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Fernández-González, Arturo J.; Prado, José CarlosUSEFULNESS OF QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM INTERNAL AUDITS. LESSONS FROM AN

EMPIRICAL STUDY

Revista de Administração FACES Journal, vol. 7, núm. 1, enero-marzo, 2008, pp. 11-23

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FACES R. Adm. · Belo Horizonte · v. 7 · n. 1· p. 11-23 · jan./mar. 200810

USEFULNESS OF QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM INTERNAL AUDITS. LESSONS FROM AN EMPIRICAL STUDY

ADMINISTRAÇÃODA PRODUÇÃO


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FACES R. Adm. · Belo Horizonte · v. 7 · n. 1· p. 11-23 · jan./mar. 2008 11

Arturo J. Fernández-González, José Carlos Prado

ADMINISTRAÇÃO DA PRODUÇÃO

USEFULNESS OF QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

INTERNAL AUDITS. LESSONS FROM AN EMPIRICAL STUDY

Arturo J. Fernández-GonzálezUniversity of Vigo

José Carlos PradoUniversity of Vigo

RESUM O

O padrão ISO 9000 tem sido considerado parte im portante da im plem entação das audito-

rias internas dos Q M S (Sistem as de G erenciam ento da Q ualidade), de m odo a gerar um a

avaliação de eficiência do sistem a.

Este trabalho apresenta os resultados de um serviço em pírico, conduzido em em presas de

Portugal e Espanha, sobre as m etodologias usadas nas auditorias internas dos Sistem a de

Q ualidade, provendo conclusões e recom endações que perm itam aprim orar estes sistem as

de auditoria e gestão.

PALAVRAS-CH AVE

ISO 9000. Q ualidade. Auditoria.

ABSTRACT

The ISO 9000 standard has been considered an im portant part of the im plem entation of

internal audits from Q M S (Q uality M anagem ent System ), to generate an assessm ent of

efficiency of the system .

This paper presents the results from an em pirical service, conducted in com panies from

Portugal and Spain, about the m ethodologies used at the internal audits from the Q uality

System , providing conclusions and recom m endations that aloud to im prove these auditing

and m anagem ent system s.

KEYW O RDS

ISO 9000. Q uality. Audit.

UTILIDADE DO SISTEMA DE GERENCIAMENTO DA QUALIDADE DAS AUDITORIASINTERNAS. LIÇÕES DE UM ESTUDO EMPÍRICO


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INTRODUCTION

The ISO 9000 standard has alw ays considered

the obligation of im plem enting q uality

m anagem ent system (Q M S) internal audits, w hich

are one of the m ain elem ents in the qualitym anagem ent m odel em bodied in such regulations,

oriented to self-evaluate the system efficiency,

objectively and on a regular basis.

According to the ISO 19011:2002 definition,

an audit is an indep en den t, docum en ted

system atic process designed to obtain auditing tests

and to evaluate them in an objective m anner, in

order to determ ine the extent to w hich auditing

criterion are m et.

The potential of internal audits as tools for

continuous im provem ent is noted by authors such

as Karapetrovic (1999), w ho points out that the

objective of the sam e should be “to identify areas,

processes and products that can be im proved”,

w hile Russel and Regel (1996) m aintain that this

approach should find problem s, ensure that they

are understood and check that the solutions w ork”.

Sakolsky (1 99 4 ) con siders that process

im provem ent can be aided by identifying w eakpoints in the chains in the process. M o and Chan

(1997) also note that the ongoing internal auditing

process of the system is certainly accom panied by

a genuine com m itm ent to establish corrective

actions linked to the sam e, is an authentic TQ M

tool. Arter (1994) states that internal audits, apart

from m any other facets of ISO 9000, are tools for

im provem ent.

