ISO 9001 QMS, it is not in itself sufficient. To develop and implement a fully functional ISO 9001
QMS, it is essential that a SME correctly identifies the initial state of its QMS and the path it will
follow to achieve the desired state.
This paper uniquely contributed to this challenge by identifying four main initial states and five
paths from the initial to the desired state. The explicit identification of the initial states and paths
will help managers within SMEs to understand the process of implementing ISO 9001 and the
fundamental issues that they must address. This should help SMEs to prevent implementation
failures within their organizations. In particular, the paper cautions that ISO 9001 cannot be a
documentation-driven system. Although this may indicate the QMS exists, it does not guarantee
its functionality