Effectiveness gained from combination of ISO 9001 and ISO 3834 at LISEMCO JSC

LISEMCO Joint Stock Company is the leading company in Vietnam in manufacturing, supplying equipment and steel structures for industrial plants and shipyards. So far, LISEMCO has been confirmed in the international market. According to the company’s leaders, one of the factors that help LISEMCO to be successful is the application of ISO standards, specifically applying both ISO 9001 and ISO 3834.

Since the early days of establishment, the Board of Directors of the company has been paid attention to productivity and quality of goods and products supplied to the market. Therefore, the company has developed and applied the quality management system ISO 9001 into production and business activities.

Although some departments of the company were familiar with the quality management system, during the application process, the company faced problems related to the quality control of the metal melting welding links. Welding is the most commonly used and popular process in a company, affecting all mechanical structures as well as product and construction quality.

In order to become a main contractor and not depend on subcontractors when exporting products to tough markets, the company needs to apply appropriate international standards, including the ISO 3834- requirements for metal melting welding. The company decided to participate in the project “Developing a pilot model on the application quality management system of ISO 9001 integrated with ISO 3834” into the company’s current quality management system.

After participating in the project, the members have mastered the requirements of the quality management system. The departments have developed their own system of documents and practiced the necessary actions related to their departments, meeting the requirements of the integrated quality management system.

In addition, the company cooperates with experts of Vietnam-Germany Technology Transfer and Training Center to conduct advanced training and skill assessment for welders according to ISO 9606. The Company also appoint qualified and knowledgeable technical staff in welding field to participate in training courses on welding coordinators, welding supervisors, and inspection staff according to the requirements of ISO 3834.

Initially applied, the company met certain difficulties but according to the assessment, the application of integrated quality management system has really become an effective tool, gradually promoting the great impacts of productivity and quality improvement of products, reducing the cost of repairing defects, increasing the reputation of the company’s products in the market.

Surveying at the workshop producing welded steel assemblies, assembling equipment for shipbuilding and steel structure construction, showed that labour productivity has increased significantly, the number of employees to produce 1 ton of product has decreased from 14 to 12.5 labour. The amount of welding rods to produce 1 ton of products also decreased by nearly 10%, the rate of defective products also decreased because the welding workers were re-trained, more basically and the jobs were also standardized from the beginning.

In the coming time, the company continues to apply and continuously improve the integrated system. Besides, the company will apply for ISO 3834 certificate.

The ISO 3834 standard provides requirements for welding quality control (management of metal material, welding materials, welding process, welding personnel and inspection personnel, welding supervision, etc.) as well as a set of necessary technical standards, to supplement and clarify the requirements of ISO 9001 in the field of welding techniques. In Vietnam, ISO 3834 standard has been adopted as a national standard since 2005.

Productivity and Quality Office