Let us debunk a popular myth, you are not a CQI IRCA Certified Lead Auditor by completing the CQI IRCA Certified Course.
But the good news is you are eligible for CQI IRCA Auditor Grade membership.
If you wish to be part of the elite group of IRCA Certified Lead Auditors, the first step is to complete the relevant course.
Let us illustrate through an example. Let’s say Mr. Sam who has been working in the field of quality assurance for the last 10 years wishes to become a certified lead auditor and wants his name to appear on the IRCA register on this page.
What should Mr. Sam do?
Step 1: As Mr. Sam is in the field of Quality Assurance, his obvious goal will be to become a QMS Lead Auditor. He should enroll for ISO 9001:2015 QMS Lead Auditor course from a CQI IRCA Approved Training Partner. 3FOLD Training is an Approved Training Partner. This is a mandatory requirement, Mr. Sam can’t avoid it.
Step 2: After successful completion of the QMS Lead Auditor course, Mr. Sam should decide whether to apply immediately for ISO 9001:2015 QMS Associate Auditor status or wait until he accumulates the required audit man-days to apply at upper level grades. To learn more about the various Auditor Grade levels, visit our article ‘CQI IRCA Auditor Grade Membership’.
Now, Mr. Sam has an important question about the audit requirements to apply for QMS Lead Auditor grade membership.
The Question is, ‘I have done several audits in my past 10 years of experience, can I use it to apply for the Lead Auditor Grade’?
The answer is a resounding NO.
Here is the logic: CQI IRCA can’t verify or validate whether you have followed the ISO 19011 Auditing guidelines and certain good practices. This is the reason why CQI IRCA only counts audits that are performed after you have completed the course. Now that you have trained based on CQI IRCA course specification, there is a level of assurance that you would follow the best practices during the audit.
So, in a nutshell, all the audits Mr. Sam completed prior to attending the CQI IRCA certified QMS Lead Auditor course will NOT be considered towards the Auditor Grade membership.
Now that Mr. Sam has completed the course, what are the audit requirements to apply for the QMS Lead Auditor grade membership? Visit our article on ‘CQI IRCA Auditor Membership’ to know more about specific audit requirements or visit www.quality.org.
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