MARINE CORPS LOGISTICS BASE BARSTOW, Calif. -- In March 2002 Fleet Support Division Barstow began what it thought would be a long journey down the road to International Organization for Standardization registration. That trek ended recently when FSD cleared it final audit by an independent registrar and received its ISO 9001:2000 registration. By becoming ISO-registered the organization is just one more added to a list of about 400,000 organizations worldwide to receive certification."We've been at this for just under 14 months and managed to get registered within a third of the time than any other organization in the Marine Corps," said Maj. Vincent Applewhite, director, Fleet Support Division. "Management worked with the employees to get this accomplished and it's a remarkable accomplishment."Even more remarkable, said Applewhite, is that FSD accomplished this feat while supporting operational forces in Iraq."Operational tempo had gone up tremendously," he said, " and we didn't drop our guard because of what we were doing for ISO, it was actually making us better and faster."The International Organization for Standardization (ISO), based in Geneva, Switzerland is a network of national standards institutes of about 140 countries. ISO developed the 9000 series of quality management systems, which applies to all types of businesses and organizations no matter how large or small, according to the ISO Web site."What they've done is create a standard that goes through everything from management responsibility, training, internal auditing, development of the product, and procedures for carrying out the product," Applewhite explained. "If you have these elements in your organization, then you will be defined as a quality organization, or you will be able to meet the quality standards of the customer."ISO 9000 is concerned with "quality management." This means what the organization does to enhance customer satisfaction by meeting customer and applicable regulatory requirements and continually to improve its performance in this regard, according to iso.org."In the case of FSD we have a broad range of customers," said the FSD director. "Overall, FSD's customers are operational forces west of the Mississippi, to include Okinawa. Locally, FSD supports the Maintenance Center, MCLB, and Ft. Irwin - the Army rotations coming through here - we do have some deliveries to Ft. Irwin, and finally the City of Barstow."According to Applewhite, the goal of the International Organization for Standardization, which includes more than 100 countries, is standardize everything such as what a double 'A' battery's size should be, to camera film to ensure the film purchased works in the camera an individual may have no matter what the make is."In order for commerce to work you need to have standards, " he said. "Without standards there's no way we would be able to exchange information, or to function effectively."If you want to compete in the global market you pretty much have to be ISO registered. It made [FSD] a quality organization that can compete in today's market with some of the best companies in the world."Applewhite notes the being registered has tremendous benefits. Particularly worth noting about ISO 9001:2000 is that everything is performance driven.The organization has a management meeting monthly where it addresses the results of the previous month's decisions. From there decisions are made regarding where FSD plans to move from there and are recorded, and this is how the quality management process begins."From this process we establish a quality manual which states what we are and what our quality management systems contains," Applewhite said. "We map out our processes and we have in the neighborhood of 19 standard procedures. Those standard procedures include everything from document control, nonconforming product, corrective actions, preventive actions and internal audits."Continuing with the steps in the quality management system, the FSD director highlighted the fact from this procedures they've developed roughly 80 work instructions that tells an employee exactly what needs to be done, and they receive training on those instructions at least once a week.Now FSD has developed a regular training program internal to its organization to keep employees current with current procedures, and if any employee wants to see what they have to do or what someone else has to do all they have to do is go to FSD's Web site and get it. "It brings up their work instructions which tells them who does what and how it needs to be done. It has references, points of contact, it spells out everything," Applewhite revealed. "That empowers the employee because now the employee knows, and our strength is our employees."One of the key strengths to this whole process is every FSD employee is empowered to make a change to anything that needs it, according to the director. This can be done through a correction action report submittal, or a nonconformance report and once a report is submitted management must respond to the inquiry.Another key item is communication from the top to the employees, which is done through an all-hands meeting."The one thing that binds us together is that quality policy, which states what we're all about in our organization," Applewhite said. "Three key things stay in our employees minds: Our ear to the customer, eye on detail, and focus on quality."We're always listening to the customer; we're always paying attention to the quality of what we're doing."Now, the employees have been trained and know how to do a particular job because procedures are established and everyone has access to the procedures. From this step the systems is looked at and results are monitored. According to Applewhite every statistic links back to a quality objective that meets the attempt of the organization."Once we do that, looked at the data, then we're obligated to analyze the data and come up with a recommendation from it," he said. "That's posted throughout the organization. We then go back to the employees to ensure they understand it, and most of them can tell you exactly what that data is for and where they fit into making that number."One of the main cogs in the whole ISO effort is Carlos Arriola, the management representative. In this capacity he speaks for the director, coordinates all the audits, follows up on all corrective actions, and oversees the management meetings. He is the eyes and ears of the organization at all times, Applewhite revealed"Of particular note are the auditors we have," he said. "All employees, everyone from warehousemen to laborers, supervisors, to include myself, are trained auditors. FSD has about 40 trained auditors, everyone is trained."With this in mind FSD is constantly checking its processes to ensure its employees are trained and to ensure that the employees are doing what they say they're doing."The key is this: Say what you do and do what you say," Applewhite commented.Only after the organization conducted its own internal audits and felt satisfied with the results was an outside auditor called in. The result of the registrar's audit is sent before a review panel and at the end of that review the registrar returns to the organization to grant it the certification and put the organization on the rolls of world class internationally standardized organizations, Applewhite said."At this point it's remarkable what [FSD] has done," said Applewhite. "They've done it on their own because this is their quality system; the employees own the quality system.As I often say to them 'we've come across a long journey, we've crossed the ocean over to quality and we're not going back. We've burned our ships; there is no going back.' Quality is our mission and our mission is quality."