Friday the 13th – Or Why Audit Management Seems Cursed (and How to Break the Spell)

At exactly 8:00 a.m., the lead and co-auditor leave the quality office and head straight to the first floor. In the purchasing department, the head is already waiting. The dark circles under her eyes make it obvious — she too was working late to get her department audit-ready. The auditors confidently pull out their standard questionnaire, developed (of course) by the QM team.

And just like that, the cat-and-mouse game begins. The initial questions go well — purchasing has done its homework. But by the second half, things start to unravel: one of their C-suppliers has outstanding corrective actions with a long-missed deadline. That doesn’t sit well with QM. The auditors pounce. Heated debates break out as purchasing and QM offer conflicting views. In the end, one side must concede. The deviation is noted. The auditors leave, satisfied.

Everyone involved knows the ripple effect this will cause. Countless hours will now go into follow-up tasks — not only for purchasing and QM but also for departments like logistics and development. Time that could be much better spent. The lack of shared perspective between purchasing and QM creates frustration and undermines collaboration — even though everyone should be working toward the same goal: the company’s success. In the end, everyone loses. The company. The QM department. Purchasing. But most of all — the people.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because it is. This kind of audit drama plays out in companies everywhere. Possibly, even as you’re reading this, someone else is going through it. And yet, many believe there’s no way out.

But there is — if we rethink audit management from the ground up.

Finding a better way

I spent nearly 17 years working in quality management across the automotive, medical, and home appliance industries — mainly in strategic leadership roles. A key part of my work was developing global quality strategies, including building an entirely new approach to audit management. After years of seeing the same counterproductive patterns — like the one above — I knew the system had to change. My goal? Design a more effective audit process that benefits the company while genuinely empowering its people.

Rethinking audit management — together

Here are the four most important building blocks of a better approach:

1. Let process owners write the questions

It quickly became clear to me: the audit questions shouldn’t come from QM. The best people to define what matters in a process are the ones doing it every day — the process owners themselves. When people write the questions for their own areas, the results are not only better, but they’re also much more accepted. After all, no one likes to argue with themselves — and no one knows better what’s important than the experts on the ground.

2. Change the auditor role

If every audit is run solely by QM, it inevitably feels like “cops and robbers” — one side searching for violations, the other side trying to hide them. That’s not productive. Instead, we made the lead auditor the department head. They decide whether a deviation exists — and they’re best placed to judge what truly matters. People want to do good work. When you make process owners responsible for audit outcomes, they start to see audits as tools that help them improve and succeed.

3. Redesign how actions are tracked

Follow-up actions are often where audits get stuck. If the department doesn’t agree with the deviation, the corrective measures are doomed from the start. And nobody has time for tasks they don’t understand or believe in.

But if the process owner wrote the audit questions and the department head documented the deviation, acceptance is naturally higher. The department takes ownership and implements the actions on their own — on time, without the need for external pressure. That saves enormous time, energy, and bureaucracy.

4. The ultimate goal: empowering people to create quality

Here’s the kicker: with this approach, we haven’t just improved audit efficiency. We’ve made process owners an integral part of quality management — simply by giving them real responsibility. In the end, it’s not QM that ensures quality — it’s the organization itself. The job of QM is to enable the business to deliver quality. That’s the gold standard. And that’s exactly what this system achieves.

It’s not easy — but it’s worth it

Sure, all this might sound reasonable on paper. But implementing it is challenging. It means breaking with old habits, legacy structures, and resistance like: “But we’ve always done it this way!” I’ve heard it all — especially from auditors who’ve done things the same way for decades. Without a shift in mindset, nothing changes. But when you make that shift, everything changes.