Knowledge Management and ISO

9001:2015
An organisation will need to have many knowledge management elements operating as
part of its quality management system in order to comply.

POSTED BY IAN FRY ON 14 OCTOBER 2015 IN ABCS OF KM, KM STANDARD

- ISO 30401 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS | 11,666 VIEWS | 2
RESPONSES
The inclusion of Knowledge Management within the recently released ISO
9001:2015 marks a huge change within the world of KM.

For the first time, one of the global business standards explicitly mentions
knowledge as a resource, and specifies expectations for the management of
that resource. This provides a long-awaited level of legitimacy for KM which
could be a game-changer.

ISO 9001 is the most widely applied standard for Quality Management systems,
used by organisations of all sizes and in all countries to demonstrate that they
have a management system to control the quality and consistency of goods
and services. Over a million ISO 9001 certificates are awarded every year.

An ISO 9001 certificate is not a once-and-for-all award, but must be renewed at

regular intervals recommended by the certification body, usually once every
three years. Similarly the ISO standard itself has been through many updates.
In preparation for the 2015 update, ISO surveyed about 15000 people
worldwide to see what was missing from the standard which needed to be
included. The overwhelming answer was “you need to include the management
of knowledge”.

A new clause has therefore been added to ISO 9001:2015, as follows:

Clause 7.1.6. Knowledge

Determine the knowledge necessary for the operation of its processes and to
achieve conformity of products and services.

This knowledge shall be maintained and made available to the extent

necessary.

When addressing changing needs and trends, the organization shall consider
its current knowledge and determine how to acquire or access any necessary
additional knowledge and required updates.
 NOTE 1: Organizational knowledge is knowledge specific to the organization; it
is generally gained by experience. It is information that is used and shared to
achieve the organization’s objectives.

NOTE 2: Organizational knowledge can be based on: a) Internal Sources (e.g.,

intellectual property, knowledge gained from experience, lessons learned from
failures and successful projects, capturing and sharing undocumented
knowledge and experience; the results of improvements in processes, products
and services); b) External Sources (e.g., standards, academia, conferences,
gathering knowledge from customers or external providers).

As Nick Milton of Knoco Limited notes, this new clause is not a Knowledge
Management standard, nor does it require an organisation to have Knowledge
Management in place as a formal requirement. As a clause in a Quality
standard, it simply requires that sufficient attention is paid to knowledge to
ensure good and consistent quality of goods and services.

However, an organisation will need to have many Knowledge Management

elements operating as part of its Quality Management system in order to
comply.

The new standard offers the following commentary, which gives a little more
guidance on the sort of things that an auditor might be looking for:

In 7.1.6 the international standard addresses the need to determine and

manage the knowledge maintained by the organization, to ensure the
operation of its processes and that it can achieve conformity of products and
services. Requirements regarding organizational knowledge were introduced
for the purposes of:

a) safeguarding the organization from the loss of knowledge, eg – through staff

turnover – failure to capture and share information
b) encouraging the organization to acquire knowledge, eg
– learning from experience
– mentoring
– benchmarking

From the text above and in the previous section, it is clear that many of the
common elements of Knowledge Management are implied or specifically
mentioned. These include:

 an appropriate system for learning from experience, including the use of

lesson learning
 an appropriate approach to knowledge retention, including mentoring,
tacit knowledge capture, and knowledge sharing
 some form of KM audit, benchmarking and KM strategy, sufficient to
identify the critical knowledge needed to deliver quality products and services,
and the main knowledge gaps, and
 a system (roles, processes and supporting technology) for maintaining
knowledge and making it available to the extent necessary

