Does ISO 9001:2026 Really Bring Ethics into Quality—And What Should Companies Do About It?

For years, organisations have treated “quality” as a discipline of procedures, controls and metrics. Meanwhile, public trust, stakeholder expectations and ESG pressures have pushed leaders to ask a more human question: how we achieve results matters as much as the results themselves.

The Draft International Standard of ISO 9001:2026 (ISO/DIS 9001) moves decisively into this space. It elevates ethics and quality culture from soft aspirations to explicit leadership and awareness requirements. The change is not cosmetic; it reshapes how quality systems are led, learned and lived.

What the ISO 9001:2026 Draft Actually Says

Multiple national bodies and accredited conformity-assessment organisations summarising ISO/DIS 9001 report that Clause 5.1.1 (Leadership and commitment) now requires top management to “promote a quality culture and ethical behaviour.”

DNV’s update on the DIS captures this shift, noting a “new amendment in 5.1” with guidance on demonstrating it in practice. NEPIC’s briefing confirms that leadership is “strengthened, with an explicit focus on promoting quality culture and ethical behaviour,” and BSI’s explainer states plainly that ISO/DIS 9001 “introduces ethical behaviour and quality culture as part of leadership responsibility.” These are not peripheral notes; they sit inside the leadership clause that anchors the entire system.

The revision also expands Clause 7.3 (Awareness). Commentaries that have examined the draft text agree that people doing work under the organisation’s control must now be aware of the organisation’s quality culture and ethical behaviour expectations, not only policies and roles.

9001Simplified puts it succinctly: Clause 7.3 “adds a new awareness requirement for employees to understand ‘quality culture and ethical behaviour’,” while Oxebridge’s clause-by-clause review states that 7.3 “adds a requirement to ensure employees are aware of ‘quality culture and ethical behaviour.’”

Beyond ethics, the DIS integrates other structural changes that matter for implementation. Clause 6.1 is reorganised into clearer subclauses (6.1.1–6.1.3) that separate risk from opportunity actions, and the 2024 climate-change amendment to ISO 9001 is absorbed into the main text on context and interested parties.

These revisions signal ISO’s intention to keep the standard aligned with contemporary risk and stakeholder thinking.

A practical note on timing and process is important for readers and clients: BSI confirms the DIS is out for public consultation with publication of the revised standard projected for autumn 2026, meaning the current wording can still change at the FDIS stage. That makes early preparation sensible, but quotations should be attributed to commentary and national-body communications unless you hold the DIS itself.

Why Ethics and Culture—Why Now?

The first driver is stakeholder trust and ESG alignment. BSI frames ethics and quality culture as part of leadership’s visible commitment to values, while Intertek explicitly links the revision to “ethics and organisational governance” and the wider shift toward stakeholder and ESG expectations. In short, ISO 9001 is being tuned to the world in which it operates: customers, regulators and employees increasingly evaluate not only outputs, but the integrity of processes and decisions.

The second driver is closing the notorious gap between “paper systems” and real behaviour. RigCert highlights that the draft even includes a note describing how quality culture and ethical behaviour are “reflected in… shared values, attitudes and established practices,” which is precisely what auditors encounter when procedures look fine but incentives or pressures lead to corner-cutting. By naming culture and ethics in leadership and awareness clauses, the DIS makes it harder to claim conformance when conduct undermines the system.

A third driver is alignment across the ISO family and contemporary risk thinking. DNV, SGS and others point to the clearer treatment of risk/opportunity and the climate-context integration. In that light, ethics is not an add-on; it is one dimension of organisational resilience and responsible decision-making, consistent with adjacent standards (for example, ISO 37001 on anti-bribery) and modern governance expectations.

What This Means in Practice: How to Meet the New Requirements

The draft’s intent is behavioural, not bureaucratic. BSI’s guidance encourages senior leaders to show commitment through training, open communication and example-setting so that values are lived, not laminated.

Advisory notes from practitioners echo that auditors will now probe how leaders model integrity in everyday choices, how staff learn to recognise and escalate dilemmas, and how culture is discussed in management review alongside KPIs.

Begin with leadership, because Clause 5.1.1 places the burden there. Executives should define what “quality culture and ethical behaviour” mean in their real context, integrate those expectations into the quality policy and objectives, and demonstrate them visibly. In operational terms, this looks like leaders refusing to trade integrity for output, acknowledging when pressure creates unsafe shortcuts, funding training that equips people to act ethically under constraint, and making space in reviews to discuss dilemmas as well as defects. Intertek’s transition guidance and Advisory explainers emphasise that ethics must be evident in “daily choices,” not a poster on the wall.

