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  1. Andy Nichols

    Andy Nichols Moderator Staff Member

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    Turtles are fatally flawed as an audit tool!

    The use of the "turtle" diagram to help auditors to plan their process based audit (which isn't a defined requirement, btw) is very common, but it seems that no-one has discovered - or publicly pointed out - that it's use is fatally flawed! Yes! The use of a turtle misses something which has been required, since ISO 9001:2000 and certainly since 2015, that is the "sequence and interaction of processes" is not adequately considered. Although "buckets" of things to consider under the 4 "M" categories (Man, Machine, Materials, Methods) are present, we know it's the sequence of when these are considered during the process are key and consequential to the output and quality.

    Despite it being around since 1995 or so, there's been no notable shift in QMS audit results, so it's likely that the tool isn't contributing much...
     
    Last edited: Feb 21, 2023
  2. John Predmore

    John Predmore New Member

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    You make a good point. But you miss a good point.

    All models are flawed. Some are useful. (With credit to George Box.)

    The so-called turtle is a static depiction of one element of a dynamic system, it is not the actual element and not the dynamic system. There is practical value in looking at that, so to focus a line of inquiry in an audit, without loosing sight of the larger truth, that a part is not the complete system.
     
  3. Andy Nichols

    Andy Nichols Moderator Staff Member

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    Agreed. My point is that despite the uptake of the turtle as a "silver bullet" to auditing (and even being used to document a QMS) it isn't that good - it's "fatally" flawed.