1st in Healthcare

Crothall’s Operations Certified with Honors

The Mark of Genuine Excellence

In 2008, Crothall Services Group joined other building service contractors seeking outside, third-party validation of the quality of its cleaning standards by the International Sanitary Supply Association (“ISSA”), the leading worldwide cleaning trade association. Like all quality-minded cleaning organizations, Crothall has its own set of highly disciplined standards and customer service practices. However, when the ISSA announced the development of the Cleaning Industry Management Standard (“CIMS”), a consensusbased standard of excellence, formed over years of management experience, Crothall decided to put our own practices to the industry test.

“Our healthcare clients are in the business of caring for patients, and, while they desire healthy environments, they must rely on someone else’s expertise to create them,” National Director of Standards Rich Feczko explained. “It’s hard for them to know, except through the arduous process of checking references, looking at standards manuals, and understanding metrics, if they are choosing the best Environmental Services partner. Even then, much of the decision is based on trust rather than on the recommendation of a third-party expert.” A CIMS certification, on the other hand, should quickly allow a client to distinguish one service provider from another. This designation guarantees that the organization has passed a rigorous certification checklist of mandatory and recommended program requirements and that ISSA Certified Experts (“ICE” Assessors) have inspected and verified that the ISSA standards are in place.

In January 2009, Crothall received CIMS certification with honors, becoming the first healthcare service provider to align its standards with the ISSA. Clients who are required to perform a due diligence for all contractors sift through piles of proposals hoping to find those whose standards of excellence and professionalism match their own. Now, they can easily identify quality organizations for consideration simply by looking for CIMS certification.

“It is quite an honor for Crothall management systems and processes to be validated by an organization respected industry wide,” commented CEO Bobby Kutteh. “Achieving this designation will reassure our clients that they have put their trust in the right organization, and that Crothall represents the best this industry has to offer.”

Improving operational efficiency and better serving customers is the ultimate aim of aligning our processes with a broad-based standard such as the one the ISSA has developed. According to ISSA literature, CIMS represents a “touchstone resource, a common rallying point around which all members of the industry can gather and work toward achieving an unprecedented level of professionalism and excellence.”

Crothall Services Group is proud to be one of the first, and the only healthcare service provider, to achieve CIMS certification. According to Rich Feczko, the achievement helped solidify company efforts. “It’s at the core of what we do. The CIMS process in concert with our existing standards strongly enhances our field operations, corporate support, and client value. Our clients should know that having a CIMS Honors designee as an Environmental Services partner means they have chosen the best provider in the industry.”