Robbins-Gioia Announces Release of Process Refinement and Optimization Solution; Reveals Emerging Industry Focus on Process Improvement

Business Wire, March 28, 2005

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Robbins-Gioia, LLC, the leading provider of program management services, today announced the launch of its Process Refinement and Optimization (PRO)(SM) solution - the latest addition to Robbins-Gioia's evolving portfolio of services and capabilities. Supporting the requirement for the PRO solution, the company also announced the results of a survey of business and information technology leaders that confirms a trend toward an increased focus on process improvement.

PRO combines Robbins-Gioia's core project and program management consulting expertise with specific process improvement methodologies, enabling organizations to more effectively meet business objectives driven by such trends as outsourcing, justifying insourcing, regulatory compliance, merger and acquisition activity, and simply doing more with less. "Global 2000 organizations struggle with poor process and organizational strategies for areas such as project/program management and quality and risk control," said Melinda-Carol Ballou, senior research analyst at META Group, Inc. "Being able to leverage strong content across these areas and staffing support to facilitate process change are key elements to overcoming cultural barriers to success." PRO is designed to enable organizations to meet customer demands for increased throughput, reduce labor costs, improve time to market, minimize re-work, improve customer service, optimize budgets for project funding, enhance employee job satisfaction, and reduce turnover, as well as streamline bureaucratic processes for efficiency and cost reductions. The solution weds effective quality management with six process improvement methodologies, including:

--Lean

--Six Sigma

--Process Improvement with Capability Maturity Models and Optimization Measurement

--Enterprise Risk Management

--Balanced Scorecard

--Quality Management.

These techniques have been shown to improve the bottom line for projects, programs, divisions, and organizations.

"The PRO solution capitalizes on Robbins-Gioia's strong background in program management and process improvement. It provides our customers confidence that highly comprehensive enterprise management programs are properly designed and efficiently implemented," said Stephen Hawald, process improvement practice area leader for Robbins-Gioia. "With PRO, we assess a client organization's management practices, work with staff to define their organization's strategic direction, and then develop and implement an enterprise-wide program."

"Robbins-Gioia is dedicated to bringing new solutions to market that save our clients time and money, as well as enable them to constantly improve customer satisfaction," said Jim Leto, chief executive officer, Robbins-Gioia. "The PRO solution builds on Robbins-Gioia's 25-year history in bringing a disciplined and results-focused approach to process improvement, as well as project and program management."

Demand for Process Improvement on the Rise

Demand for PRO is evidenced in a recent Robbins-Gioia survey of approximately 200 professionals that measured the value organizations place on process improvement and quality assurance. Conducted at several industry events in 2004, survey results indicated that 89 percent of respondents believe that process improvement and quality assurance will become more important in their organizations. Of survey respondents who had a strong infrastructure in place for process management, nearly 75 percent indicated their business was either exceeding goals or gaining momentum; only five percent indicated that they were struggling to drive profitability and growth. "Compliance with sound risk and quality management practices has always been critical to delivering complex, costly projects," said Matt Light, research director, Gartner, Inc. "Today, with drivers like Sarbanes-Oxley, the pain of failing to plan against risk and control quality is likely to become more acute."

Conversely, the correlation between the lack of a process management infrastructure and the difficulty in achieving project success was clear in the survey results. Of the organizations that place little value on process optimization, nearly 75 percent indicated that they do not manage projects very well. Further, of organizations that have "no plans in the immediate future" to implement a process management infrastructure, 60 percent feel they manage projects inconsistently.

About Robbins-Gioia

Robbins-Gioia has been dedicated to delivering management consulting solutions to government agencies and Fortune 500 companies for 25 years. Robbins-Gioia combines thought leadership, disciplined processes, industry-based knowledge, and integrated tools to help global customers optimize their business processes, accelerate change, and establish time, cost, and quality improvements to transform their businesses. For more information, please call Robbins-Gioia, LLC at (800) 663-7138, or visit the web site at www.robbinsgioia.com.