riga solutions group, inc.

fast, reliable solutions that work

HOMEABOUT USSERVICES TO GOVERNMENTSERVICES TO COMPANIESCONTACT US

Services to Government

• Executive Management Planning and Support

• Outcome-Centered Leadership ^TM

• Business Process Development and Reengineering

• Risk Management

Riga can help executive management teams of human service and public safety agencies plan for the future by providing them with the right tools to accomplish their mission.    

Central to the ability to make lasting positive change is the establishment of the leadership’s vision, style, goals, and expectations.  Too often, officials are, by need, drawn immediately into the day-to-day operations or crisis management of an agency and are unable to focus on the future.  This common situation is generally caused by a lack of time or manpower to quickly assess their agencies’ operations and craft detailed plans for the future.  In order for an official to be effective at not only managing an agency but also at making it better, a balance must be struck between these two very different goals, which is often difficult. Riga’s experienced consultants can help any agency’s leadership by providing support that gives them the tools they need to focus on the future without detracting from their ability to meet their day-to-day responsibilities. 

Riga Solutions can assist by first quickly assessing the agency’s operations, organizational and management structure, business practices, and relationship to its outside partners and customers.  We can move to help you design or document a direction, improve your management team, communicate well with your staff and outside partners, and develop realistic work plans to enact new initiatives and reforms. 

• Assist in developing strategic plans and/or visioning for the future.

• Help government in developing restructuring, reorganization or consolidation plans that will reduce duplication and increase efficiency.

• Assist in developing comprehensive work plans that allows agencies to implement changes and track their progress.

• Assist in developing performance measures.

• Work with Governor’s Offices and agency heads to initiate major reform efforts.

• Provide quick organizational assessments that can identify agency strengths, weaknesses, and problematic issues.

• Offer temporary management support for agencies that have undergone high turnover in key upper-level positions.

• Delivering effective, discreet, and responsive services to revamp troubled organizations or companies.

• Assisting government think and plan strategically about outsourcing and privatizing initiatives.

• Innovative and comprehensive systems solutions for criminal justice, juvenile justice, homeland security and public safety agencies.

Riga can help agencies build meaningful performance management systems that demonstrate value and provides accessible and useful performance feedback to drive smart decisions.

Outcome-Centered Leadership^TM was developed jointly by Riga Solutions associates Rose Hayden, Carla Penny, and Thomas Chapmond,  reflecting their experience as agency leaders, performance management consultants, and organizational development practitioners.

Riga Solutions Group’s OCL engages the client agency at whatever stage they are in their performance management journey.   Reflecting a firm commitment to the critical importance of leadership in any transformation effort, OCL asks the chief executive and the executive team to drive their organization’s accountability and performance by setting the high-level goals and outcomes as well as shepherding the effort through all levels.  OCL rests on the belief that because organizations consist of individuals, any meaningful change relies on both creating the right processes and structures as well as engaging the workforce in personally meaningful and properly aligned ways.

Stakeholder Input Synthesis and Direction-Setting begins with the organizational leaders who have responsibility for identifying the desired results for the organization.  This comes about through the integration of information regarding the priorities of all stakeholders--internal and external.  Executive leadership must make the decisions and has the ultimate responsibility for the direction of their organization.  The executive leadership also has the responsibility to communicate their priorities to the staff in ways that enable them to implement the strategies that will achieve the desired outcomes, as well as to those policy and decision-makers who determine resource allocations.

Selecting the Right Measures starts with the measures and focuses on choosing the most significant results and the best outcome measures to indicate the degree to which the organization is achieving those results.  We focus on developing the right outcome measures that are:

• Meaningful

• Reliable

• Straightforward

• Readily accessible (through available data collection systems, if possible)

Developing a roadmap begins by using “best in class” benchmarks to construct a map or critical path starting from where you are to where you want to be that identifies key milestones and timeframes to guide your organization over time.

What Makes Us Different?  We offer a logical, straightforward approach without oversimplifying the process.  While appealing in many ways, we believe “cookie cutter” approaches fail organizations because they drive “check-the-box” behavior rather than genuine engagement in performance improvement and meaningful customer impact.

We enable your organization to sustain this effort without continued outside assistance.  We believe in fostering sustainability, not dependence on external resources to achieve success.  We leave you with the knowledge, skills, and a map to get you where you want to be over time.

Our approach is informed by a national perspective that allows us to assess your progress against state- of-the art measures.

We transform data into useful information.  Where there is an abundance of data and information, we help you sort through the mountain to determine what is critical for your organization at this stage of your performance journey.

Riga can enhance the accountability, performance, and business practices of federal, state, and local agencies that administer or distribute funds.

Through streamlining and simplifying processes or advancing technological solutions, our company, Riga will increase the operational efficiencies of government organizations. We will provide these services to a wide range of public safety, criminal justice, human service, and homeland security governmental agencies.  

Failure to maintain adequate business practices results in millions of dollars in questioned costs and funds unnecessarily returned to the federal government.  Contracting for assistance in these areas would provide a low-risk alternative to developing new systems of their own. 

A full menu of services includes:

• Developing appropriate performance measures for grant programs including providing technical assistance to grantees in establishing proper data collection systems.

• Developing grants management, quality assurance, or monitoring strategies that include tailoring risk assessment tools that will prioritize the monitoring protocols. Our company can train staff in new monitoring protocols, and even outsource grants management or quality assurance functions through partnerships with other companies.

• Providing technical assistance in restructuring organizations, re-deploying staff resources, streamlining business practices, and eliminating unnecessary bureaucratic procedures.

• Analyzing and developing grant management information systems that allow agencies to conduct business via the Internet and combine programmatic, financial and monitoring components into a single system.

• Technological solutions that help grant funding agencies to administer their grants using a workflow system designed to fit their needs and allow managers easy access to the information they need to make decisions and show success.

Riga can develop risk management information systems for law enforcement, criminal justice, homeland security and social service agencies.

Now more than ever, human service and public safety agencies must use information and technology to reduce their risks and liability as it relates to their management of those in their care and custody. Every day law enforcement officials, homeland security officials, correctional officials, protective service caseworkers, and probation officers make critical decisions about the likelihood of individuals to commit certain acts.  We can assist agencies in using technology and research to develop systems that will assist them in maker more informed decisions.               

 For corrections officials, a critical factor is the need to intelligently manage correctional officer risk; situational risks among confined offenders; control costs; and control liability. In homeland security, the need for information technology products that may be designed by Riga and its’ partners involve tools that proactively determine risk of travelers, persons, and situations; the need to manage urban community risk for conventional, nuclear, and other risks; and to monitor targets, persons, and victim response related to terrorism.  In social and protective service agencies they must gather the appropriate information to assist to making better judgments about services and interventions for their clients.

• Examples of opportunities that Riga will target include:

• Providing state-of-the-art training for Homeland Security personnel on risk management

• Developing and deploying law enforcement case management tools and Developing law enforcement officer risk tools

• Implementing offender management and classification systems for correctional, community correctional and criminal justice agencies

• Developing passenger screening tools for the transportation aviation agencies.

• Developing risk assessment tools for youth service and  juvenile justice agencies.

• Developing child welfare information systems that better predict risk in family violence cases.