The ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management System Standard: Companies' Drivers, Benefits and Barriers to Its Implementation

Purpose: The aim of this study is to evaluate companies' perception of the latest version (2015) of ISO 9001 in terms of motivations that pushed companies to the implementation of a Quality Management System. Methodology: The research was conducted through a questionnaire proposed to 3,975 ISO 9001 certified companies, making a simple random sampling among the 150,143 Italian companies certified in 2018. Among the companies contacted, 493 participated in the survey and gave shape to the reference sample. Findings: The results of the study show that the “culture of quality” is rooted in Italy and mainly in the North, which represents the most economically advanced area. With regard to the evolution of the standard from ISO 9001:2008 to 2015, companies seem to have perceived the main changes introduced with the latest revision, that helps to easily adopt its principles in companies. Research Limitation: The main limitation of the study lies in the fact that the focus of the research was based on Italian companies. It would be important for future research to consider also other European countries, and make a comparison between them, in order to consider if companies of different markets have different motivations for implementing the standard and perceive different benefits and barriers to its implementation. Value of paper: Few researches have focused on the latest version of the ISO 9001 standard; therefore this study gives a broad vision of how companies that have had to deal with the new standard consider it in relation to the previous version, highlighting the main strengths and weaknesses.