services that meet customer and applicable statutory and regulatory requirements, and to enhance customer satisfaction through the effective application of the system, including processes for improvement of the system and the assurance of conformity to customer and applicable statutory and regulatory requirements.
ISO 9001:2015 is the current version of the ISO 9001 standard, which outlines the requirements an organization must maintain in their quality system for ISO 9001:2015 certification. The 2015 version only introduced clarifications to the existing requirements of ISO 9001:2000 and some changes intended to improve consistency with ISO 14001:2004.