N evertheless, as w ith m any other elem ents in

quality m anagem ent, errors are often m ade in theirim plem entation that decisively com prom ise the

system ’s efficiency. O ne of them is through using

these audits solely as a preparation for the external

auditing of certification, checking the points to be

exam ined by the external auditors. This should not

be the objective (KARAPETRO VIC, 1999). Authors

such as Beeler (1999), consider that internal audits

do not, in them selves, provide continuous

im provem ent, but if they are orientated correctly,

they can m ake a contribution. In other w ords, it is

essential to use a suitable m ethodology to optim ize

the results of internal audits, otherw ise they w ould

becom e a m ere procedure w ithout contributinganything to im provem ent. This opinion is shared

by others, such as W illborn (1990), Barthelem y

and Zairi (1994) and Peters (1998).

Addey (2000), in a very interesting w ork, covers

this issue by dism antling internal audits as tools

for identifying problem s and opportunities for

im provem ent, as they are usually orientated,

stating, am ong other considerations, that they are

“retrospective”, “sam ple based”, “usually carried out

by staff external to the w orking area”(in term s ofthe ISO 9000 requirem ent on this point); and the

m ajority are “im posed rather than agreed and are

scheduled to cover all the business”in a typical

period of one year, instead of being “targeted at

areas of key business risk”, and restricted to

ensuring com pliance w ith the requirem ents,

w ithout really evaluating the quality system (pp.

681-682).

This paper presents the m ain results of an

em pirical study, conducted on com panies in Spain

and Portugal, dealing w ith the m ethodology used

in Q M S internal audits and the use, from the

com panies’view point, of such practices. Said

results, along w ith the com m entaries of the

m anagers responsible that w ere interview ed in the

study, and the experience of the authors in

collab oration w ith com pan ies in quality

m anagem ent, m ake it possible to obtain certain

conclusions and recom m endations to im prove the

quality of the Q M S internal audits and, therefore,

their use for the organizations concerned.

THE EMPIRICAL STUDY. METHODOLOGY AND

MAIN FEATURES

The em pirical research w as developed by a

team in the O rganization Engineering G roup (G IO )

at the U niversity of Vigo (Spain), from June 2002

to M arch 2003. The aim of this research w as to


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determ ine the current situation and outlook for the

future in quality m anagem ent im plem ented in

com panies w ithin the Euro-region com prising G alicia

(autonom ous region in N orthw est Spain) and the

N orth Region of Portugal. M easuring and analysis

practices applied to client satisfaction w ere one of

the key aspects in this research.

The em pirical study was conducted on a random

sam ple of 305 ISO 9000 com panies, em ploying 10

or m ore w orkers, belonging to the industrial and

service sectors. The follow ing conditions w ere

im posed: the com panies should have been certified

before 30th June 2001, in order to guarantee a

certain level of m aturity of their quality m anagem ent

system ; they should be located (at least one plant)w ithin the territory of the Euro-Region (regardless of

their nationality), and they should have autonom y in

their quality m anagem ent (that is to say, they should

not totally depend on the directives of a person

responsible or central departm ent located outside

the Euro-Region). The firm s w hich fulfilled these

conditions turned out to be 1,675 in total (1,001 in

G alicia and 674 in the N orth of Portugal), after the

prelim inary inventory carried out by the investigating

team , for w hich different resources were consulted,

such as the certifying bodies operating in the zone

and other secondary sources of inform ation.

D ata w as gathered by personally interview ingthose responsible for quality m anagem ent at the

com panies. The com panies to be interview ed w ere

random ly selected. The 305 com panies that w ere

finally interview ed w ere nearly 20% of the total,

consisting of a representative sam ple w ith a 5.18%

m argin of error at a 95.5% confidence level and

p= q= 0.5.

Table 1 sum m arizes the basic typology of the

com panies interview ed. In the case of sm all and

m edium -sized com panies (SM Es), w e have used theEuropean U nion definition of SM E. A division by

sectors of econom ic activity is recorded in Figure 1.

The com panies that carry activities both productive

and services, have been classified w ithin the sector

that gives the largest turnover, according to the

com panies interview ed. Construction com panies

have been included in the category of service

com panies.

