Lloyd International Translations passes
Terex quality audit with flying colours
Quality/Services case study
The Terex Corporation is a diversified global manufacturer with net sales in the region of $10 billion and is now the world’s third largest manufacturer of construction equipment. Terex operates in four business segments: Terex Aerial Work Platforms, Terex Construction, Terex Cranes, and Terex Materials Processing & Mining. Terex manufactures a broad range of equipment for use in various industries, including the construction, infrastructure, quarrying, surface mining, shipping, transportation, refining and utility industries. www.terex.com
Background
In simple terms, the essential ingredient of Quality involves the formal, regular and systematic inspection of an activity, process, or the whole quality system, to verify conformance (or otherwise) with documented procedures and standards.
In July 2009, Terex Construction asked to perform a full quality audit on Lloyd International, preferred supplier of technical translation services to all Terex Construction sites, which are based in the UK, Germany and the USA.
Terex needed to ensure that the same levels of quality applied to both service and translations were in place behind the scenes at Lloyd International.
The primary purpose of the planned audit was to evaluate the process management solutions in place at Lloyd International, determine deficiencies and suggest possible improvements. The audit would check practice against procedure to identify and document any differences. In short, Terex wanted to measure Lloyd International’s ability to do what it said it was doing.
“Working with world class partners is key to Terex’s strategy. The regular review of quality and adherence to processes are major factors in determining a benchmark partner,” explains Mark McLeod, Global Head of Customer Information at Terex Construction.
Approach
To be effective the audit needed to be pre-planned so that it covered all aspects of quality control. The audit would therefore cover a number of steps defined by Terex:
• Audit schedule
• Preparation and organisation
• Audit execution
• Summarise results
• Prepare report
• Corrective action
• Remedial action
• Follow up
Lloyd International welcomed the audit, seeing it as a means for Terex to confirm that LIT’s processes conformed to ISO 9001:2008 standards and were effectively implemented and maintained.
It was agreed that Terex would share its findings with Lloyd International, who would take timely corrective action on any deficiencies found during the quality audit. Lloyd International recognised that this may involve a review of current control methods to indicate or predict the need for corrective action. Any resulting follow-up actions would include the verification of the implementation of corrective action and the reporting of verification results.
Audit
To be effective, a quality audit (whether internal or performed on a supplier) should always include members of the organisation’s quality control staff. In this case Mark McLeod (from Terex) was the auditor and Vicky Robinson (Quality Manager) was the key point of contact at Lloyd International.
Mark ran through a series of specific quality-related questions, recording his observations and compliance or non-compliance regarding the activity in question.
As part of his questioning technique Mark asked probing questions, such as:
• Is it documented?
• Is it being followed?
• Is it effective?
• Can I see the report?
• Frequency and agenda?
• What is your policy on ….?
• Do you have?
Any non-conformities would then form part of Mark’s final audit report, which would detail observations and recommendations.
Findings
Lloyd International passed the quality audit with flying colours; no corrective actions were required.
According to Mark, “The Audit process is one of the measures that has confirmed to Terex that its initial selection of Lloyd International was correct. Having our publications translated to the highest possible standards is an essential element of providing world class aftermarket services to our dealers and customers. These results combined with the passion and integrity that LIT exhibits on a daily basis give me the confidence to aggressively promote Lloyd International to the other segments of my business as a key strategic solution to their translation requirements.”
Partnership approach
Lloyd International’s account management relationship with Terex Construction includes rigorous business reviews performed with representatives from all Terex Construction client sites on a quarterly basis.
The availability and discussion of data relating to spend, savings, delivery performance, quality issues, personnel changes and service levels results in a very open and interactive two-way relationship. Mark concludes, “The engagement of partner in lieu of supplier is very important to me. The business review process that we’ve introduced this year ensures that high standards are maintained in all areas of our relationship with LIT, and a collaborative approach to finding innovative solutions is vital to both of our businesses’ needs.”