Recently published results from the ISO Global Survey 2017 reveal ISO 20000 to be among the favourite management system standards.
What is the ISO Survey?
Each year, ISO does a survey of all accredited certification bodies around the world to ask for the number of certificates for 10 of their management system standards. Accredited means assessed by their national accreditation bodies e.g. UKAS in the UK.
Management system standards are those which specify requirements for a management system for different topics. A management system sounds scary but it is just a way of putting together policies, plans, processes and procedures to be acted upon to gain a specified outcome. In the case of ISO/IEC 20000-1, the outcome is services delivered to fulfil service requirements and deliver value to the customer, user and organization delivering the services.
ISO/IEC 20000 is the only international standard for service management. It can be used by organizations big and small, public and private, for IT and non-IT services. The latest edition, ISO/IEC 20000-1:2018 Service management system requirements, was published in September 2018. Alongside this, the update to ISO/IEC 20000-10, Concepts and Vocabulary, was also published.
The survey results for 2017 are the latest published and these show that ISO/IEC 20000 is the 7th most certified standard and grew by 10% since the 2016 survey.
Of course, we will never reach the 1 million+ certificates which ISO 9001 has achieved. But the numbers are steadily increasing.
The ISO Survey results
| Standard (ISO) | Subject of standard | Number of accredited certificates in 2017 | Increase in % from 2016 |
|---|---|---|---|
| ISO 9001 | Quality | 1,058,504 | -4% |
| ISO 14001 | Environment | 362,610 | +5% |
| ISO/IEC 27001 | Information security | 39,501 | +19% |
| ISO 22000 | Food safety | 32,722 | +2% |
| ISO 13485 | Medical devices | 31,520 | +7% |
| ISO 50001 | Energy | 22,870 | +13% |
| ISO/IEC 20000-1 | Service management | 5005 | +10% |
| ISO 22301 | Business continuity | 4281 | +11% |
| ISO 28000 | Supply chain security | 494 | +39% |
| ISO 39001 | Road traffic safety | 620 | +30% |
Summary
ISO/IEC 20000-1 is growing and becoming more and more recognised as a standard that can provide benefits to the business and the service management area. This survey demonstrates its steady growth.
You an access the survey and further information at https://www.iso.org/the-iso-survey.html
Lynda Cooper, an independent consultant and trainer, specialising in supporting organizations to achieve and maintain ISO/IEC 20000 and ISO/IEC 27001 certification. Lynda chairs the BSI committee for service management and is the project editor for ISO/IEC 20000-1. She represents the UK at the ISO committee for ISO/IEC 20000. She is one of the first people in the world to hold the ITIL Master qualification.
