ISO 44001 Maturity · Collaborative Business Relationship Management (industrial partnerships and supply chain)
Your collaborative relationships, assessed against ISO 44001 and turned into a costed action plan.
10 themes, a 5-level scale. And the action that moves each level to the next.
The framework’s 10 themes, already written from L1 to L5. One company, one business unit, or 300 at once.
ISO 44001 Maturity · Collaborative Business Relationship Management (industrial partnerships and supply chain)
10 themes, 5-level scale.
Nordhavn Industries
53 / 100
They measure their maturity with Datamensio
An example
This could be your situation.
Take one company as an example: three sites, three spreadsheets, no shared answer.
Nobody can consolidate.
Nordhavn Industries, 2,400 people in Hamburg, Lyon and Porto. A client asks where the group stands. Each site answers in its own spreadsheet, with its own scales.
Three weeks, a single base.
One ISO 44001:2017 assessment launched across all three sites at once, from the managers’ interview notes. The framework was already written, its 10 themes and levels L1 to L5 too.
Two costs avoided before being committed.
A score of 53 out of 100, with the gap concentrated on three themes. The AI companion spotted that two actions duplicated those of another audit. The committee report took one sentence to request.
What it saved them
- 3sites measured on the same base, instead of three questionnaires to reconcile
- 2duplicate actions caught before the spend
- 1committee report, with no manual rework
These figures are an example. They could be yours.
The standard imposes processes. Datamensio says where you stand.
01
The framework is already written
Themes, questions and levels L1 to L5, all written. You do not start from an empty spreadsheet.
02
The score lands the same day
Online, by self-assessment link or in interview. Theme by theme, comparable over time.
03
The gap becomes a costed plan
Every step up carries its action. The AI prioritises on expected effect, not on the order of the standard.
04
Progress can be demonstrated
Campaign after campaign, against your target and against your own past. That is what your board asks for.
The maturity scale
One level, the next, and the action that links the two.
This mechanism, one level, the level above, and the action linking the two, is what turns an observation into a trajectory.
Do your strategic collaborative relationships have a documented relationship management plan that is kept up to date?
- N1
No relationship management plan. The partnership rests on the contract and on direct exchanges between contacts.
- N2
A plan exists for one or two relationships, often drafted for an audit or a launch, then rarely updated.
- N3
Every strategic relationship has a documented plan, with joint objectives, governance and a named accountable owner. Updates happen during reviews.
- N4
Plans are reviewed with the partner at fixed intervals, objective gaps are tracked, and the joint risk register is updated at the same pace.
- N5
Plans feed into an executive-level portfolio review of collaborative relationships, and lessons learned are fed back into the framework applied to new relationships.
Action to move from L2 to L3
Draw up the list of relationships considered strategic, appoint a named owner for each, and tie the relationship management plan’s update cycle to the existing supplier performance review rather than to an additional ritual.
« With Datamensio, we meet our objectives far more efficiently. The ERDF inspection services and our supervising ministry particularly appreciated an approach that gives them reliable data. »
Director, CCI 94CCI Île-de-France
« We believe this is the most suitable solution to scale our transformation project and measure impact according to our needs. »
Maja SucekChief Operating Officer, Interreg Danube
Rarely on its own
Frameworks combine. Put several together to cover your business, or have the AI write yours.
Take your first measurementon ISO 44001.
What this framework covers
ISO 44001 is the international standard that specifies the requirements for a collaborative business relationship management system. It is certifiable and applies to an entire organisation, a division, or a single relationship. Its structure rests on an eight-stage lifecycle: awareness, knowledge of your own operating framework, internal assessment, partner selection, working together, value creation, staying together, and exit strategy. Each relationship is documented through a relationship management plan, a named accountable owner (the SER, Senior Executive Responsible), and an attached risk register.
In practice, this lifecycle is hard to steer because it runs across procurement, production, legal and the business lines. The practical questions surface quickly. Does the relationship management plan exist for strategic partnerships, or only for the one used as a pilot during certification? Are value creation objectives measured jointly, or does each party keep its own scorecard? What happens when the named accountable owner changes role, does the relationship’s institutional memory stay with the organisation or leave with them? And has the exit strategy required by the standard ever been written for anything beyond the audit file?
