Purpose of Internal Audit in ISO 9001 & other Standards
ISO 9001& other standards require the organizations to carry out the internal audits.
You may call it self-assessment, self review or introspection.
For this, the client organizations are first required to make a plan. The plan gives details on when the audit will be conducted, which departments/processes will be covered & who will be the auditor(s) for the audit.
The organizations are free to set the frequency of the internal audit. It can be any number of times in a year. However, the standard requires that atleast one internal audit is conducted in a year.
Now, we come to the most pertinent question of "Why the Internal Audit"?
The outcomes of the internal audits inform the top management/the boss/the manager whether the well though out system they had implemented is working fine or are their any issues.
With these outcomes, one gets to know about the effectiveness of a process/strategies, allocation of resources & training needs of the staff.
To sum it up, its an opportunity for the top management/the boss/the manager to get to the ground & do the reality check.