TABLE 1

Basic typology of the sample companies

FIGURE 1

Sample companies classified by sector of activity


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G eographically, out of the 305 com panies, 205

belong to the territory of G alicia (Spain), and 100

to the region of N orth of Portugal. The distribution

of the com panies by the standard of certification

(at the tim e of carrying out each interview ) turned

out to be the follow ing: 38 com panies (12.5% )

w ere ISO 9001:1994 certified, 59 com panies

(19.3% ) w ere ISO 9001:2000 certified, and 208

com panies (68.2% ) w ere ISO 9002:1994 certified.

RESULTS

The m ain results of the study, in term s of Q M S

internal audits in the com panies studied, are

presented below .

Importance of internal audits

The average evaluation m ade by com panies

on the im portance of Q M S internal audits is 4.16

(on a 1-5 Likert scale), the replies being distributed

as show n in Table 2. This table points to the fact

that Q M S internal audits are m ore im portant in

the large com panies, in production firm s and in

com panies in N orth Portugal than in SM Es, service

com panies and com panies in G alicia, respectively.

TABLE 2

Importance of conducting QMS internal audits

Methodology used in conducting internal audits

This section looks at three basic aspects of the

m ethodology used by organizations in conducting

Q M S internal audits; the characteristics of the

hum an resources em ployed in them ; theirfrequency and m aking the results know n.

Human resources

The hum an resources used by the com panies

for conducting Q M S internal audits are in-house,

in 50.5% of cases, external in 22.1% and both

types in the rem aining 27.4% , as show n in Table 3.

Exclusive use of in-house personnel is clearly

greater in large com pan ies, w hich hardly

subcontract internal audits, than in the SM Es,25.4% of w hich externalize them . Also, am ong the

Spanish com panies, it is notably less com m on

(57.6% ) than in the Portuguese com panies, it is

notably less com m on (57.6% ) than in the

Portuguese com panies (36% ) to use in-house

personnel, the latter m ost com bining in-house and

external personnel (46.0% ) as opposed to only

18.2% in G alicia). H ardly any differences are noted

betw een production and service com panies.

TABLE 3

Human resources used to conduct internal audits


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Table 4 analyzes the type of personnel used by the com panies that acknow ledge their use.

TABLE 4

Type of external personnel used in conducting internal audits

As show n in this table, out of the com panies

using external personnel to carry out internal audits,

the vast m ajority turn to external consultants or

professionals (94.5% ), w hereas the use of

personnel from other com panies in the sam e group

(10% ) or other com panies1 (2% ) is far low er.

Continuing w ith the hum an aspect in carrying

out internal audits, out of the 226 com panies using

in-house personnel and that provided a valid reply,

personnel training for conducting internal auditsw as as follow s: 46.0% exclusively by external

courses; 13.7% exclusively by consultants

contracted for auditing and, w here applicable,

subsequent system m aintenance, 5.8% trained in-

house, 22.1% trained in both external courses and

by consultants, 8.4% in external courses and

internally, and the rem aining 4.0% trained in other

contributions of these form ulas. This training

included auditing practicals in the com pany in

80.7% of the com panies concerned.

Interview ees w ere asked about their opinion

on if Q M S internal audits shoud be assigned to in-house or external personnel, or a com bination of

the tw o. The replies are show n in Figure 2.

FIGURE 2

Type of personnel that should carry out internal audit s

1 A case to take into account is of com panies hosting specialized personnel from the com pany itself, personnel norm ally

belonging to an auditing service centralized in a quality departm ent that is also centralized. In the com panies studied, since the

entities lacking autonom y in quality m anagem ent w ere ruled out, this is not reflected w here the com pany is directed by a

m anager or quality departm ent outside the plant in the Euroregion. Such entities passed us on to a central departm ent for the

interview .


