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The dilemma of getting consultants to write your SOPs for you. Should you or shouldn’t you?

August 13th, 2019 by

As a consultant, I am often brought in to assess systems, perform gap analyses or to audit. In many respects it is the same activity. I look at what is in place in the form of documents (SOPs and policies) and in processes in action in their operations. Some of these clients are large pharma or biopharma but a large number are relatively new and small operations with much of their activities outsourced to third parties.

Now let me stress, as a consultant, I am totally against getting consultants to write SOPs. It is not because I can not write an SOP. It is because a document that is written must be owned by the eventual company and to get ownership requires, in my mind, an active involvement in the production of the document and process. Ordinarily, I will supply key elements I would expect to see in a document or process. I will review the document to modify it to include elements forgotten or to restructure for clarity.

My approach is the same for both type of clients when I come in to assess. I use the classic moniker of “say what you do, do what you say, prove it, improve it” or putting it simply, documents, execution, records, improvements. So what do I see? In large companies, I often see well established elements with often strengths and weaknesses. So my tasks are relatively straightforward. But in small companies do I see the same? The simple answer is No.

What I see is groups of people working furiously to keep momentum going. This results in major gaps in systems. Many times, procedures are not in place and even if they are, they do not reflect the process in place. Particularly when procedures are in place they are written vaguely with no clarity as to process. When you interview people to gain clarity, you find their processes as verbally described are often quite robust. But it is just not described in any formal document. But since the company is small everybody knows everybody else and communication is very much ad hoc. While this may work initially, as the companies grow they lose that advantage.

So what we have to do is get them to think through the actual processes, write them down and immortalize them in policies and SOPs. This is easier said than done. They are so busy, they do not have the time to get it down on paper. On many occasions, to get them to a better state, I take on the task of writing it down, then getting them to check for accuracy and then shepherd the documents through the system. Ordinarily, I am not a supporter of getting a consultant to write an SOP for the company. Even if written very well, there is no ownership within the organization. But this is different. You are not inventing a new process to implement, it is writing down what is actually done. Or at least that is how I justify going against my own philosophy.

My goal is to put into place procedures describing what is actually done in the company, in a manner that if all the employees disappear overnight, to be replaced in the morning with new people, there is a good chance the processes would be executed similarly as before. In other word a robust sustainable process. This is the first step in building a rugged Quality Management System.

The third Part of our series on QbD and Quality Continuous Improvment

September 24th, 2017 by

We are happy to announce the publication of the third part of our series.  This article, co-authored with colleagues Dr. Ko and Dr. Stein covers how to create a sustainable continuous improvement program with an emphasis on QbD.  Happy reading.  The link is https://www.pharmaceuticalonline.com/doc/how-to-catalyze-sustain-continuous-improvement-in-pharmaceutical-operations-0001 

 

Part II of article “Big Data & Leadership Strategies For Enabling Quality By Design”

August 29th, 2017 by

Part 2 of a series of articles about Pharma implementation of new regulations and quality systems is out and available for viewing at a number of sites including Pharmaceuticalonline.com  Happy reading.

The second part to our survey on implementation of Guidances on Company QMS

July 3rd, 2017 by

In the first article dealing with our surveys, we concluded that not all of the guidances issued had been implemented completely.  Even when they had been implemented, the implementation did not take advantage of all the potential.  For instance many companies were reluctant to  not work on certain technical areas even though their risk analysis indicated that these same areas were relatively unimportant and had little impact on product quality and patient outcome.  And why was that?  Perhaps they did not believe their analysis.  Perhaps they were afraid of inspectors disagreeing.

The second article (Part 2 of the survey) showed that even though guidances had been implemented, the impact on some of the most troublesome elements of the QMS was not as effective as hoped.  Some if you find your company not gaining as much traction as hoped, you are not alone in struggling to become more effective.

How well has the pharma industry implemented regulations?

February 25th, 2017 by

This has always been a question people ask.  As a consultant i see a slice of the industry that interacts and works with me, so I have my opinions.  However, a company that employs me may not represent the average company.  So a colleague of mine, Peiyi Ko, and I decided to conduct a survey asking these questions.  we used Survey Gizmo as the survey tool and LinkedIn Groups as the interface.  These 40 questions were posed and because of the interesting answers we got, we are publishing them in two parts.  This post has the first part published in Pharmaceuticalonline.  In this part, we examine the implementation of various guidances and regulations.  The second will feature how ell they have impacted the company Quality Management System.

The second part will be published in a couple of months.  Bookmark my website so you will see it when the next is posted.

Happy reading