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What problems can happen when implementing a food safety program?

Started by , Mar 24 2014 10:50 AM
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What types of implementation problems can occur(or if you work in an enterprise with a HACCP plan, have occured) when applying the food safety program in the workplace?

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Based on my experience, problems start to occur when there is a lack of commitment from top management. Full commitment form top ensures the availability of resources (whether it is financial, man power or organizational) when/if you have implementation problems.

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When you overlook something! Don't panic, we're all human, and it can (and will) happen

 

Make sure that you spend time in production going over everything, is it done the way it says its being done;  keep in the loop when there is new kit introduced, or new processes, however trivial changes may seem; make sure you get involved in product trials and validation; become the engineers best friend; If an ingredient or supplier changes, document it, it may have an impact . I could go on for pages. 

 

But remember, if you forget something, put it right straight away; don't wait for a review; auditors would rather see an out of sequence review than think you've left it until the "official" review date.

 

Caz x

on my experience, people will ignore your new policies and procedures or as they're more comfortable working the old ways. they will also be complaining of "too many process".

 

before we don't have to much monitoring in the kitchen, only the chiller and freezer temperature, now they have to monitor the food itself and etc. i told them "you'll get use to it".

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If you don't adequately implement training to the work force and management personnel you can expect problems. You'll never be implement a food safety management system without everyone knowing what they need to do in their respective rolls in order to produce safe food.

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What types of implementation problems can occur(or if you work in an enterprise with a HACCP plan, have occured) when applying the food safety program in the workplace?

 

Hi Cannedfruit,

 

:welcome:

 

I think that problems start when you don't have an implementation plan to give the 'team' focus.

 

Plan
Document
Implement
Maintain, Measure, Audit
Review
Improve

 

QM 2.1.3 Food Safety and Quality Management System Page 11_001.jpg   80.33KB   7 downloads

 

Problems that can be encountered when implementing a food safety management system include:
- Lack of pre-requisite programmes (PRPs)
- Over-complex and unmanageable systems with too many critical control points (CCPs), partly resulting from a misunderstanding of the role of prerequisite programs and an inability to conduct proper hazard analysis
- Ineffective monitoring and corrective actions due to poor training and verification procedures
- Excessive documentation and lack of focus due to over-complex systems
- Poor validation and verification due to lack of expertise
- Over complication of HACCP implementation

 

Regards,

 

Tony

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Communication failure in the organization. Documents and records are not revised /updated as necessary, that they dont actually match what is truly happening in operations. 

My experience about problems when implementing a FSMS start with the Food Safety Team;if they don't show commitment from the word go, you are done. Then if the team is selected from people who have no focus on food safety but are there to spy what you are doing; I mean some organizations do not believe in their food safety team leaders doing a good job, so they put their own men to check what is going on, a very frustrating method of doing things

Problem starts when you got lots of documents and don't know how to interpret them to make sure that the food safety plan is working. 

You have to set a GMP culture, define responsibility who will be doing what i.e. who will be filling which documents, who will be verifying those documents and departmental managers are aware about importance of the document , little hoax scaring of any stubborn manager is enough to get this set into practice. 

If possible get your sales team head in your confidence , who can really make a difference when it comes to implementing good manufacturing practice lol ( Always works for me as sales ppl are always scared of customer complaint and consequence of failure in checking due diligence such as  product rejection, withdraw and recall !

 

Honestly there is no problem , Involve all big head of your company in your HACCP team, arrange a tea and coffee and organize a small training along with review meeting and put your concern in front of them and ask for advise and help . Give some factual example and set a date , from when you are going to implement it or you want to see it working . By this it becomes a responsibility of all departmental head and higher management , who usually engage there supervisor or team leader to look after any issue . Then as a technical person you just carry out your daily, weekly and monthly schedules work for testing, auditing and corrective action.  Dont hesitate to bring up any issue during management meeting and try to build a pressure on responsible person to close any outstanding issue . Once you prove that its not extra task but must necessary task it will be fine within couple of months. 

If you got a technical team assign daily , weekly and monthly task to them for verification , set some new Quality and technical K PI as per your newly implemented QMS . then everything will rock N roll :)

My experience about problems when implementing a FSMS start with the Food Safety Team;if they don't show commitment from the word go, you are done. Then if the team is selected from people who have no focus on food safety but are there to spy what you are doing; I mean some organizations do not believe in their food safety team leaders doing a good job, so they put their own men to check what is going on, a very frustrating method of doing things

 

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I read this. Hope you have better experiences in the future.

 

Commitment from senior management is fundamental, I always draw a line in the sand, when it is crossed, I move on.

 

Good luck,

 

Tony

Thank you for your help

Based on my experience, problems start to occur when there is a lack of commitment from top management. Full commitment form top ensures the availability of resources (whether it is financial, man power or organizational) when/if you have implementation problems.

 

You couldn't have said it any better. How true. 

Problem starts when you got lots of documents and don't know how to interpret them to make sure that the food safety plan is working. 

You have to set a GMP culture, define responsibility who will be doing what i.e. who will be filling which documents, who will be verifying those documents and departmental managers are aware about importance of the document , little hoax scaring of any stubborn manager is enough to get this set into practice. 

If possible get your sales team head in your confidence , who can really make a difference when it comes to implementing good manufacturing practice lol ( Always works for me as sales ppl are always scared of customer complaint and consequence of failure in checking due diligence such as  product rejection, withdraw and recall !

 

Honestly there is no problem , Involve all big head of your company in your HACCP team, arrange a tea and coffee and organize a small training along with review meeting and put your concern in front of them and ask for advise and help . Give some factual example and set a date , from when you are going to implement it or you want to see it working . By this it becomes a responsibility of all departmental head and higher management , who usually engage there supervisor or team leader to look after any issue . Then as a technical person you just carry out your daily, weekly and monthly schedules work for testing, auditing and corrective action.  Dont hesitate to bring up any issue during management meeting and try to build a pressure on responsible person to close any outstanding issue . Once you prove that its not extra task but must necessary task it will be fine within couple of months. 

If you got a technical team assign daily , weekly and monthly task to them for verification , set some new Quality and technical K PI as per your newly implemented QMS . then everything will rock N roll :)

 

Sounds ideal. But the big heads don't have time for "unimportant" meetings. Or so they say. 

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The most common problem I've had and seen in other sites is lack of senior management commitment.  If the senior management are not prepared to give the resources or listen to the outcomes then you are stuck.

Is there a way to persuade senior management commitment?  I agree it is step one of the recipe of success but is there a trued and true method of obtaining it?

 

Thanks for any input.  

 

sjw

 

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I read this. Hope you have better experiences in the future.

 

Commitment from senior management is fundamental, I always draw a line in the sand, when it is crossed, I move on.

 

Good luck,

 

Tony

I remember what an owner of a food compamy said to me some years ago when I was there to do a second 3rd party audit because the first one failed with the score of 15.

He said we never bought into food safety before your last audit and then it was too late because right after you left within the next week our lack of focus on food safety resulted in us killing 2 small children.

At that point he broke down sobbing.

Your senior managment lack of focus on fodd safety will result in the same, the possibility of it not hapoening is nil.

Tell them to get their ducks (nice word) in order.
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