5.17 Manual Objectives

However, from the perspective of readership, we can at least attempt to define the overall objectives of the manual:

To clearly describe the organization's QMS with enough detail to make it useful for a very wide range of readers;
To respond to each requirement of the Standard so that the defined system has the potential to achieve the full benefits of continuous/continual improvement—intrinsic within the Standard;
To write the manual from the customer/client's perspective as the primary issue for clarity and preciseness.

ISO 10013:1995, Par. 4.2.1, clearly describes additional objectives of the manual (e.g., its use in audits, training, and implementation). What we define as objectives is from a more holistic business perspective and one that ingrains the organization's personality.

New Customers Of all the readers, it is the customer, and in particular the new customer, who must rely on the manual as a primary source of organizational quality competence. Every other reader has some degree of organizational knowledge either through a series of business transactions or through audits.

The new customer looks at the organization with fresh eyes based on a particular technological and financial viewpoint. As a result, if the manual is written at a level of clarity sufficient to satisfy the new customer, it will certainly satisfy any other reader.

This assumption implies that there is sufficient detail to satisfy the needs of a still-diverse set of readers (e.g., executives, purchasing agents, quality assurance-managers, investors, and interdivisional organizations).