An organization applying for ISO 9001:2015 certification is audited based on an

extensive sample of its sites, functions, products, services and processes. The
auditor identifies and presents a list of problems (defined as “non-
conformities”, “observations”, or “opportunities for improvement”) to
management. We do not yet know how clause 7.1.6 will be audited, but,
according to Knoco Limited, the text of the ISO standard document suggests
that the auditors may be looking for evidence that your organisation has:

 completed a knowledge scan of key knowledge topics and created a list

of critical knowledge topics
 assigned a topic owner to each critical knowledge topic and created an
appropriate maintenance procedure
 an effective way to find the knowledge, such as a good knowledge base
and search engine and/or appropriate processes and systems to “push”
knowledge to those who need it
 a strategic knowledge plan with identified actions to fill knowledge gaps
from external sources
 an effective system for learning from experience, including embedded
roles, consistent lesson capture processes, a lessons management system,
good governance, incorporating process, product and service improvements,
and
 a knowledge retention and transfer program

Although clause 7.1.6 deals specifically with knowledge, there are other clauses
which knowledge management may impact or support. For example, clause 7.2
deals with organizational competence, requiring the organization to ensure
staff have the necessary competence to perform their role.

Organisations will need to review their knowledge management strategy and

see whether it is adequately designed to support the acquisition of new
knowledge that will be required to underpin future competence requirements.

Clause 7.5 is about documented information, and the ways in which the
information necessary for the effectiveness of the Quality system is managed.
This includes how the information is created, stored, controlled, distributed,
accessed, used, retained and disposed. As Nick Milton points out, the ISO
authors are therefore clear about the distinction between information and
knowledge, and the two are treated in separate clauses.
Knoco Limited point out that the new requirements under ISO9001:2015 make
a massive change to the way that Knowledge Management can be presented to
your senior managers. Instead of selling KM within an organisation as “a good
thing to do” it can be presented it as “a requirement for ISO certification in the
area of Quality”.

Note however that others may not see this new clause as being as significant
as people who understand Knowledge Management better. Staff may
underestimate the significance of the knowledge clause, perhaps assuming
that learning from experience and knowledge retention are simple matters.
You will need to make your organisation aware of any impact clause 7.1.6 may
have on their ISO 9001:2015 qualification, and to be clear on the actions that
need to be taken to ensure compliance.

Additional information on preparing for KM compliance as part of ISO

9001:2015 can be found in the latest Knoco newsletter.

How to meet the requirements of ISO

9001:2015 Clause 7.1.6 Organisational
knowledge
Advice for your organisation on meeting the organisational knowledge and knowledge
management requirements of ISO 9001:2015.

POSTED BY BRUCE BOYES ON 6 OCTOBER 2015 IN ABCS OF KM, KM

STANDARD - ISO 30401 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS | 13,336
VIEWS | 1 RESPONSE
Editors note:  This article was revised on 3 February 2017 and again on 29 January
2019 to reflect developments in international standards with regard to knowledge
management.

The international standard ISO 9001 Quality Management Systems is described

as the world’s leading quality management standard by its publisher,
the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).

ISO 9001 was revised in 2015. The revised standard, ISO 9001:2015, includes
the new clause 7.1.6 Organisational knowledge. The requirements of this
clause are:

The organization shall determine the knowledge necessary for the operation of
its processes and to achieve conformity of products and services.
 This knowledge shall be maintained and be made available to the extent
necessary.

When addressing changing needs and trends, the organization shall consider
its current knowledge and determine how to acquire or access the necessary
additional knowledge and required updates.

In seeking to meet these new organisational knowledge requirements, it’s

vitally important that proven practices and processes are used, or valuable
resources will be wasted and desired outcomes not achieved.

Linking ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 30401:2018

A potential way for your organisation to meet the organisational knowledge
requirements of ISO 9001:2015 is through the use of the new international
knowledge management (KM) standard, ISO 30401:2018 Knowledge
management systems – Requirements, which was published in November
2018.

Like ISO 9001:2015, ISO 30401:2018 is a management systems standard (MSS),

and so uses the same high level structure as ISO 9001:2015 and a number
of other ISO MSS including the well-known ISO 14001:2015 Environmental
management systems – Requirements with guidance for use. As with ISO
9001:2015 and ISO 14001:2015, ISO 30401:2018 is also a Type A MSS, meaning
that it contains requirements against which an organization can claim
conformance.

