Service Sharing

Author: (US) Chris
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-04-01
Features: What is the future prospect of service sharing? You don’t need a crystal ball to predict the future: service sharing and related BPO will bring huge profits to consulting and technology companies. "Fully automated business processes" (lights-out processing), "virtual service sharing" (virtual shared services), and "commercialization" are the buzzwords of thinkers; service sharing will adopt some of these concepts. However, service sharing may completely deviate from its original purpose. Based on the experience data and new survey of SBPOA, it concludes that at least 50% of service sharing initiatives fail to achieve the goals of improving quality and reducing costs. Many service sharing organizations are underperforming, and if this situation persists, the future of service sharing will be bleak. Why are service sharing organizations underperforming? Because many service sharing initiatives were initially launched simply to integrate various plans. Integrating company operations is like a pendulum swinging back and forth between "centralization" and "decentralization," even though the ultimate goal is cost savings, the implementation process may also produce cyclical reversals, leading to cost increases. As a part of a continuous, competitive business strategy, service sharing eliminates these cyclical reversals, enabling companies to save costs through integration and achieve stable returns. True service sharing involves creating a business—either an internal enterprise or an outsourced service company—regardless of the form, with the same operational principles: achieving business success. The best service sharing centers (SSCs) provide valuable services to their clients, who are willing to purchase their services repeatedly, with highly competitive costs, quality, and timing. The evolution of business operations requires organizations to improve efficiency, which presents a significant opportunity for creating service sharing, far beyond what people imagined a few years ago. In such an era, without thorough planning and preparation, opportunities may be missed, leading to regrets. Many large American companies have developed ambitious procurement strategies and need to leverage service sharing and BPO to enhance efficiency and effectiveness to maintain their competitiveness. To ensure the bright future of service sharing, what can we do? Here are three perspectives:
1. Strictly define service sharing and seriously discuss it—particularly emphasizing that service sharing is not just about integration, whether internal services or outsourcing, it must be treated as a business.
2. Encourage clients to break away from traditional corporate functional models and think about—what would you do differently if service sharing were not a transitional plan but a standalone business? Why don’t you do it?
3. Focus on people rather than technology. To overcome cultural, organizational, and political barriers, service sharing must be treated as a business. The purpose of this book is to ensure that the essential factor—technology—needed to establish SSCs does not distract us from ignoring the critical, winning-or-loosing factor: the people issue. This book includes some new developments in service sharing research—virtual centers, fully automated processes, and others. However, it’s important to note that these should not distract managers. Managers should continue to delve deeper into change management and cultural integration strategies, which are key to success. The future may not be as people imagine, but we can take steps to harness the positive role of service sharing.
"Service Sharing" starts from various forms of service sharing centers and explores how good center design can improve service sharing efficiency. It explains how organizations can seize opportunities brought by service sharing, streamline business processes, develop comprehensive plans, and meticulously implement them. This book summarizes the experiences of top service sharing centers, offering practical advice and recommendations. It combines real-world examples for in-depth analysis, studies the present and future of service sharing, and focuses on the market challenges, increasing trend of service outsourcing, and consulting, providing readers with reference samples, tools, and templates. This book provides senior management with the following content:
- Service sharing solutions and principles
- Strategic factors influencing service sharing decisions
- Management, technology, and process challenges faced by service sharing centers
- Developing unique solutions or frameworks within the organization to support service sharing centers
- Creating a service sharing architecture and culture to continuously innovate value
- Adopting best practices and systems, including performance monitoring and compensation systems
- Making proactive responses to electronic service sharing and business process outsourcing