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Figure 2 show s an im portant diversity of

opinions since the percentage of com panies

inclined to in-house personnel is very sim ilar to

those that prefer to use external personnel (both

in the region of 30% ). This is slightly higher than

TABLE 5

Type of personnel that should carry out internal audits

The table above show s that, although the joint

option is the m ost com m on in all the categories ofcom pany involved, the large concerns are m ore

likely to use in-house personnel (38.0% as

opposed to 24.7% ) of the SM Es w hich, in their

m ajority, opt for subcontracting this practice). Also,

the Spanish com panies put a greater value than

the Portuguese com panies on using external

personnel. The com panies in the N orth Region are

m ostly m ore convinced of counting on m ixed

personnel to carry out this practice.

It is clearly noted that both SM Es and large

com panies w ould rather count on in-house

personnel to a lesser extent than they do at present.

In other w ords, the trend appears to be to

externalize this activity (either totally or partially),

and if this is not m ore w idespread, it is probably

due to the cost involved.

FREQUENCY

As regards the frequency or intensity w ith w hich

com panies practice Q M S internal audits, Table 6show s the replies from the interview ees2. The

period of reference is one year.

the percentage of those w ho consider it ideal to

have a com bination of both types of personnel

(42.4% ).

Table 5 show s these results, differentiating

betw een types of com panies.

2 It m ust be taken into account that som e com panies have given m ore than one opinion as an answ er, so that the percentages

per group m ay add up to m ore than 100 .


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TABLE 6

Amount of internal QMS audits conducted in the year

As can be seen from the table, the norm al trend

is to have a full auditing of the quality m anagem ent

system once a year, a practice carried out by 54.2%

of the com panies. The next m ost w idely used

option is to conduct several partial audits,

equivalent to a full annual audit, as practiced by

28.6% of the com panies. This second option is

m ore com m on am ong the large com panies

(38.0% ) than am ong the SM Es (26.7% ), am ong

w hich single annual audits are the m ost com m on

(55.4% as opposed to the 48.0% in the large

com panies). This option – a single audit once a

year – is also especially com m on in the com panies

in N orth Portugal (63.3% as opposed to 49.8%

in G alicia).

W hen coupling these results w ith the opinionsand com m ents of several interview ees in the w ork

field, w e noted a strong link betw een the internal

audits and the audits carried out by the certifying

bodies w hich, in m ost cases, carry out audits on

an annual basis. M any of the interview ees provided

the fact that their internal audits are carried a short

tim e previously and in preparation for the external

audits, or to ensure satisfactory com pliance w ith

the requirem ents prior to being subject to them .

MAKING THE RESULTS KNOWN

As far as m aking the results of the internal audits

know n, and taking for granted that this w ill alw ays

be the responsibility (at least to a certain extent)

of the head of quality m anagem ent (either throughdirect intervention in the audits or as a direct

interlocutor w ith the auditors w hen they are

external), and the responsibility of those involved

in the non-conform ities detected, it w as interesting

in the investigation to see w hich other parties in

the organization received inform ation on the results

of the sam e. Table 7 show s the results obtained.

It is noted that the m anagem ent is inform ed of

the results on the internal auditing in 69.4% of the

com panies (m ore in the production com panies than

in the service com panies), such percentages being

very close to 70% in all categories. The m anagerial

staff is inform ed in 38.0% of the com panies (m ore

in the Spanish than in the Portuguese); the

interm ediary positions, by 21.3% and the inform ation

reaches all personnel in 16.2% .


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TABLE 7

Organization personnel in formed of the results of the in ternal audits

The em pirical study m ade it possible to note,

on the one hand, that 155 com panies (50.8% of

the total) have a form ally established Q uality

Com m ittee. O ut of these com panies, in 87.7% of

cases, the Com m ittee analyzes the results of the

internal audits.

