Management Commitment

The new version of the British Retail Consortium Global Standard (BRC) for food safety includes some changes in the section on senior management commitment and continual improvement.

Management Commitment has been described as the “Direct participation by the highest level executives in a specific and critically important aspect or programme of an organisation”. In the development of a food safety and quality management system this encompasses:

• The establishment of the senior management team with the appropriate level of knowledge, skills, and competence;
• The development, documentation and implementation of a food safety and/or quality policy as combined or separate documents;
• The establishment of the organisations “mission” in terms of food safety and quality and the associated organisational goals and objectives. These objectives must be formally established (written down), communicated with the associated awareness programme, monitored to determine whether performance standards are being achieved and reviewed and amended as required in order to continue to improve performance. The objectives therefore must contain elements that are measurable for example consumer complaints, customer service levels, internal reject levels;
• The provision of adequate resources (people, premises, equipment, raw materials etc) and the necessary training and supervision to effectively use the resources. The resources that need to be provided within an organisation include financial, physical, human, social and environmental capital (See effective management of assets).;
• The development of a management infrastructure to implement the actions necessary to achieve organisational goals and objectives and to deliver products and associated services that consistently meet customer requirements;
• The development of communication channels throughout the organisation. Any issues with food safety, legality and quality should be identified and preventive and/or corrective action implemented. These actions could include strategic planning and development of internal checks and balances and/or the implementation of product recall procedures;
• The implementation of management review and internal audit programmes to evaluate the effectiveness of policy implementation and determine how the organisation can continue to improve. The frequency of management review should be determined and should include an evaluation of the adequacy and effectiveness of food safety and quality management systems such as HACCP. An annual review will routinely evaluate performance, but the review is largely historic and cannot influence current practise. Monthly review will drive performance and the implementation of timely corrective and preventive action. Separate agendas should be developed for each meeting. Minutes of the meetings and associated documented system reviews should be maintained to demonstrate the meetings and reviews have taken place , the adequacy of the process and the actions that have been planned, implemented and signed off on completion.

Effective management of food safety and continuous improvement doesn’t just happen in an organisation or supply chain, it is planned, driven and requires the continued commitment of the senior management team.

© Louise Manning, 2008