Lori Gillespie

Vice President, ANSI National Accreditation Board (ANAB), Milwaukee, WI, USA

Lori Gillespie is currently a vice president at ANSI National Accreditation Board (ANAB), responsible for the management systems and validation and verification accreditation programs, including the accreditation program for ISO 9001 certification. Lori has been with ANAB, previously RAB, for almost 25 years where she has struck a balance applying and implementing requirements with knowledge and understanding of business-related needs while maintaining a high level of customer service.

Lori’s competence includes enhanced skills and knowledge in leadership, ISO/IEC 17021-1 and accompanying requirement documents, consensus building, innovative thinking, managing diversity, and maintaining neutrality; all while being sensitive to national and international differences yet trying to preserve consistency and make decisions for the greater good. During Lori’s tenure at ANAB the management systems accreditation programs have grown from four standards to over 30. Through various mergers and acquisitions from 2006 to ANSI’s complete unification of ANAB in 2018, ANAB is now a wholly owned subsidiary of the American National Standards Institute. The ANAB brand encompasses all conformity assessment accreditation including laboratory, inspection body, product certification (ANSI legacy program), etc. ANAB also provides training on topics related to accreditation standards and conformity assessment. ANAB is the largest multi-disciplinary accreditation body in the western hemisphere, with more than 2,500 organizations accredited in approximately 80 countries.

Lori has not only focused internally on ANAB’s accreditation programs and customers, but she has also been liaison to and a member of various programs, industry groups, and membership organizations. An active member of International Accreditation Forum (IAF) for over 10 years, including currently the IAF Vice Chair, co-leader of the Management Systems Certification Working Group, and a member of other working groups, task forces, and various committees including Technical, MLA and Database Management (IAF CertSearch).

Currently an associate (non-voting) member of the Independent Association of Accredited Registrars (IAAR) as well as a non-voting member of the IAAR Apprenticeship Central Committee and a previous member of the AAQG RMC, IAQG OPMT and QuEST Forum (TIA) Oversight Committee.

Lori graduated from DePaul University with a marketing degree and spent several years in Chicago managing a food distributor. She then joined ANAB and her family spent 16 years in Wisconsin before relocating to Fort Worth Texas. Lori and her husband John have two daughters, Jordan 19 and Jaclyn 13.

Both daughters are heavily involved in sports, Jordan plays basketball at the collegiate level and Jaclyn plays school and club volleyball. Most of Lori’s free time is spent in a gym being her girls’ biggest fan.

It’s “A Whole New World"

To achieve and expect progress or improvement, we can’t keep doing the same thing we have always done.

We must maintain the knowledge and foundation from our past while we move forward into our future. Easier said than done, as we don’t know what the future holds. However, if we have learned anything through the past few years, it is to expect the unexpected, have confidence in our processes and systems, and manage for risk.

For accredited certification to continue to be successful and raise the bar, we must maintain our foundational roots. Yet continue to advance our standards, requirements, audit methodology, processes, and expectations.

We must be successful adapting to changing technology and business needs while balancing people’s wellbeing.