One confusion comes up often: ISO 44001 is not a procurement framework. It does not replace supplier qualification, contractual clauses, or duty of vigilance requirements. It is about how to run a relationship in which two organisations create value that neither could produce alone: co-development, industrial alliance, consortium formed to bid for a tender, long-term partnership on a critical supply chain. It succeeds the British framework BS 11000, whose lifecycle logic it inherited and clarified.
The maturity assessment answers a different question from the certification audit. The audit concludes with conformity or a gap against a requirement. The assessment places each practice on a progressive scale and points to the action that moves it up a level. This is what makes it possible to compare several business units, track progress year on year, and prepare for the audit without waiting for its verdict before acting.
In Datamensio, the framework is ready to use and remains yours. You can edit the themes, questions and levels, or ask the AI to build a version based on your own documents: existing relationship management plans, partnership charters, procurement procedures. Levels are refined using the CMMI method.
Reference standard: ISO 44001:2017
The themes assessed
Awareness and internal governance
Formalised collaboration policy, management commitment, appointment of the accountable executive (SER), alignment with industrial strategy and business objectives.
Knowledge of the internal operating framework
Mapping of existing relationships, identification of collaborative capabilities, ability to mobilise dedicated resources, management of knowledge from past partnerships.
Internal capability assessment
Self-assessment of collaborative maturity, analysis of strengths and limitations, competency development plan, teams’ collaborative behaviour profile.
Partner selection
Selection criteria including collaborative fit, cross-assessment of capabilities, partner risk analysis, trade-off between transactional and collaborative approaches.
Working together and framework agreement
Documented joint objectives, collaborative relationship management plan, joint governance rules, decision-making and dispute resolution mechanisms.
Value creation
Identification of value sources, shared indicators, joint innovation mechanisms, sharing of gains and effort, periodic value reviews.
Relationship risk management
Joint risk register, technical and economic dependencies, partner business continuity, intellectual property, confidentiality and security of exchanges.
Implementation and operational steering
Interfaces between teams, monitoring rituals, management of scope changes, handling of performance gaps, escalation to executive level.
Collaborative skills and behaviours
Team training, criteria for appointing key contacts, continuity in case of internal mobility, recognition of expected behaviours.
Exit strategy and lessons learned
Anticipated end-of-relationship conditions, transfer of assets and knowledge, industrial reversibility, capitalising on lessons for future relationships.
A short version of the framework is available for the online self-assessment.
Frequently asked questions
Is ISO 44001 certifiable?
Yes, by an accredited body, over a scope that can be the entire organisation, a division, or a specific relationship. The Datamensio assessment measures the maturity of your practices and prepares for that audit: it does not issue any certification.
What is the difference between this assessment and a certification audit?
The audit rules requirement by requirement, as conformity or gap. The assessment places each practice on a five-level scale and links each one to the action that drives progress. The two complement each other: the assessment builds the trajectory, the audit validates the result.
How long does the assessment take?
The short version can be completed in a single working session. The full version, run collaboratively with procurement, production and legal, typically spans one to two weeks, most of the time being spent gathering input from contributors.
Can the framework be adapted to our industrial context?
Yes. Themes, questions and levels can all be edited, and you can also start from a blank template. The AI can also build a version based on your existing relationship management plans or procurement procedures.
Do all suppliers need to be assessed?
No, and the standard does not require it. ISO 44001 targets relationships where value comes from collaboration, not transactional flows. The assessment actually helps decide which relationships call for a structured collaborative arrangement.
Can several sites or business units be compared?
Yes. Each entity is assessed against the same framework, and scores can be compared with each other and with previous campaigns. A cross-cutting roadmap consolidates action plans from different entities and groups together redundant actions.
Does the partner need to take part in the assessment?
This is not necessary to measure your own maturity. It is useful once the relationship is already under way: the collaborative reporting space allows results to be shared with a partner or a business unit, under your own branding.
Where is the data hosted?
In France, with OVH, backed up with Scaleway. No transfer outside the European Union. The AI models used can be selected, including from European providers.