Desco is thrilled to announce that we have extended our ISO certification beyond the ISO14001, which we first received in 2009. While that has been reaffirmed by the international standards body every year since, we have been refining our systems and processes to add certification in both ISO45001 and ISO9001.
Those efforts have been successful and we received notification of our certification in all three ISO standards this week, giving us a fully-certified integrated management system (IMS).
What is ISO certification?
The reason Desco went for the comprehensive IMS involving all the three standards (ISO14001, ISO45001 and ISO9001) was because:
- it provides a structure to guide the company toward continued improvement in a holistic manner focusing on the environment, people, growth and more;
- it ensures that clear objectives are defined for accountability and for the company to maintain high standards for all stakeholders;
- it helps Desco to better support customers in reaching their sustainability goals and targets; and
- it enables the company’s constant drive for better waste management development by ensuring risk assessment and analysis is done using a lifecycle approach.
Why did we do it?
The purpose of an IMS is to provide a framework that assists all stakeholders in achieving a common set of goals and objectives. It assists in identifying risk and helps to lower and/or mitigate risk for the company and for all its stakeholders.
ISO certification also tackles the business from a socio-economic perspective, giving all stakeholders the assurance of inclusive participation in the company.
But perhaps, most importantly, it is not just the company saying this. In order to maintain our certification, all of our systems and processes must be audited annually by an external third-party certification company. That is what gives stakeholders the assurance that what we say is happening, is actually happening.
What does it all mean?
The ISO certificate is a document that assures the quality of a company’s management system, a project approach and so on. The certification is given out yearly, after a complete audit of the company by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) or its local affiliate. It’s important to note that ISO is an independent, non-governmental organisation.
ISO certification standardises all the processes in our company
Each year, the ISO audit checks if the processes at Desco are running smoothly. It verifies that all our employees are up-to-date in the way we work, which tools we use, and how we complete our administration, sales and project processes. The yearly audit also makes sure that we keep on improving and monitoring these processes, which enables us to continue to provide the best service to our customers.
The ISO audit checks every part of the organisation
Not only our project processes are being audited every year. In the ISO audit every part of Desco is given a complete check by the external ISO auditor. This means that all business units are audited as well and it ensures that we have better processes and systems in place and in use for the company to continue running smoothly.
The ISO certificate is proof of how we work with customers
For all individuals and companies, committing to a new product or service from a company with which you have not worked before together can be daunting. The fact that we are certified by ISO provides new and existing customers with an assurance they would not have from an uncertified supplier.