Maintaining accreditation

Maintaining continuous accreditation is the aim. This is also a requirement in service agreements. Possible lapses in continuous accreditation may impact on funding eligibility and contract management. To ensure continuous accreditation we have provided a number of tips to help you stay on track.

Tips to maintain accreditation

To stay motivated and keep up-to-date with systems, policies and procedures, here is a list of suggestions on maintaining accreditation and continuously improving.

• Ensure staff are aware of how important it is to contribute suggestions for improvement.
• Establish a quality group or committee that meet regularly and focus on continuously improving systems and documentation such as policies and procedures.
• Look at strategies to raise awareness across the organisation of your quality philosophy and agenda.
• Conduct training for new and current staff on quality concepts and continuous improvement tools.
• Hold 'lunch and learn' sessions on quality and continuous improvement tools.
• Develop and maintain a quality action plan.
• Develop an internal audit schedule and inform your staff when internal audits are to occur.
• Give ample time to gather and develop evidence for your Australian Service Excellence Standards self-assessment. Unless your organisation has a dedicated resource to prepare for external assessment, it generally takes between 12 and 18 months.
• Book an assessment 6 months before your accreditation expiry date in case there are quality action plans to follow up.
• Talk with other organisations about how they manage their quality improvement processes.
• Keep asking for lots of feedback from your customers and other stakeholders.
• Consider using the continuous improvement tools to collect data on progress against outcomes or problem areas within the organisation.

More information

How to start the accreditation (or re-accreditation) process