When we learned Valvoline, named one of America’s Safest Companies for 2017 by EHS Today, was a customer of ProcessMAP and had deployed several of the company’s cloud-based solutions, we wanted to hear more.
With the goal of using technology to optimize safety performance, Valvoline deployed ProcessMAP’s Incident Management, Audit Management, Permits Management, Activity Management, Event Management and Sustainability Performance Management solutions in its manufacturing and retail locations in 2016. Since then, the company has seen improved safety performance, increased employee engagement and risk reduction as it works toward building a zero-incident workplace.
“Measuring safety initiatives with globally dispersed employees can be tedious and time-consuming for organizations, especially when there’s not company-wide buy-in at all levels,” said Harold Gubnitsky, president at ProcessMAP. “With a digital solution, organizations can enhance operational processes to improve the timeliness of reporting and utilize data to drive corrective actions. Valvoline knows that prevention is key to a successful safety process and we are pleased to help the company meet internal safety benchmarks.”
Gubnitsky also serves as chief strategy officer for ProcessMAP, which offers cloud-based enterprise software solutions that enable organizations to manage risk in three key areas: employee health and safety, environment and sustainability and enterprise compliance. He is responsible for corporate development, strategy, strategic relations and business development, and has served as a founding board member of the company since 2000. He recently sat down with EHSToday.com to talk about software solutions, risk management around the world and what he’s hearing from his clients like Valvoline, Goodyear, CardinalHealth, Barill, Harley-Davidson, Republic Steel and PPG about their challenges.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: When was the company founded and have you always focused on those three key areas – employee health and safety, environment and sustainability and enterprise compliance – or did the company respond to demand from clients and move in that direction?
Harold Gubnitsky: ProcessMAP was founded in 2000 and initially focused solely on environmental safety. The company quickly moved into proactive safety management followed by integrating risk and claims helping customers to create a safety culture as well as improve financial results. This evolution of ProcessMAP’s key areas has been led by changes in the industry as safety has become a strategic function within an organization.
ProcessMAP sees the intersection of operations with risk and claims as pillars driving investments within an organization while also proving strong returns and positive brand management.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: How many end users do you have and in how many countries? Have you encountered any cultural differences between the way risk management is approached?
Harold Gubnitsky: ProcessMAP has more than 2.5 million users across 125 countries in more than 27 languages. Across various regions, there are cultural differences regarding risk management, including unique considerations associated with privacy laws in Europe versus the U.S. Also in the U.S., medical insurance is primarily paid by employers while in many European countries, there is socialized medicine. In these countries, instead of ProcessMAP’s solution integrating with third-party administrators (TPAs) for claims management, information is sent to government health officials.
Despite these minor cultural differences in the way risk is managed, organizations in different countries still want the same thing – a holistic safety approach. They are looking to create greater safety visibility, consistency across business processes, efficiency in information gathering and reporting and tools that provide actionable insights from data to drive real-time correction actions.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: What do you see as the key differences between risk management in the United States versus other parts of the world in which you do business?
Harold Gubnitsky: Risk varies across geographies and industries. In the U.S., risk management includes business model risks that may affect operations, financial planning, market saturation and brand perception. While traditional risk management methodologies exist, the U.S. has taken full advantage of trending tools and technologies – and the realization that “Big Data” can be harnessed, controlled and managed to isolate and mitigate risk within an organization. The results have been credited as contributing to increased revenue and profit goals, reduced liability exposure, increased market share and improved shareholder confidence.
The U.S. has also responded to risk management with legislation and participates with many global initiatives that regulate risks in surrounding environments and trades. We’re seeing that international corporations based in the U.S. are managing risk consistently across globally dispersed locations so there aren’t key differences at all. ProcessMAP’s solutions provides a single platform to effectively manage risk and converge best practices for risk management across the world.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: I know that you offer your solutions as both a comprehensive suite and as modular components. Which has proved to be more popular – the whole package versus components – and why do you think that is? In terms of demand, which individual components seem to be the most popular?
Harold Gubnitsky: We offer the ProcessMAP solution as a comprehensive suite and modular components to give customers the ability to choose which modules best fit their needs. Having a modular offering is critical so customers can focus on the highest priority areas within their organizations based on their budget.
At ProcessMAP, the modular components have proved to be more popular that the comprehensive suite. Modules that are most popular include Integrated Incident Management, Claims Management, Audits Management and Activity & Actions Management, followed by Industrial Hygiene and Risk Assessment.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: How closely do you work with clients? Can you give my readers an idea of the size of the companies with whom you work? Is it mid-sized-to-larger companies or have smaller companies approached you for solutions?
Harold Gubnitsky: At ProcessMAP, we work very closely with clients, including a large continuum of customers from Fortune 500 companies with thousands of globally dispersed employees, to mid-sized as well as emerging companies.
We work with customers to configure their software solution to meet the current and future state of safety and risk processes. The company methodology starts off with a blueprinting phase, which examines current processes and works to develop a future state than configures the application to meet those needs. In addition, we work with the client teams to integrate internal as well as external data, including HR, insurance, laboratory and regulatory information. We also work to help companies adopt the ProcessMAP platform via training, self-help tools, intuitive design and change management best practices.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: What type(s) of information do you provide clients? How do/should they use that information to improve risk management?
Harold Gubnitsky: The ProcessMAP platform incorporates a tremendous range of data including:
- Detailed incident information.
- Analytics associated with root cause.
- Contributing risk factors.
- Insurance information.
- Audit findings.
- Corrective and preventive actions.
- Near misses.
- Regulatory content.
- Environmental information.
- Employee demographics.
- Notifications and alerts.
- Training information.
Clients use this information to first create visibility, second to measure, third to manage and fourth to predict and prevent incidents form occurring and to proactively protect employees and the organization’s bottom line.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: As workforces become more mobile and companies more global, how important are cloud-based solutions and software solutions becoming for companies that are seeking to track and improve risk management?
Harold Gubnitsky: Cloud-based solutions are critical to ensure companies have the latest software and innovations to keep up with their growing global workforce. With a cloud-based solution, safety managers can easily track globally dispersed employees to improve health and safety practices and mitigate risks. Mobile computing is also key to enterprise adoption so organization leaders have safety data on the go. ProcessMAP's mobile platform is a key differentiator for the company allowing managers to have access to data from anywhere, at any time.
Sandy Smith/EHSToday.com: What trends are you seeing in the tracking and management of risks? Are you seeing any new risks or safety challenges emerging or trending?
Harold Gubnitsky: Tracking and management of risk standards are being globalized and organizations are seeking validation. They are looking to differentiate themselves as a product or service provider by gaining International Organization for Standardization and ISO certifications. These certifications support the application of standardized processes and recognize their efforts of high productivity, while minimizing errors and waste in specific disciplines.
One of the ISO disciplines includes Risk, ISO 31000. This framework provides principles and generic guidelines on risk management. ProcessMAP simplifies the complexities of enterprise standardization of processes and standards with a highly-configurable Audit Management platform. Improved compliance is prioritized and risk is reduced, resulting in enhanced accountability.
In addition, we are seeing the correlation of data between traditionally siloed functions such as safety and risk/claims or safety operations and/or safety and quality. We are seeing the safety function becoming more strategic and serving as a differentiator for many organizations.