Awareness then becomes the daily mechanism. Clause 7.3’s expansion means onboarding and refresher training should go beyond “what to do” and teach “how to do it well”—including speaking up, handling conflicts of interest, and understanding the human impact of quality decisions. Commentaries summarising the DIS are consistent on this point: awareness now explicitly includes quality culture and ethical behaviour. When internal audits test awareness, they will probe whether people can describe the organisation’s expectations and what they would do under pressure, not just recite the policy.

Integration into the management system closes the loop. Planning processes should consider ethical risk as part of 6.1 alongside operational risks and opportunities.

Performance evaluation should track not only hard indicators, but culture signals: near-miss reporting, speak-up utilisation and closure, outcomes of ethics-related investigations, and themes in employee feedback.

Management review should explicitly examine whether leadership actions, resource decisions and communication are strengthening the desired culture. DNV’s summary of new guidance in 5.1 and SGS’s advice on leadership emphasis both support this integrative approach.

For smaller organisations, the intent remains achievable without bureaucracy. Leaders can weave ethics into existing rhythms: start-of-shift conversations that surface pressures, monthly town-halls where dilemmas are discussed without blame, and corrective-action reviews that include cultural root causes. The DIS does not prescribe heavy documentation; it asks leadership to make ethics and culture real, taught and tested in the flow of work. Commentaries stress this is about living expectations, not inventing binders.

A brief illustration makes the point. Consider a fabrication firm facing a rush order that tempts supervisors to skip sign-offs. Under the revised 5.1.1 expectation, the plant director begins by restating the organisation’s stance: quality and ethical behaviour are non-negotiable. He authorises overtime to relieve pressure, personally joins the line to see friction first-hand, and later brings the episode to management review as a culture topic.

Training refreshers that month include a short scenario on handling schedule pressure. When the certification body audits awareness, operators can describe both the rule and the expectation to stop the line—and they believe leadership will back them. That is the “lived” system the DIS is pushing toward.

What to Watch Next

The DIS is open for comment, and final wording may still evolve before publication, which BSI projects for the latter part of 2026. Organisations should therefore treat current summaries as indicative, acquire the official draft through their national standards body where possible, and begin gap-assessing leadership behaviour, awareness content and management-review coverage. Preparing now creates value regardless of final edits: if ethics and culture become more visible, your operations will already be safer, more resilient and more trustworthy.

References

Title: ISO 9001:2026 – Key Changes and Guidance (BSI); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.bsigroup.com/en-GB/products-and-services/standards-services/iso-9001-2026-key-changes-and-guidance/ BSI Group

Title: ISO 9001:2026 Draft Update Version Released (DNV); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.dnv.us/news/2025/ba_iso-90012026_update-released/ DNV

Title: The New Draft International Standard (DIS) for ISO 9001:2026 Has Officially Landed (NEPIC); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.nepic.co.uk/%E2%AD%90%EF%B8%8F%E2%AD%90%EF%B8%8Fthe-new-draft-international-standard-dis-for-iso-90012026-has-officially-landed%E2%AD%90%EF%B8%8F%E2%AD%90%EF%B8%8F/ NEPIC

Title: ISO 9001:2026 Revision—Key Changes, Timeline & What to Expect (9001Simplified); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.9001simplified.com/learn/next-iso-9001-revision.php 9001 Simplified

Title: ISO/DIS 9001:2026—An In-Depth Look Prior to Publication (Oxebridge); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.oxebridge.com/emma/iso-dis-90012026-an-in-depth-look-prior-to-publication/ Oxebridge

Title: ISO 9001:2026 – Key Updates & Transition Guidance (Intertek); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.intertek.com/assurance/iso-9001/iso-9001-2026-key-updates-transition-guidance/ Intertek

Title: ISO 9001:2026 – Key Updates & Transition Guidance (SGS); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.sgs.com/en-us/showcases/iso-9001-2026-key-updates-and-transition-guidance SGSCorp

Title: Draft of ISO 9001:2026—What to Expect (RigCert); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://rigcert.education/resources/draft-of-iso-9001-2026-what-to-expect rigcert.education

Title: ISO 9001:2026—What You Need to Know About the Upcoming Revision (Bureau Veritas AU); accessed on: 14 October 2025; https://www.bureauveritas.com.au/newsroom/iso-90012026-what-you-need-know-about-upcoming-revision