Christina is part of our Senior Leadership team as Head of Quality Assurance here at Arriba Group. Christina has been with us for over 3 years, whereby her commitment to her job and deliverance of high-quality outcomes has helped the business see great success and growth.
We sat down with Christina to have a chat about what’s involved in Quality Assurance and her experiences within the Arriba Group.
What is involved in being Head of Quality Assurance?
Essentially, my role is to make sure that all four companies under the Arriba Group are meeting contract requirements with our customers and that we are complying with legislation and policies, all while making sure everything we do is gold standard and best practice.
The importance of quality assurance comes down to meeting our goals and delivering on our promises to ensure we keep contracts and can continue to grow the business. We see growth and success by having great quality assurance standards as it allows us to hire more staff, source the latest in IT systems and facilities and to reinvest back into the company with employee programs such as Earnd and recreation leave.
If we can follow through on our promises and do what we say we can do, we can grow as a business.
How do you ensure Arriba Group complies with relevant standards?
We ensure Arriba Group is compliant with relevant standards through auditing sites against our registration and contract requirements, such as ISO 9001, and also through training staff on requirements to make sure we can pass the audits. It also involves managing the process behind the requirements, which includes addressing complaints, freedom of information requests, data breaches, managing the document library, training staff, and also developing guides and manuals.
There is a lot involved but it all comes down to making sure we have the right policies, procedures, documents and training in place and tracking performance against requirements. This is all managed to ensure that if there are any gaps or issues, we can begin addressing these problems in the business and continue to grow.
What is ISO 9001?
We are accredited to ISO 9001, which is an international standard that is a customer-focused quality management system. This standard essentially says that if you adhere to these quality management guidelines on how to operate your business, you will deliver exceptional service to your customers.
For example, the ISO 9001 guide covers topics on:
- Commitments of Leadership: Ensuring that our goals across the leaders are aligned and we collectively adhere to our own internal policies, procedures, and guidelines. For the Arriba Group, this also incorporates the customer-focused mindset into everything that we do.
- Planning: The actions that must be in place to assess risk and opportunities, and to plan for any changes happening in the organisation.
- Support: That we have the right resources in place to support, including our infrastructure, people, monitoring and measuring tools and the organisational structure.
- Performance Evaluation: Looking at how we monitor, measure, and evaluate our services, which includes how we review and provide internal standards.
Our ISO 9001 accreditation is a key factor in the continued success of the business as it allows us to keep our business and contracts, whereby customers expect us to be accredited, and also to grow the business and go for new tenders.
What was a highlight for you over the past year?
I have two main highlights.
The first would be the success we’ve seen in completing audits, whereby we completed 4 big types of audits from third party accreditation auditors and received the fantastic result of zero non-conformances. This is essentially unheard of in quality assurance and was a great team effort. It also reflects that our staff have the right training, and that we have the right policies and procedures in place.
My second highlight would be COVID and how quickly we were able to restructure the entire business from office-based to a home-based environment without it impacting on the business.
What is your favourite part about working for the Arriba Group?
As I’m a very competitive person from a background of sporting, fear of failure is what drives me. I will always try my best and apply myself to anything I do, which I’ve seen success through doing so in sports such as Gymnastics, Netball and CrossFit. I see the Arriba Group as a team, and although there are competitors trying to make it to the top, so are we. We are always trying to do more to be the best. Every individual I work with in the Arriba Group wants to be No.1 in the market. The Arriba Group is innovative and is always thinking up new ideas, products, services, and initiatives on how to improve the business and better support staff. I believe the managers and staff morale are important in creating this thriving work environment, which all reflects back on Marcella’s leadership style.
I have been with the Arriba Group for 3 years, and the personal approach I have seen Marcella deliver to clients, staff and community initiatives is a key reason for the positive corporate culture across Arriba Group. We also have fantastic communication within the company across all types of roles, where although the senior leadership is driven, we are rational and approachable, which filters down through to the people we manage. Everyone is equal and deserves equal respect and treatment, and that is the company culture that Marcella has created. She is a great mentor, leader, and manager, and it’s a reason why I love my job.
