Quality policy: our first responsibility is to our clients.

Our first responsibility is to the organisations that use our consulting, training and certification-support services and our software products. Since 2003 that has meant 8,100+ client engagements in 60+ countries, across ISO management systems, GRC frameworks and attestation standards.

We constantly strive to improve the quality of our services and products, to gain and keep market leadership in each of the geographical areas where we operate. Our aim is customer delight: consulting assignments completed on time, exceptional output, enquiries and queries answered promptly, and continual improvement of our business processes.

We believe our success is determined by the success of our clients, and we work hard to make our clients successful. That is the Sterling Promise: 100% on-time completion, 100% success and 8,100+ client engagements. On a certification engagement, success means the certification outcome agreed at the start, and Sterling stays engaged, answering each finding with the client, until that outcome is reached. Sterling does not certify; an accredited body audits and decides.

Every engagement runs on Sterling OS™, the same method refined since 2003, with Design™ or Drive™ as the two alternative ways to build a management system, and Sustain™ and Automate™ to keep it working afterwards. Each engagement passes through the same controlled stages:

• Scoping: the requirement, the standard or framework, the sites and the outcome are agreed before anything is promised, and the deliverables, responsibilities, assumptions and exclusions are set out in writing in the engagement proposal.
• Plan: one engagement team, a weekly working session, the deliverables and the decision owners are agreed at the start, with a dated route to the outcome.
• Delivery: the work is done with the client's process owners, on the client's premises or remotely as agreed, and progress is tracked against the plan.
• Closure: deliverables are handed over, open points are recorded, and engagement information is returned or deleted as the Information security policy describes.
• Feedback: every client is asked for feedback at closure, and what we learn is fed into the method.

We are responsible to our employees, the men and women who work with us. We respect their dignity and recognise their merit. They must have a sense of security in their jobs. Compensation must be fair and adequate, and working conditions conducive, productive, progressive and ergonomically suitable. Employees must feel free to make suggestions and complaints, and there must be equal opportunity for employment, development and advancement for those qualified.

Sterling's engagements are delivered by expert and experienced consultants. A consultant is assigned to an engagement only when their experience matches its standard and sector, and consultants keep their knowledge current as standards are revised, including through Sterling's own transition training. Subcontracted consultants are held to the same competence, conduct and confidentiality requirements as employees.

We measure what this policy promises: delivery against the agreed plan, response times to enquiries, client feedback and complaints. Nonconformities in our own work are corrected and their causes removed, the same corrective action discipline we implement for clients. Management reviews these results, the method and this policy regularly, and sets the improvements that follow.

We provide competent management, and its actions must be just and ethical. We are responsible to the communities in which we work and provide services, and we comply with all applicable legal and regulatory requirements. We launch new services and products to address the needs of changing markets, and we aim for, and achieve, excellence in everything we do.

This policy is part of Sterling's Company policies. Complaints about our services are handled under the Complaints and feedback policy.