A Quality Manager is a very important function in a food manufacturing facility. On the other hand, there is a lot of variation in the role of a Quality Manager and of course also a lot of different skills that are needed. It al depends on how your company is structured, what kind of products you manufacture and of course all the challenges that you can face in a food manufacturing facility.

To answer your question: ‘What skills does a Quality Manager need?’ depends of course on your situation.

But what kind of skills would we like to see that a Quality Manager has at least?

 

Skills

These are the skills a Quality Manager needs to have at least:
• Communication skills
• Planning skills
• Project management skills
• Analytical skills
• Problem-solving skills
• Influencing skills
• Strategic insight
• Ability to facilitate change
• Stress handling
• Helicopter view

 

 

<p> <img src="QFS Success Coaching.jpg" alt="Image QFS Success Coaching"> How do you change the image people have of a Quality Department?... </p>

 

Course vs Training on the Job

A few of these skills can be acquired or improved by following a course. It’s rather ‘easy’ to follow a course, – get certified if you want – and mention these skills on your CV. However not all skills can be trained by following a course. Most importantly the best way to train these things are ‘training on the job’.

 

Challenges

What do I mean by this? Firstly, let me give you an example. You are a Quality Manager in a food manufacturing company. You get the assignment to create a food safety culture in your organization. What are the skills that you need to use to fulfil this task? Okay, what if I told you that you need all skills mentioned above?

Secondly, even if you use all of these skills, the outcome may still be that you have a challenge on implementing a working food safety culture. All the courses that you followed don’t provide you the tools that you need to influence your food safety culture. How come? Most of the trainings are on a basic level and give you some guidance what you can do. You learn on the job by doing. And yes, you will fail sometimes. That’s fine, you truly learn by doing and making mistakes.

Some of us can handle these kind of situations easily and adapt to the situation and make the necessary changes to improve the situation. And sometimes you are blocked. You can’t figure out why things don’t work out as they should. How can you overcome this?

Thirdly, a very good way to address this is to have a coach, and talk to your coach about your challenges and your targets. Your coach will break down all of your targets in quarterly focus items for you to work on. This way you will improve your performance and enhance your career.

 

QFS Success Coaching

In conclusion, at Food Safety Experts we have a proven program called QFS Success Coaching. We help you to overcome your challenges and realize your targets. How do we do this? Check our program by clicking here and see how this will work for you.

 

Training for Quality Managers

All GFSI-guidelines acquire that people are trained. Therefor we all provide a lot of trainings on our CCP’s and OPRP’s. However, training on every topic you need to know as a quality manager is not common. Next to this, often after following a training you learned a lot about WHY it is so important that you take action. On the other hand, most of the courses don’t provide you the information of HOW to implement and improve your system. And that’s exactly the difference of all the courses of Food Safety Experts and all the other courses you can find. We, at Food Safety Experts, focus on the HOW. I know this will give you a lot of tools to implement and improve your situation.

In short, check out our Webinar Replay Repository. You will have one year access to all online trainings. Every month a new training is added to the Repository. This will give you the time to implement what you have learned. You can watch the video lessons as often as you would like to. Next to this, you will receive certificates that you followed trainings on food safety. For more information: QFS Training Replay Repository.

<p> <img src="QFS Webinar Replay Repository.jpg" alt="QFS Webinar Replay Repository"> How do you stay up to date with food safety?... </p>

 

QFS Mastery Program

At Food Safety Experts we have our QFS Mastery Program. This Program contains 24 modules with different topics related to food safety. Every module you will receive ± 2.5 hours of video lessons on HOW to Improve Food Safety and ± 10 downloads that you can implement in your organization.

In conclusion, this Program will give you a huge boost as a professional and for your company. For more information, please visit our website QFS Mastery Program.

 

Food Safety Experts Services

Other Interesting services of Food Safety Experts:

QFS Mentoring

QFS Success Coaching

QFS Mastery Program

 

Articles Food Safety Experts

Interesting blogs of Food Safety Experts:
How to Improve Business Performance in the Food Industry
5 Tips to Sustain a Food Safety Budget – Even in Times of Crisis
5 Crucial Steps for Focussed Improvement
5 Must Do’s for a Compelling Multi-year Plan
The Importance of Strong Issue Management
Have Sense of Urgency in 5 Steps
6 Steps to Create a Strong Team
7 Steps to be IMPACTFUL as a Quality Manager