MAIN BENEFITS OF INTEGRATED MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS THROUGH LITERATURE REVIEW

International Journal for Quality Research 13(4) 1037–1054 ISSN 1800-6450 Subrata Talapatra Gilberto Santos1 Kutub Uddin Filipe Carvalho Article info: Received 30.05.2019 Accepted 05.09.2019 UDC – 006.013 DOI-10.24874/IJQR13.04-19 MAIN BENEFITS OF INTEGRATED MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS THROUGH LITERATURE REVIEW Abstract: The main aim of this paper is to prepare a comprehensive list of benefits offered by Integrated Management System (IMS) discussed in the previous literature. This paper had followed a methodology for literature review based on the keyword search in the electronic database of Web of science, Science direct, Scopus and Emerald. Findings of this literature review have unveiled several important and interesting benefits offered by the integrated management system and wider scope of integration. Several studies have confirmed the listed benefits of integrated management system, namely, Quality Management System (QMS) according ISO 9001, Environmental Management System (EMS) according ISO 14001 and Occupational Health and Safety Management System (OHSMS) according ISO 45001/BS OSHAS 18001. Moreover, this study has highlighted some dimensions of future study in line with the analysis of benefits of integrated management system. Keywords: Quality; Environment; Occupational Health and Safety; Integrated Management Systems; ISO 9001; ISO 14001; ISO 45001. 1. Introduction During growth of quality and environment movement back in 90’s appeared EMS (Environmental Management System - ISO 14000), OSHMS (Occupational Safety and Health Management System - OHSAS 18001), risk management system, and some others. Appearance of large number of management systems, with different and sometimes divergent demands, demand reconsideration of optimal strategies of introduction of these standards in national quality system and point question of their integration through integrated management system. Now-a-days, business organizations are practicing several management systems such as quality management system (QMS) 1 according ISO 9001, environment management system (EMS) according ISO 14001 and occupational health and safety management system (OHSMS) according ISO 45001/BS OSHAS 18001, among others. Recently, business organizations are using Corporate Social Responsibility Management System (CSRMS) (Santos et al., 2018a). Each management system works in particular area and offers benefits in that area. For example, if a firm choose QMS, it can enjoy several benefits like continuous improvement of products, services and process quality, customer satisfaction on quality; improve product reliability, reduction of cost by improving process efficiency etc. (Santos et al., 2019a; Costa et al., 2019; Araújo et al., 2019; Dahlgaard-Park & Dahlgaard-Park, 2019; Marques et al., 2018; Bravi et al., 2019; Corresponding author: Gilberto Santos Email: 1037 Santos & Barbosa, 2006; Batista & Santos, 2015; Lee et al., 2009; Tari et al., 2012; Ferreira et al., 2015; Khan & Farooquie, 2016; Babakian et al., 2015; Ng et a., 2008). It is very importante to créate a quality culture in the Organization (Zgodavova et al., 2017; Santos et al., 1996; Weckenmann et al., 2015; Santos et al., 2019c). Similarly, EMS can offer saving in energy consumption, pollution prevention, customer satisfaction on environmental protection etc. (Asif et al., 2009; Oliveira, 2013; Rebelo et al., 2014; Santos et al., 2016; Tarí et al., 2012; Turk, 2009; Psomas et al., 2011; HerasSaizarbitoria et al., 2011; Gavronski et al., 2008; Matuszak-Flejszman, 2009; Reis et al., 2018; Álvarez-García & RíoRama, 2016; Bednárová & Jergová, 2015). OHSMS can offer risk level reduction, better safety, employer satisfaction, etc. (Ferreira et al., 2019; Rebelo et al., 2017; Santos et al., 2014; Monteiro et al., 2013; Ferreira & Santos, 2014; Gonçalves et al., 2019; Yiu et al., 2019; Santos et al., 2013; Rzepecki, 2012). On the other hand, the certification of the management systems (QEOHS) also shows benefits (Fonseca et al., 2017). For this reason, many business organizations those who are not aware of management standard practice, are trying to adopt various management system standards. Implementations of ISO standards are completely voluntary (Rebelo et al., 2016a; 2014). But, now-a-days, it becomes obligatory measure to implement ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 as instructed by the customers (Oliveira, 2013; Guilherme et al., 2013). Researchers are trying to find out significant impact of these management system standards on firm’s business performance. Some of them have found positive link (Arimura et al., 2015; Asif et al., 2009; Oliveira et al., 2010; Su et al., 2015), while other have not found any significant link (Abad et al., 2013; Clougherty & Grajek, 2014; Lo et al., 2014; Mohammadfam et al., 2016; Prajogo et al., 2012). Beside this, a large number of studies had been conducted to analyse the benefits offered by ISO 9001 1038 and ISO 14001 implemented sequentially or simultaneously (Manders et al., 2016; Tarí et al., 2012). Several authors have argued that, two above mentioned ISO standards has a lot of compatibilities from the angle of structure and management procedure (Chen et al., 2016; Rybski et al., 2017). Both of these standards follow continuous improvement practice (PDCA cycle). Process improvements, advent of new technology, changes in consumer’s priorities, improved quality of service provided by competitors is just a few. It has, therefore, become important to periodically update the knowledge of consumer expectations and transform the organization to a customer-focused organization. With better understanding of consumers’ perception about product quality and service, a company can identify its relative strengths and weakness and chart a path for future progress and improvement. Many research scholars have argued that, companies those who have already implemented and are practicing ISO 9001 have enough knowledge to adopt ISO 14001 (Asif et al., 2009; Luo et al., 2015). Because, both of the standards require similar practices to meet the regulations of quality and environment. Similarities between these standards in terms of structure, management philosophy can create an opportunity to integrate, innicially, these two management systems and later other management systems (Rebelo et al., 2016b; Santos et al., 2017). In this context, synergies may be achieved by integrating these two standards based on their similarities. Greater benefits can be obtained through better synergies (Bernardo et al., 2009; Kafel & Casadesus, 2016). According to Rybski et al. (2017) all individual management systems can be integrated into one management system. Important benefits obtained from the integrated systems are optimum use of resources, unification of audit, increase efficiency of the firm and so on (Abad et al., 2014; Bernardo et al., 2012; Bernardo et al., 2018; Bernardo et al., 2015; S. Talapatra, G. Santos, K. Uddin, F. Carvalho Mezin (...truncated)