RESULTS OF THE INTERNAL AUDITSRESULTS OF THE INTERNAL AUDITSRESULTS OF THE INTERNAL AUDITSRESULTS OF THE INTERNAL AUDITSRESULTS OF THE INTERNAL AUDITS

The results of the internal audits in the

com panies are analyzed from different points of

view . O n the one hand, the typology of the actions

arising from said audits is analyzed; on the other

hand, the use that the com panies m ake of the

audits, as they are accustom ed to doing. Thirdly,

an analysis is m ade of the extent to w hich thecom panies use these internal audits as a tool for

im provem ent.

TYPOLOGY OF THE ACTIONS ARISING FROM

THE INTERNAL AUDITS

O ne im portant aspect to be considered w hen

evaluating internal audits is the typology of the

actions arising from the sam e, as show n in Table 8.

Table 8 show s that m ost of the com panies

determ ine corrective actions based on the results

of the auditing, relegating preventive actions to

second place. So the percentage of com panies

that state that they establish actions that are w holly

or m ostly corrective rises to 76.3% of the total.

TABLE 8

Actions arising from QMS internal audits


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This fact, w hich is com m on to all the types of

com pany analyzed, occurs m ore intensely in the

SM Es, in service com panies and in the com panies

in G alicia: out of all of these, m ore than 20%

acknow ledges that internal audits only help them

to establish corrective or non-preventive actions.

USEFULNESS OF INTERNAL AUDITS

The interview ees w ere asked to evaluate the

usefulness of the internal audits practiced in their

com panies. The average evaluation w as 3.95, the

replies being shared out as show n in Table 9.

TABLE 9

Usefulness of the QMS internal audits

In view of the results in Table 9, it is noted that

the large com panies and the com panies in N orth

Portugal obtain a greater usefulness to internal

audits than the SM Es and to the com panies in

G alicia, respectively.

The usefulness of internal audits can be

analyzed in term s of tw o variables of interest:

· The type of personnel used in carrying out

the audit

· The intensity involved in carrying it out

a)U sefulness according to type of personnel

Table 10 show s the usefulness according to

the personnel carrying out the internal system

audits. These results seem to point to the use of

external personnel (generally consultants), both

exclusively and in com bination w ith in-house

personnel being m ore useful to the com panies

than the exclusive use of in-house personnel. To

confirm this, an AN O VA test w as run w ith the

results, as show n in Table 10.

The results show that there are significant

differences betw een the three groups under

analysis (p= 0.028), although to determ ine exactly

betw een w hich, 2 against 2 need to be subjected

to the corresponding contrasts. O nce this is carriedout, the result is that the differences betw een the

groups using in-house and subcontracted

personnel (not m ixed) are not sufficiently significant

(p= 0.111). N or are there sufficient differences

betw een the groups using subcontracted and

m ixed personnel (p= 0.487), although there are

betw een the group using solely in-house and the

one using com bined personnel (p= 0.011).

Therefore, it m ay be concluded that the best

solution to im prove a high perform ance from the

internal audits is the com bination of in-house and

external m eans, w hich gives better results than the

use of in-house personnel. This result is coherent

w ith the m ajority opinion of the com panies, as

noted earlier. The use of exclusively external

personnel also gives better results than the use of

exclusively in-house personnel, although there is

no significant statistical difference.

b)U sefulness acco rding to intensity of

conducting audits

Table 11 show s the usefulness according to

the intensity w ith w hich the audits are carried out.


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TABLE 10

Usefulness of the QMS internal audits according to type of personnel carrying them out

TABLE 11

Usefulness of QMS internal audits according to the intensity of carrying them out

These results do not perm it us to draw clearcut conclusions as to w hich is the best frequency

or intensity for carrying out internal audits, since

no appreciable differences are noted in the use

m ade by the com panies in term s of the use of

one or other m ethod. Follow ing an AN O VA test

for one factor, it is confirm ed that the non-existence

of a significant relationship betw een said intensity

and the use of internal audits (F= 0.696 and

p= 0.500).

