The management system helps organizations achieve their goals, and auditing organizations is of positive commercial significance. The international standard of management system audit has just been updated to provide more guidance.

Management system standards are gaining popularity as organizations realize how to apply management system standards to manage related processes to achieve their goals. The list of standards, from quality or energy management to food or traffic safety, is growing to help organizations establish effective management systems.

ISO alone has more than 70 management system standards based on international expertise and best practices designed to help organizations operate better, save money and play a competitive advantage.

In order to make full use of the management system and ensure continuous improvement, periodic review is required. If, like most organizations, you have several management systems, it is not easy.

ISO 19011 Guidelines for Audit Management Systems provides a unified and coordinated approach to effectively audit multiple management systems simultaneously.

Dennis Robitaye, chairman of the ISO Project Committee, which revised the standard, said it was updated to ensure that it continued to provide effective guidance in response to market changes, evolving technologies and many new management system standards recently issued or revised.

"Other major changes in the 2018 edition include the addition of a risk-based approach to audit principles to reflect management standards and greater market attention to risk," she said.

"The standard provides tips on audit risks and opportunities, as well as information on applying risk-based thinking to the audit process.

"In addition, the scope of guidance for this standard has been expanded in some areas, such as management audit programmes and auditing."