12 replies to this topic

[bananaOz]

if there is no dedicated personel for QA, who can be allocated to temporarily fulfill the QA role, given that there is alread a QA plan in place. 
so we have full documentation what test need to be done, what to record, where to record it, how to manage those record, but no QA 

[Tony-C]

Hi bananaOz,

 

I sometimes come across this and the responsibility for carrying out QA testing is allocated to suitable production line staff who are appropriately trained prior to taking on this responsibility.

 

I would say this works better when it means an upgrade for the employees in question and they receive some recognition and financial benefit for taking on the extra responsibility.

 

Kind regards,

 

Tony

[Setanta]

I agree with Tony. On occasion, I have done the QA role when no one else is available. It isn't ideal, but at the same time, I gain an appreciation for the day-to-day tasks QA has...

[Charles.C]

I am curious as to the size of this manufacturing Organisation ?

 

Miniscule ?

[Setanta]

I am curious as to the size of this manufacturing Organisation ?
 
Miniscule ?

Mine is not. Getting reasonably intelligent people to fill positions is a CHALLENGE in the US. We struggle to get hourly production people and we pay on the high end for the area.

[kfromNE]

Production management is trained and certified on a lot of the QC duties. Pre-op is the main one I need help every now and then if staff doesn't show up or weather issues. I can use them in a pinch if I'm really short handed for CCPs during production too. 

Works well. 

[G M]

This is part of where the food safety and quality training program becomes important. 

 

One approach would be that everyone is fully trained and responsible, but that will probably only work in facilities with very low numbers of staff and people are used to "wearing multiple hats" to make sure things are done and done correctly.

 

The second is to have tiers of training, and make sure there are enough people in each of the upper tiers to cover all the critical roles if some of them are missing for various reasons.

[bananaOz]

in my case, the company size is that we have about 30 people in the whole factory,

the boss working as production head, no manager, and soon to be no de'facto QA manager (me, I only have 2.5 QA experience) only 10 are full time, all in production role,  2 production head, 1 vice production head, no maintenance, no packaging head, the rest are part timers.

administration are done by the company owning this small factory, ala subsidiary

[Brothbro]

in my case, the company size is that we have about 30 people in the whole factory,

the boss working as production head, no manager, and soon to be no de'facto QA manager (me, I only have 2.5 QA experience) only 10 are full time, all in production role,  2 production head, 1 vice production head, no maintenance, no packaging head, the rest are part timers.

administration are done by the company owning this small factory, ala subsidiary

 

A dangerous situation can brew when a company is structured this way; the production staff need to make sure that they're held accountable to food safety standards. If there is only one decision maker on site at any given time, and they're always production minded, it's common for decisions to get made that favor production over safety. Example: production operators forgetting to monitor/log CCPs, followed by the boss releasing the product because it's "probably fine". This leads to operators not taking CCPs seriously.

 

Having production staff do QA/QC monitoring is certainly possible, it's just important to make sure the right people are capable of holding everyone accountable to food safety.

[QAKat]

A dangerous situation can brew when a company is structured this way; the production staff need to make sure that they're held accountable to food safety standards. If there is only one decision maker on site at any given time, and they're always production minded, it's common for decisions to get made that favor production over safety. Example: production operators forgetting to monitor/log CCPs, followed by the boss releasing the product because it's "probably fine". This leads to operators not taking CCPs seriously.

 

Having production staff do QA/QC monitoring is certainly possible, it's just important to make sure the right people are capable of holding everyone accountable to food safety.

Brothbro please do not get me started on this lol

 

10000000% TRUE! Especially when they have favorites and those people get ZERO consequences.

They call it a family oriented business YUCK! 

[bananaOz]

Brothbro please do not get me started on this lol

 

10000000% TRUE! Especially when they have favorites and those people get ZERO consequences.

They call it a family oriented business YUCK! 

 

well, yes, the company is still family owned, and that favouritism while not as big, still can be seen. but wont talk much more because it is the management people's issue

[SQFconsultant]

Ah, a family owned business.
When we first started in consulting I loved working with the small to mid sized operations along with their own set of peculiar things going on.

One day I got a call from a 7 person company and the owner said - can you come here and do a gap analysis so we can start working on this stupid thing called SQF.

While questioning the the owner I asked who was the person responsible for QA and he said; well that depends if Joe is here or not - yes, I understand family ops indeed.

I think the best thing to do is identify the best non-family member in the company and get that person trained into the role of QA Supervisor/manager - thus keeping that important role out of the family circle.

By the way I flew out to Oshkosh to do the gap analysis and upon meeting the owner he said - I didn't really tell you the whole truth - our SQF audit is tomorrow and we decided to have both the desk and site audit done at one time and we'd like it if you would be the one to show the inspector everything.

This was the only place I ever walked out of and went back to the airport, flew home and took a couple of days off.

[bananaOz]

Ah, a family owned business.
When we first started in consulting I loved working with the small to mid sized operations along with their own set of peculiar things going on.

One day I got a call from a 7 person company and the owner said - can you come here and do a gap analysis so we can start working on this stupid thing called SQF.

While questioning the the owner I asked who was the person responsible for QA and he said; well that depends if Joe is here or not - yes, I understand family ops indeed.

I think the best thing to do is identify the best non-family member in the company and get that person trained into the role of QA Supervisor/manager - thus keeping that important role out of the family circle.

By the way I flew out to Oshkosh to do the gap analysis and upon meeting the owner he said - I didn't really tell you the whole truth - our SQF audit is tomorrow and we decided to have both the desk and site audit done at one time and we'd like it if you would be the one to show the inspector everything.

This was the only place I ever walked out of and went back to the airport, flew home and took a couple of days off.

 

well at least the silverlining is that the family member consist of the 2 production head