INTERNAL AUDITS ARE TOOLS FOR

IMPROVEMENT

Interview ees w ere enquired as to w hat extent

the internal au dits are used as a tool for

im provem ent, i.e., as an instrum ent for detecting

strengths, w eaknesses and opportunities for

im provem ent in quality m anagem ent. The average

evaluation w as 4.00, m eaning that the com panies

find a considerable use for the internal audits as atool for im provem ent in their quality m anagem ent.

The distribution of the replies is show n in Table

12, w here it can be seen that the com panies in

N orth Portugal give a fairly higher m ark than the

Spanish ones, this being quite hom ogeneous in

the other cases.

TABLE 12

Use of the QMS internal audits as a toolfor improvement


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In com m on w ith the analysis of the use of

internal audits, the extent to w hich they are used

as a tool for im provem ent can be analyzed in term s

of the type of personnel used. Table 13 show s

the extent of use given by the com panies accordingto the personnel carrying out the internal system

audits.

TABLE 13

Extent to which QMS internal audits areused as a tool for internal improvement,according to type of personnel carrying

them out

These results appear to indicate that the use

of subcontracted personnel help the com panies

m ore to interpret the internal audits as a tool for

internal im provem ent, particularly w hen com bined

w ith in-house personnel. N evertheless, on the

contrary to the case of the use of internal audits

explained above, in this case, the AN O VA test

provides no significant differences betw een the

average values (F=0.954 and p= 0.387).

CONCLUSIONS

In view of the results from the em pirical study,

w e can conclude that organizations do not m akethe best for them selves in conducting Q M S internal

audits, although it is prom ising to observe that the

m ajority of the organizations lay a good deal of

im portance on such a practice, and that the

m anagem ent is involved in a high percentage of

them .

O ne of the m ain w eaknesses noted is the

som ew hat abusive use m ade of in-ho use

personnel to carry out internal audits. Approxim ately

half of the com panies carry them out solely using

in-house personnel, w hereas 22% subcontract

them in their entirety while 27% com bine in-house

w ith external resources. W e are not against theuse of in-house personnel as an internal auditor,

but for this to be successful, great care needs to

be taken w ith theoretical and practical training for

said staff. O ur experience as collaborators w ith

num erous certified com panies tells us that, as a

general rule, this is not the case and that it is norm al

to rely on in-house personnel, often lacking and

w ith a superficial training. W hy is this the case?

G enerally, to avoid extra costs for contracting

consultants or specialist personnel in this type ofauditing. Furtherm ore, on num erous occasions,

especially in the SM Es, audits are entirely carried

out by personnel directly linked to quality

m anagem ent (e.g., the quality m anager), only

partially com plying w ith the requirem ent of

independence set by the ISO 9000 standard.

The results of the study have dem onstrated

that the com bined use of both types of audits (in-

house and external) appear to be the m ost

satisfactory option. It can be clearly appreciatedthat the use of internal audits is greater w hen

carried out by a com bination of subcontracted and

in-house personnel (4.14) than w hen only w ith

in-house staff (3.80). Certainly, the com plem entary

factor betw een training in quality m anagem ent,

know ledge of the regulations and the m ethodology

applied by the consultants subcontracted, on the

one hand, and the know ledge of the processes

and of the organization input by the internal

personnel, on the other, give the best results. In

an interm ediate situation (4.03) lies the use of

internal audits carried out w ith exclusively external

personnel, w hich is better in results than that of

exclusively in-house personnel and slightly w orse

than the com bination of both (although these

differences are not sufficiently significant, from the

statistical view point). It is interesting to note that

these results confirm the opinion expressed by the


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com panies as to w hat type of personnel they w ould

prefer to carry out internal audits.

Also, w hen analyzing the use of internal audits

from another angle, that of its contribution to

con tinuous im provem en t as a tool forim provem ent, it is also observed that the

usefulness is greater w hen external personnel is

used (4.05) than w hen in-house personnel is used

(3.92), and especially w hen both are com bined

(4.11). N onetheless, in this case, no statistically

significant differences could be found betw een the

three options.

