By Zach Parker, Director of IT and Service Delivery
Choosing a trustworthy and reliable partner can be difficult for consumers to navigate, especially in the crowded scientific field. With an ISO 9001 2015 certification, however, the search is narrowed to only the most qualified companies, like ours, Numed. With the help of the certification, our customers know they have access to the highest quality products at the most efficient prices in the medical imaging field.
If you’ve never heard of the ISO 9001 2015 certification, the name alone can be daunting, and provides little insight as to what it entails. So, let’s start with something simple - what exactly does it mean? According to ASQ, the certification is the “international standard that specifies requirements for a quality management system.” Essentially, it signals to consumers that a business with this certification has proven themselves to uphold the highest standards in their field.
For us, the ISO 9001 2015 was required to become a leader in the medical imaging service industry, as we are exacting in every aspect of service. We made it our priority to earn the 2015 certification and, once achieved, didn’t stop there. We continue to pursue higher standards, paving the way for other medical imaging companies and setting an example in our field.
To get started, we identified areas that could be improved through professional guidance. After a year and a half of discussion with quality management consultants, many changes were made, ranging from the preservation of equipment to quality of vendors to training our own engineers. Through rigorous commitment and implementation of our vision, in March 2019, we achieved our ISO 9001 2015 certification.
Looking back, the key to this achievement is in the way we entirely angled our services towards customer wants and needs. The customer comes first, always. Though it’s now the expected standard, this certification is not given to businesses simply checking boxes. For many, it takes a shift in the entire framework of their company to truly center around the customer.
These efforts aren’t merely ornamental. By doubling down on consumer needs, our customers find us more reliable and have higher levels of satisfaction. Through a deeper understanding of their behavior, we are able to absorb their recommendations into our framework, setting us apart from our competitors.
In our business, we are extensions of the hospitals where our products are found. The proper function of our MRI scans, CT scans and PET scans is crucial for our clients and those they serve. In many cases, our products are involved in grave injury or sickness; this makes us accountable for the proper function of every piece of equipment installed or serviced to properly function and gives our customers the ability to do their jobs with ease.
With over 44 years of quality service, we have been around longer than the ISO standards themselves. Despite being seasoned experts, with the changes implemented by the ISO 9001 2015, we have seen our customer satisfaction rates skyrocket along with the establishment of services that better meet consumers’ needs.
From the outside, the ISO 9001 2015 may seem like a standard operating procedure, another accolade for companies to parade. In reality, it’s so much more. With the changes implemented to meet the certification criteria, our entire company shifted to become geared toward the actions that consistently result in customer satisfaction.
Our ISO 9001 2015 certification aids us in producing what our customers need, implementing internal change in response to feedback and focusing on our goal of improving what matters the most to us: customer satisfaction.