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HROA Announces 2008 Award Winners
-HR Outsourcing Industry’s Best and Brightest Honor 2008 Recipients of Coveted Recognition-
 

WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 18, 2008) – This week’s Fourth Annual HROA Awards Gala celebrated the winners of the 2008 HROA Awards™.  Held on April 16, 2008 at the New York Hilton in conjunction with the annual NY HR Week Conference and Exposition, this year’s event attracted over 300 HROA members, industry leaders, press and analysts who convened to applaud the award recipients.
 

The 2008 HROA Awards recognized the ingenuity, industriousness and industrial-strength dedication required to succeed in HRO.  New contracts, relationships, and projects with start dates in the award year and existing contracts, relationships or projects with start dates prior to the award year (January to December 2007) are eligible for the awards.  Consistent with the theme of this year’s awards “Be Ingenious”, nominees needed to demonstrate their insight, vision, service and other ingenious attributes. 
 

The HROA Awards Committee established 13 separate award categories with detailed qualifying criteria focused on effective relationships and demonstrable results.  Anyone may submit a nomination.  The Committee carefully reviews all nominations to ensure the nominees meet the criteria in each category and rejects any that do not.  The full membership of the HROA is eligible to vote on the nominations.   The categories included: Person of the Year; Thought Leader of the Year; Buyer Executive of the Year – Middle Market; Buyer Executive of the Year – Large Market; Provider Executive of the Year; Customer Relationship of the Year – Large Market; Customer Relationship of the Year – Middle Market; Technology Relationship of the Year; Sourcing Relationship of the Year; Payroll Relationship of the Year; the highly competitive RPO Relationship of the Year; Relocation Relationship of the Year; and Benefits Relationship of the Year.
 

The 2008 Award winners are:
 

• Person of the Year – Lowell Williams, EquaTerra
• Thought Leader of the Year – Scott Gildner, TPI
• Technology Relationship of the Year – SAP AG and ADP
• RPO Relationship of the Year - RPOworldwide and TalentBridge International
  
• Customer Relationship of the Year – Large Market - Accenture and Kimberly-Clark
  
• Customer Relationship of the Year – Middle Market - Accenture and Strategic Restaurant Acquisition Company
• Buyer Executive of the Year – Large Market - Edwin Garcia, Kimberly-Clark
  
• Buyer Executive of the Year – Middle Market - David Lutterbach, Hess Corporation
• Provider Executive of the Year – Gary Butler, ADP
• Sourcing Relationship of the Year - EquaTerra and E.W. Scripps
• Payroll Relationship of the Year – ADP and DIRECTV
• Relocation Relationship of the Year – Cartus and Raytheon
• Benefits Relationship of the Year – Hewitt Associates and Dell

In addition to the publicly announced award categories, the Awards Committee established a surprise category:  Distinguished Member Service.  This award recognizes those members who have made an outstanding level of contribution to the Association and its mission.  In this inaugural year of the award, the Committee chose to honor Sharon Taylor, senior vice president of HR for Prudential.  Taylor recently completed her term as Chairwoman of the HROA and now serves as Chair-Emeritus.  She has been active in the Association since its founding and has made incredible contributions to the growth and maturation of the practice of HR, the HRO industry, and the HROA as an institution.
 

Global Executive Director of the HROA, Richard Crespin, said, “This year’s impressive list of nominees demonstrated ingenuity, insight, and an industrial-strength commitment to HR transformation.  I have no doubt that it was  

challenging for our membership to cast their votes.  On behalf of HROA and its members, I’m honored to recognize this year’s extremely accomplished winners and look forward to their continued contributions to our industry.”
 

About the HROA
The HROA is the definitive independent organization for all those who purchase, provide, or participate in HR transformation and outsourcing. Its membership encompasses over 7,500 HR executives, including the largest 50 buyers, the top 30 providers, the leading sourcing advisors and attorneys, and the best thought leaders in HR Transformation. The HROA brings its diverse membership together to set standards and practices, provide peer networking, and maintain a robust curriculum.
 

For information about the HROA or to become a member of the HROA, contact Adam Bleifeld at (202) 905-0351, ext. 19 or visit www.hroa.org.
 

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Norma Todd died last week.

If you’re not from the Jersey Shore, her name probably isn’t even remotely familiar.  But she was amazing - in every sense of the word.

Mrs. Todd co-founded Red Bank, NJ’s Lunch Break, a community “soup kitchen” that never turns away those in need.  She worked at Lunch Break every day up until a few months ago, which was no small feat considering she was well into her 80s.

Our loss is heaven’s gain.  The good news is her work continues, as she built a solid organization that - although it relies heavily on the kindness of donations - will live on.

Way to go Cynergy! 

Forbes, then PhizzPop.

Over the years, we’ve had the pleasure of welcoming interns from Boston College, Boston University, Rutgers, Monmouth, Seton Hall, NYU and a host of other universities.  This year will be no different and we invite the best and the brightest (college sophomores, juniors and seniors only please) to apply for our internship program. 
 

Positions will be located in our Shrewsbury, NJ offices (just south of Red Bank) and flexible hours are available.  If selected, you’ll have the opportunity to learn the PR industry inside-and-out, and test your own creative writing skills and organizational prowess.  To be considered for these paid internships, please fax (yes, fax!) your resume to 732-224-1199 and make sure to note “Summer Internship” on your cover sheet. 
 

The deadline for applications is March 24, 2008.

The Devon Group’s stocking included a great gift this holiday season - a prestigious Magellan award for best media relations…press release to follow!

Devon won a Davey! ”The Davey Awards exclusively honor the “Davids” of creativity, the finest small firms, agencies and companies in the world.  David defeated the giant Goliath with a big idea and a little rock - the sort of thing small firms do each year. The annual International Davey Awards honors the achievements of the “Creative Davids” who derive their strength from big ideas, rather than big budgets.  The Davey Awards is the leading awards competition specifically for smaller firms, where firms compete with their peers to win the recognition they deserve.”

The agency is once again supporting NY HR Week, as well as LRP’s new show, HR in Healthcare.  For vendors, both promise to be the right destination for Spring ‘08 product launches and press/analyst events; for buyers, serious educational opportunities as well as “one stop shopping” to help research new technologies and services.  Coming off last month’s wildly successful HR Technology Conference, we’re very excited to continue our long-standing relationship with LRP.

OK, not exactly related to our core business but it’s a mention for The Devon Group in WSJ nonetheless!