Is your organisation experiencing high levels of growth? Is your business expanding to new sites and territories? Could you be part of a merger or expansion in the next few years?
Large and growing organisations, with multiple locations, can greatly increase their return on investment in ISO Certification through better planning and a well- considered strategic approach.
The investment in ISO certification, such as ISO 9001, ISO 14001, ISO 45001, and ISO 27001, for large or growing organisations can be significant.
Global organisations need an effective solution to manage their management systems in a way that is both cost and resource effective.
Multisite certification is designed for organisations with centralised control and management of up to 50 sites and wishes to have them all certified under a single certificate.
What is Multisite Certification?
With any ISO certification, your organisation demonstrates its compliance with the relevant standard. This applies to the entire organisation or the defined scope of activities for which the certificate has been issued.
If your organisation has multiple branches, such as sites, offices or factories, perhaps in multiple countries, each branch must achieve ISO certification separately each year. This is quite a resource intensive process and the investment required can be significant.
Multisite certification requires you to have a centrally operated management system used by all your sites and headquarters.
How does it work?
Where your management system, processes and records are organised centrally, our assessor does not have to visit each site every year. Assessments of multisite organisations are divided into two elements:
First is an evaluation of the central office or location. This is conducted to:
- Ensure that the client has full operational control of all sites included in the certificate.
- That procedures are in place to ensure full conformity with the standard’s requirements.
- That the procedures have been implemented by trained and qualified personnel
- That the central office conducts monitoring and oversight of all sites to ensure that each is in full conformity with ASC requirements.
Second is an evaluation of the sites. The initial assessment will include on site evaluations of all sites. For surveillance and re-certification assessments, the number of sites to be evaluated is based on a risk assessment of the operation.
The site evaluations are conducted to:
- Ensure the operation at each site conforms with ASC Standard requirements.
- Ensure that the operational procedures of the central office are fully implemented.
What are the benefits?
Cost savings
The most obvious benefit, of course, is the financial one. Multisite certification helps reduce the resourcing requirements of managing your certification process. Assessment costs are reduced because only a limited number of sites need be audited each year. In particular, if your organisation has sites that are in more than one country, the cost of multisite certification will become significantly more advantageous.
Consistent Operations
Consistent and standardised operations is another benefit of Multisite certification that clients find extremely beneficial.
For Multisite certification, you create a central system where you draw out the standard business operations, called the Central Function. As a result, all sites should largely work according to the same processes and procedures. By doing so, good work practices are shared across all sites and any improvements are implemented throughout also.
Improved Management
When you deploy a central management system, you map out the complete business operations of all sites in one system – which is used by all sites and teams.
As a result, organisations discover the sites and processes where improvements are needed and can implement them immediately. With the correct structures and systems for efficient process management and document control, you can identify deficiencies and opportunities in real time.
Increased Customer Satisfaction
A central management system leads to better communication and shorter decision-making lines. This means, you can respond much faster to customer issues, complaints and requests.
In addition, your overall customers experience becomes more consistency and will increase customer retention and loyalty.
Better Employee Satisfaction
The central management system required for multisite certification also has many advantages for your teams and employees. This is because of processes and procedures being clearly documented. Teams are far more aware of what is expected of them, they are able to implement change more readily and improves the onboarding of new team members.
Training
Organisations that already have multisites or are growing rapidly can often find themselves without the time or knowledge available to properly manage their entire ISO Certification requirements.
Whether you are adding more sites or new employees are coming aboard, Amtivo (formerly Certification Europe) has a range of courses that can be customised to meet your specific needs.
If you’re seeking to consolidate your currently certified sites, implement your management system into newly acquired sites to expand your multisite certificate, internal auditor, lead auditor or standard transition courses can better prepare you for certification and help plan for ongoing change. Visit our training page to learn more.
Gap Analysis
Amtivo can perform an optional gap analysis to assess how you currently comply with the requirements of the relevant standard as well as the criteria for sampling and identify any omissions or weaknesses that need resolving before formal assessment.
Platinum Account Management
For larger organisations or those that are scaling rapidly, we have developed a cost–effective solution which incorporates a dedicated Specialist Account Manager, who is on hand to develop your custom annual programme, assist in the planning of your certification plans and answer any questions you have throughout the year.
Transfer
If you currently have one or more ISO Certifications with other Certification Bodies, arrange a call with one our specialist team to discuss the wide range of benefits in transferring these to Amtivo.
This is a relatively simple process and one that can be undertaken at any stage of your cycle.
Contact us to find out more about multisite certification.
