GroupEAD successfully achieves ISO 9001:2015 Certification

GroupEAD has successfully achieved the certification of the Quality Management System under the new ISO Standard 9001:2015 for the provision of EAD Operation & Training Services and EAIM Training services. The certification audit took place during the 4^th and 5^th of July and was passed without any minor or major Non Conformities or Observations. The auditor provided only a few proposals for system improvement. The auditor, from the certifying company SGS, congratulated GroupEAD for a great job done adapting the Quality Management System to the new standard.

The work has been quite challenging and started more than a year ago:

• The changes required by the new Standard went quite deep into the existing company structure and processes. It emphasised concepts like the process approach, introduction of company strategy within the quality management system, the analysis of the company context as a key factor of the quality management system and promoted the use  of risk management to be applied to all areas within the organisation, in addition to a full Standard re-structuring.
• There was very little information available so far, such that even the training provided on these new concepts did not fully answer all questions or provide complete guidance to comply with the new requirements. The definitions were to some extent quite open and as far as new concepts were involved, there was no established means of compliance. All this has resulted in a delay in certification process for all companies. A difficult year 2018 is expected by the certification companies since many heading for this new standard obviously have not adapted the Quality Management Systems so far. This will become more time urgent as the current certificates are only valid until September 2018.
• Over the last 12 months, the GroupEAD QM department accomplished some large scale projects including strong contributions to the CS#5 CFT preparation, the Safety and Security implementation for EAD SES Certification and the adaption of the Quality Management System. In addition during this difficult and stressful year, all these challenges were faced and solved without any external consultancy support, using only the resources given, including the provision of training to the internal auditors.
• And last but not least, all of the work and results concerning the new Quality Management System, records and procedures developed to comply with the new standard were praised by the auditor.

The company is very proud of this success and in particular of all the team members involved in achieving this excellent result.

This is taken as further proof to the competence, efficiency, good practises and experience of GroupEAD and its staff members, showing how we are able to move forward within the Aeronautical world,  adapting to new standards and regulations and successfully achieving our goals.