What the CQA Credential Is, and What This Course Is Not

The Certified Quality Auditor (CQA) is a professional certification run by ASQ, the American Society for Quality. It is aimed at people who plan, perform and report audits of quality systems, processes and products. Holders work as internal auditors in factories and service companies, as supplier auditors, as auditors for certification bodies, and as quality managers who run audit programs.

The exam tests whether a candidate understands the principles of auditing and can apply them: choosing the right kind of audit, planning it, collecting objective evidence, writing findings, following up corrective action and managing a whole audit program. It also tests the people skills an auditor needs and a set of quality tools, including basic statistics and sampling.

A quality auditor is not a financial internal auditor

The word "audit" is used in two professions that are easy to confuse. A quality auditor compares how an organisation works against requirements such as a quality management system standard, a customer contract, a regulation or the organisation’s own procedures. The usual subject is product, process or system conformity and effectiveness.

An internal auditor in the IIA sense (the Institute of Internal Auditors) gives assurance on governance, risk management and internal control across the whole organisation, often with a strong financial and fraud focus. That profession has its own exam, covered by the IIA CIA Exam Preparation course. The two share ideas such as independence, evidence and risk, but the bodies of knowledge, standards and vocabulary are different. Do not mix them in the exam.