Management system guidance
Relationship management
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Key benefits of relationship management
Interested parties influence the performance of an organization. Sustained success is more likely to be achieved when the organization manages relationships with all of its interested parties to optimize their impact on its performance.
Relationship management with its supplier and partner networks is of particular importance. Key benefits of relationship management include:
- Enhanced performance of the organization and its interested parties through responding to the opportunities and constraints related to each interested party;
- Common understanding of goals and values among interested parties;
- Increased capability to create value for interested parties by sharing resources and competence and managing quality-related risks;
- A well-managed supply chain that provides a stable flow of goods and services.
Actions you can take to enhance relationship management:
- Determine relevant interested parties (such as suppliers, partners, customers, investors, employees, and society as a whole) and their relationship with the organization;
- Determine and prioritize interested party relationships that need to be managed;
- Establish relationships that balance short-term gains with long-term considerations;
- Pool and share information, expertise and resources with relevant interested parties;
- Measure performance and provide performance feedback to interested parties, as appropriate, to enhance improvement initiatives;
- Establish collaborative development and improvement activities with suppliers, partners and other interested
parties; - Encourage and recognize improvements and achievements by suppliers and partners.
Relationship management in ISO 9000:2026 and ISO 9001:2026
ISO 9000:2026 keeps relationship management as a principle and lists context of the organization and interested parties among its additional concepts, alongside topics such as the circular economy and integrated management systems. Your relationships extend beyond suppliers to customers, regulators, partners and the wider community.
The ISO 9001:2026 clauses most closely linked to this principle are:
- Clause 4.2 - determining relevant interested parties and their requirements, and now also deciding which of those requirements the QMS will address. Interested parties can have requirements related to climate change;
- Clause 8.4.3 - communicating requirements to external providers, now including their interactions with your customers and other relevant interested parties, and verification at their premises or another location;
- Clause 8.4.2 and Clause 9.1.3 - controlling external providers and evaluating their performance;
- Clause 8.3.2 - involving customers and other relevant interested parties in design and development where appropriate;
- Clause 6.1.3 - opportunities such as new partnerships;
- Clause 9.3 - changes in the needs and expectations of interested parties are now a separate management review input.
More information on quality management principles
| Customer focus | Meeting customer requirements, exceeding expectations and customer experience |
| Process approach | Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA), sequence and interaction, inputs, activities and outputs |
| Leadership | Establishing strategic direction, purpose and a quality culture |
| Improvement | Innovation, opportunities, root cause analysis, and change management |
| Evidence‐based decision making | Data analysis, process performance assessment, and risk-based thinking |
| Engagement of people | Competence, knowledge, empowerment and quality culture |
More information on PDCA
Planning
Context
Planning
Support
Doing
Support
Operations
Checking
Monitoring, measurement, analysis and evaluation
Acting
Improvement
How to apply the latest quality management principles
The latest and current quality management principles (QMPs), stated in ISO 9000:2026, are intended to provide the foundation by which any organization can continually improve its performance.
You can learn to apply the latest quality management principles in the context of your business's own particular operations by reviewing and documenting its activities in the context of each quality management principle.
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