The use of the same high level structure across ISO management system
standards means that organisations can operate a single or integrated
management system to meet the requirements of two or more management
system standards simultaneously. So while adopting ISO 30401 would require
an additional commitment of resources, this could be minimised by integrating
ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 30401:2018 into the same management system.

Other relevant resources

The RealKM Magazine article Knowledge management and ISO 9001:2015 also
provides useful guidance on meeting the organisational knowledge
requirements of ISO 9001:2015.

Other relevant RealKM Magazine resources include the following articles and
article series:

 Evidence-based knowledge management

 KM standard – ISO 30401 knowledge management systems

 A model for understanding knowledge systems

 Components of a knowledge management system

 A knowledge flow notation for designing knowledge management

systems

 Taking knowledge management to the next level

 Agile decision-making

 KM in small and medium enterprises (SMEs)

 KM in the construction industry

Subscribe to keep up to date

Make sure to keep up to date with the latest ISO 9001:2015 and ISO
30401:2018 articles added to RealKM Magazine by:

 Signing up to receive the RealKM Weekly Wrap email newsletter

 Following RealKM on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook

Guidance and resources for evidence-based

knowledge management
A regularly updated list of reference links to help you make better decisions through
evidence-based practice in KM.

POSTED BY BRUCE BOYES ON 12 FEBRUARY 2019 IN ABCS OF KM, EVIDENCE-BASED

KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT | 933 VIEWS | LEAVE A RESPONSE

This article is part of an ongoing series of articles on  evidence-based knowledge

management.

Evidence-based practice is nothing new or complicated or mind-blowing. It isn’t

a disruptive paradigm-shifting solution to every problem. It doesn’t involve
convoluted equations, and you don’t need a team of brainiacs. It won’t push
your thinking way outside the box with awesome concepts. It will do something
much more exciting, interesting, and important than all of these put together: It
will help you to make better decisions.
 Professor Rob Briner.1

The links on this page have been collated to help you make better decisions
through evidence-based practice in knowledge management (KM). Some of the
links are to RealKM Magazine articles and article series, and others to external
resources.

This page is a living reference, with new links regularly added.

Why evidence-based practice is important in KM

 Article: The disastrous effects of opinion-based decisions, and how

knowledge management can be better evidence-based
 Presentation: KM transformation must consider “how” we do things, and
not just “what” we do

The fundamentals of evidence-based practice

 Article: The Basics of Evidence-Based Practice

 Infographic: The Four Sources and Six Steps of Evidence-Based Practice
 Paper: Evidence-Based Practice: The Basic Principles
 Lecture: Understanding and overcoming individual and organisational
barriers to evidence-based management

How to source and assess evidence

 Article: Using narrative reviews, systematic reviews, and meta-analyses

in evidence-based knowledge management (KM)
 Article: Information literacy and evidence-based knowledge
management
 Article series: Understanding science and research
 Article series: Cultural awareness in KM

Case studies

 Article: Critical Eye: Evidence of the importance of curation

 Article: Tacit knowledge paper gets lost in neuromyths, highlighting
issues with evidence quality in KM
 Article: What more could be done to address the persistence of the
conceptually flawed Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)?

Other resources

 Article: Some misconceptions of evidence-based practice

 Article: Best practices aren’t
 Article: If you’re not evidence-based, what are you?
 Article: Why do we discount facts that dispute our opinion?
 Article series: The case for indigenous knowledge systems and
knowledge sovereignty
 Youth resource: Ask for Evidence lesson plan
 Youth resource: Evidence Hunter activity pack

Header image source:  Adapted from  Evidence Based  by  Nick Youngson  on  Alpha
Stock Images  which is licenced by  CC BY-SA 3.0.
 .