A Guide to Effective Internal Management System Audits

INTRODUCTION

Internal audits are required to be performed by any organization wishing to comply with any of the international standards for management systems, for example ISO9001, ISO14001, ISO13485, ISO27001 and so on. Although certification of organizations to these management systems standards has been available for nearly 25 years, the requirements were written to be implemented without the need for external certification audits. If internal audits are not used to “prepare” an organization for the audits of a Certification Body, why are they (universally) required by these standards?

Today, most organizations wishing to implement an ISO standards-based management system often utilize available (often accredited) training for management systems ...