PMC Solutions Signs Mentor-Protégé Agreement With International Firm

PMC Solutions is proud to announce that it has signed a three-year Mentor-Protégé agreement with Michael Baker Jr., Inc. (Baker), an engineering unit of Michael Baker Corporation (Amex:BKR). Baker is an internationally recognized engineering and energy services management firm headquartered in Moon Township, Pennsylvania.

"This agreement allows PMC Solutions to leverage Baker’s success in Federal procurement with the U.S. Department of Transportation, Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Coast Guard, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, among others," says Brit Harvey, PMC Solutions’ Vice President. PMC Solutions’ clients in the private and governmental sectors around the country use inProcess®, the company’s proprietary process mapping software, to improve performance, enhance efficiencies, meet Malcolm Baldrige and ISO criteria, and realize improvements through Lean Six Sigma methodologies." Read more new articles on our website.

inProcess Focus: Template Reports

Did you know that inProcess comes with 6 template reports that present information like the number of times a process is viewed, who is viewing processes, and for how long? These reports, plus the completely customizable reports now in version 3.2 mean that inProcess provides auditable evidence that your processes are being utilized by your organization.

Webinar: Project Management and Lean Six Sigma

Join us on Tuesday, October 23rd at Noon EST for a webinar led by PMC Solutions’ Business Process Director Leon Spackman, Six Sigma Master Black Belt and Project Management Professional (PMP). The webinar will help participants understand:

• What is project management and the 9 key processes it uses?
• What is Lean Six Sigma and why should you care?
• Common ideas and tools in project management and Lean Six Sigma.
• What each methodology can learn from the other.

Email us at info@pmcsolutions.com or signup at the www.inprocess.com homepage.

PMC Solutions and inProcess® Launch a New Website

On October 8, 2007, a new website for inProcess was launched at www.inprocess.com. This site was proudly conceptualized, programmed, and designed by the inProcess software development team.

Find a new simple navigation menu with added learning center articles, and an updated listing of our clients by industry, among many other valuable improvements.

We hope our updated website is helpful to you in learning more about process mapping, and our products and supporting services. Please contact us with any feedback.

Case Study: inProcess® is the Perfect Fit

Don Chalmers Ford began working with PMC Solutions and its inProcess® process mapping software in 2005 to better understand and improve the organization’s way of doing business. The company had begun documenting its processes already, but knew it needed a better system to design and deploy them to the entire workforce. One of the biggest challenges was getting the right revision of a process to the right people in a timely way.

Lee Butler, Don Chalmers Ford’s Director of Performance Excellence, saw that PMC Solutions and inProcess® were exactly what Don Chalmers Ford needed. "After talking with them, it was a perfect fit," he adds. Read more case studies on our website.

What’s your process improvement methodology of choice?

1. Malcolm Baldrige
2. Lean
3. Six Sigma
4. Value Streaming
5. Pick low hanging fruit

Click here to respond to the Quarterly Question.

We'll let you know the responses next month.

Here's what you said about last month's question:
What feature of inProcess do you think is the most valuable or innovative and why?

50% share maps on the web
20% attach documents and reference materials
15% create map to document automation
10% resources allocation and costs
5% train viewers online

Click here for more valuable, innovative features of inProcess.

Process Driven Organizations Succeed
by Leon Spackman, Director Business Process Services, PMC Solutions

It used to be that selling a product or service that was good enough was good enough. Not so anymore. With the globalization of the business world, even being 99.9 percent accurate and effective may not be good enough any more. This accuracy rate still means that 114,500 mismatched pairs of shoes would ship each year or 5.5 million cases of soft drinks produced would be flat. Over the last 30 years, our economy has been shifting away from manufacturing as we have outsourced and moved to offshore production. It is estimated that 80% of U.S. industry today is service related, not manufacturing. A great deal of opportunity exists for companies to improve the way they provide information and services. For these organizations, 99.9 percent accurate means 103,260 income tax returns would be processed incorrectly each the year and 18,322 pieces of mail would be mishandled every hour.

What's a company to do? Click here to read more.

Question: My organization is doing some things right, but in terms of managing by systematic processes, they fall short. Can you give me some ideas to help get my organization on the process path?

Answer: Business Process Management is a deliberate method for collecting data and organizing and analyzing it with statistical and scientific methods to create a solution that will minimize waste, optimize efficiency, and reach the quality goals a company has set for itself. inProcess®, our mapping software, is a business process improvement tool you can utilize on your own or as a complement to our consulting and management services. inProcess software can help you map your processes to gain a greater understanding of how your organization currently operates and help you identify areas for improvement... Read more

Have a question about inProcess®, process management or how to make the most out of the expert assistance that PMC Solutions provides? Ask us! Contact us with your burning questions. Maybe you'll see your question and answer here.

"Process improvement" means making things better, not just fighting fires or managing crises. It means setting aside the customary practice of blaming people for problems or failures. It is a way of looking at how we can do our work better. Excerpted from Handbook for Basic Process Improvement, Balanced Scorecard Institute.

To view more process tips, visit our Learning Center at www.inprocess.com/learningcenter.aspx.

"The French Family of Companies has been working with PMC Solutions for over a year now. At every step of the way, the PMC team has been professional, courteous and thorough in their efforts. They have given us the support and encouragement we needed as we began this complicated work. I would highly recommend their product and their team to anyone wanting to begin process management, or improve on an existing system."

Paul F. Layer Jr., VP of Development, French Family of Companies

Read more testimonials

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