From ISO Quality Standards to Integrated Management System: the key role of Balanced Scorecard in SMEs

The effective implementation of an integrated management system (IMS) is increasingly recognised as essential for all types of organisations facing today’s turbulent and competitive environment. Literature stresses that most companies could benefit from moving from the mere adoption of the International Standards Organisation (ISO) quality standards to the implementation of an IMS linking strategy and operations by means of an interrelated set of management tools. However, despite the wide range of investigated issues, scholarly literature still mainly focuses upon large organisations, and although much progress has been made in recent years, many questions on how an IMS could be implemented in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) remain unanswered. In order to contribute to this research gap, this paper investigates the process characterising the effective implementation of an IMS in a leading SME and the main factors enabling the changeover from the adoption of ISO quality standards to the implementation of an IMS. The implementation process identified here is synthesised in a framework which can support the understanding and the implementation of an IMS in SMEs.