What is Gap Analysis?
A Gap analysis is an objective evaluation of your organization’s current arrangements against the Standard requirements. A Gap Analysis can be an ideal place to start when implementing a new standard in your organization.
Starting with a gap analysis can be very beneficial as it often saves time and money. The gap analysis will identify the ‘gaps’, allowing you to produce a more accurate project plan for filling those gaps and achieve Certification & Set Targets.
BTS Consultants Follow under define steps for GAP Analysis:
1. Documentation Review of your existing Management System and asked to provide your existing policies, procedures, and a master list of documents and records, identify missing records.
2. Visit your location(s), interviews staff, and evaluate the existing business processes through the lens of Management System.
3. Prepared a detailed report that identifies where your current practices meet to the requirements of international standard and where “gaps” exist.
4. The outcome of the Gap Analysis can then be used to develop a draft Project Plan for implementation & execution of the project.
Three main components to completing an Gap Analysis
1. Scheduling the Gap Analysis
2. Conducting the Gap Analysis
3. How to use the Results of the Gap Analysis: The Report
Schedule the Gap Analysis:
• Select the date(s) for the Gap Analysis, and communicate to all employees what is being done, and why.
• You will want to be able to make the employees comfortable with answering your auditor’s questions. You may want to consider sending out a newsletter to inform employees that the Gap Analysis will be performed, by whom, when and why the Gap Analysis is being performed. Use the Employee Newsletter which is included in the Gap Analysis Checklist Toolkit.
• Determine whether you will audit by process/procedure or by area of the facility. Our approach is usually to audit by area of the facility.
• Divide the facility into manageable areas.
• Schedule time to audit each section of the standard that applies to the area.
• If you are using an audit team, assign the team to cover the various areas of the facility.
• Arrange your Gap Analysis checklists so each auditor will have the sections of the standard that are applicable in the areas they will cover.
Conduct the Gap Analysis
• Follow the schedule that you have prepared. Go into each area of the facility to evaluate the current quality system.
• Focus on what is in place, and what is not in place. Remind auditors that you are not focusing on compliance or non-compliance to the current system, but on the design of the current system, and how it matches the Standard requirements.
• Take notes on what is in place, and what will need to be developed and changed. Take complete notes, reference documents and examples.
• Notice where all the processes link to other processes in the organization.
Complete a Gap Analysis Report
Summarize the audit findings in the form of a task list.
• Processes that comply with the standard and are documented.
• Processes that comply with the standard and must be documented.
• Processes that do not comply with the standard and must be redesigned.
• Processes required by the standard that are not currently in place.
How does a gap analysis differ from an Audit?
The main difference between a gap analysis and an audit is that during a gap analysis your organization will compare your business to the standard. During an audit, the goal is to compare an organization’s policies and procedures to the requirements of the standard, and then look for evidence that they are being followed within the business.