A second relevant w eakness is the excessive

orientation tow ards corrective action as a result of

the audits. The vast m ajority of the com panies,

over three quarters, adopted solely and particularly

corrective actions as a result of the sam e. O nly

one com pany out of all those studied confirm ed

adopting solely preventive actions, and those

adopted m ore corrective than preventive m easures

am ounted to less than 5% . This points to the

notion that the orientation tow ards m ore preventive

rather than corrective actions is extrem ely lim ited,

largely confirm ing the opinions of Addey (2000).

This is probably due to the fact that internal audits

are, in turn, excessively biased tow ards detecting

non-com pliances w ith the quality m anagem ent

system requirem ents, and very little tow ards

preventing and detecting o pportunities for

im provem ent. The participation of m ore personnel

in the auditing sessions, both internal (e.g., groups

of helping or observer auditors, groups for analyzing

the results, etc.) and external (e.g., consultants)

m ay help to correct such a bias.A further w eakness, that w e consider to be

im portant, is the lack of repercussion of the auditing

results on the m anagerial staff and interm ediate

posts in the organizations concerned (except on

those directly affected by the non-conform ities

detected). O nly in these com panies w here there

is a Q uality Com m ittee, norm ally m ade up of this

type of person, is there a high degree of inform ation

on the results. Furtherm ore, the personnel in

general is not inform ed of the results of the audits

(this only occurs in 16% of the com panies). In

our opinion, the auditing results are w orth being

given the attention of all the departm ents in theorganization since they reflect the general state of

health of the quality m anagem ent system and can

help to im prove its understanding and the extent

to w hich it is im plem ented. Such a w eakness is

strongly linked w ith the em inently corrective nature

of the actions arising from the audits, as m entioned

earlier, and to the lack of participation of personnel

in approaching solutions or im provem ents to the

deviations found. The use of the results of audits

as m aterial for training personnel is also highlyrecom m endable, both from the point of view of

corrective and of preventive m easures, although

this is barely used in the organizations.

Conversely, no statistically justified relationship

has been found betw een the frequency w ith w hich

these audits are carried out and their use. But, in

our opinion, carrying ou a single internal audit each

year is not the m ost suitable. Inevitably, the

tendency is to carry it out shortly prior to the auditing

conducted by the certifying body, and an annual

frequency helps for it to becom e just a necessary

procedure, w hich alm ost alw ays leads to haste and

m ethodological deficiencies. W e consider that it is

preferable to plan the internal auditing of the quality

m anagem ent system , breaking it up into a series

of sessions throughout the year (or the auditing

period chosen), each one for one of the different

sectors or areas to be audited – w ith m ore regularity

in those sectors w ith a w orse level ofim plem entation or w here m ore deficiencies are

detected, as proposed by Addey (2000) – so that

the results can be analyzed, m ore gradually, by

groups of personnel (in different stages of the

hierarchy and from different areas) and contribute

to solving the problem s.

By w ay of a general conclusion, although the

use of internal audits is high (3.95), in the opinion


15/15



of the com panies (w hich dem onstrates their

potential to help in im provem ent), they can be

im proved upon if the w eaknesses observed are

gradually corrected. >

REFERENCES

Recebido em: jun. 2007 · Aprovado em: dez. 2007

Arturo J. Fernández-González

Organization Engineering Group (GIO)School of Industrial Engineers

Business Organization and Marketing Dept.University of Vigo

Campus Lagoas-Marcosende, c/Maxwell s/n - 36310 Vigo

(Pontevedra), Spain Tlf. (+34) 986 812 220 Fax (+34) 986 812 385

e-mail: [email protected]

José Carlos Prado

Organization Engineering Group (GIO)

School of Industrial EngineersBusiness Organization and Marketing Dept.

University of VigoCampus Lagoas-Marcosende, c/Maxwell s/n - 36310 Vigo

(Pontevedra), Spain

Tlf. (+34) 986 812 220 Fax (+34) 986 812 385e-mail: [email protected]

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