Thursday, March 31, 2011
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Top 10 Developments which changed Shared Services (KPMG)
It’s remarkable to think that the space in which we operate – now a skein of connected activities across numerous industries and sectors employing millions of people and involving many billions of dollars – has only existed in anything like its current form for a mere handful of years. From concept to delivery, the shared services and outsourcing space has been granted a fraction of the development time which more established activities such as manufacturing have enjoyed – but nevertheless, in that time we’ve witnessed some truly remarkable developments which have utterly revolutionized the business environment – and, indeed, the very nature of business.
As Ed Kirkby, Senior Consultant at EquaTerra, recalls: “Having been involved in the IT industry since 1983 I have seen many changes – and much re-inventing of the wheel. Apart from the technology drivers and the advent of offshore (e.g. India) there are other developments over this period of: one-stop shop versus selective outsourcing (‘best in class‘), new business models (ASPs/ISPs and Legacy), Business Process Outsourcing, complexity and future proofing considerations, more sophisticated financial engineering, partnerships and joint ventures, commoditization of ‘me too’ deals in mature markets as well as Sole-Source versus Competitive Tender. These have all combined to make outsourcing one of the most interesting market sectors to be in, both from a historical perspective and the place to be in the future – why? Because outsourcing works!”
Recently SSON reached out to a number of experts and commentators from around the shared services and outsourcing space to give their thoughts on the developments which have made the space what it is today. Now, we present the result: our Top Ten Developments Which Changed Shared Services & Outsourcing. Enjoy!
1. Technological advances
No surprises that this one’s on the list; pretty much every one of our contributors mentioned technology in one form or another, whether it be the incredible facilitating impact of the internet or the development of specifically process-related tools boosting companies’ efficiencies and productivity. It’s impossible to imagine life today without many of the technological innovations which have taken place, or reached maturity, during the period of time in which the shared services and outsourcing space has blossomed and boomed; it’s even less possible to imagine that space without the technology upon which it is supported.
As The Hackett Group’s Tom Bangemann says: “the one big enabler is technology, because without technology developments – especially ERP 20 years ago – no global business service or shared service organization of any sort would work.”2. Globalization
Alongside purely technological advances, of course, must be placed the dramatic changes in the relationships between nations and individuals, and the contracting or removal of previously obstructive chasms between locations and businesses, which have become known as globalization. It is possible to conceive of a form of shared service, and a variety of outsourcing, emerging in a non-globalized environment – but it’s absolutely impossible to see how either of those two concepts could ever have reached the levels of complexity, or resulted in the remarkable gains in efficiency and effectiveness, which they have achieved thanks to what journalist and academic Frances Cairncross has so elegantly termed “the death of distance”.
“The key development that makes shared services and outsourcing the successful model it is today is globalization,” says CenterPoint Energy’s Julienne Sugarek. “Through technology, we can be connected instantly to people in other cities, states and countries. We can pass work products back and forth as if our offices were down the hall from one another. In addition, the promotion of free trade has led to reduced transportation costs and the harmonization of intellectual property laws has opened the doors to a new way of doing business – business without borders.”
The Hackett Group’s Tom Bangemann concurs: “There are today tens, possibly hundreds of locations able to provide GBS services. The supply side is also bolstered by the growth of the BPO and ITO industries. Without adequate supply the can be no match between supply and demand! Globalization has also led to organizations taking a more business and less local or nationalistic view on labor issues, hence the willingness to deploy GBS SDM has increased and today almost all medium and large organizations use this SDM (to some extent).”3. The development of outsourcing as a distinct profession
As outsourcing first touched upon, then burst into, the economic and corporate mainstream, it of necessity became an activity which required increasing specialization and particularization on the part of those engaged within it. Whereas at the beginning of the outsourcing boom developments were being driven by experts in other fields who were able to envision how radically outsourcing would impact upon business practice, today’s outsourcing practitioners are finely-tuned specialist professionals (you know who you are…) with an understanding of their environment immeasurably broader and deeper than that of those first pioneers.
“There was a time when professionals with general transaction skills were the primary architects of outsourcing transactions, and buyers typically engaged in shared services and outsourcing relationships with limited or no specialized expertise. Over the past 10 years, outsourcing advisory has grown into a distinct specialization for lawyers, consultants and procurement professionals. A host of certifications have also been created to validate this specialization. The specialization of these intermediaries has led to increased competitiveness and standardized industry transaction practices,” maintains Robin Rasmussen, Director, Shared Services & Outsourcing Advisory at KPMG.4. The rise of value-adding finance roles
Just as the development of outsourcing has required the development of outsourcing specialists, so too changes in the nature of the finance function (with the evolution of shared services a notable contributory factor) have required the emergence of a new set of roles within finance – a development which is still very much ongoing. The requirement for added value, and the response of businesses to changes in the nature of businesses themselves, have created a new generation of professionals with remits often far beyond those of their predecessors, wrestling with challenges which previously might not have existed, or might at least have been considered to reside well outside the responsibilities of finance teams.
“Perhaps more ‘work in progress’ than completed development, the growth of value-adding finance roles outside both the traditional finance department and the shared service arena has certainly changed the culture within which SSO and BPO programs are implemented,” believes independent finance and shared services expert Jim Whitworth. “Early shared services had to fight their way through considerable resistance, often from finance management who sought to protect the traditional departmental structure and roles that had shaped their careers to date and had been expected to continue to do so. Businesses fuelled the conflict by failing to get to grips with building and executing a vision for the contribution that finance professionals could continue to make outside the newly acquired SSC or outsource partnership.”
Whitworth continues: “Fortunately, we’re now seeing many more alternatives for finance careers outside the Manager – Controller – Director route in a traditionally structured finance organization. Developing systems and processes in a technically complex world, ensuring compliance and controls to meet ever-increasing regulation and partnering business leaders in decision making have all become careers in their own right in recent years. As this greater range of options continues to develop, the shared services practitioner may no longer be the enemy threatening the finance management status quo but the key to future opportunity. Greater support brings faster implementation, easier stabilization and stronger sustainability as those retained from the old organization focus on new roles that challenge and add value.” 5. The rise (and fall) of the mega-deal
It’s an old lesson in business as well as in math that the numbers just keep getting bigger over time (even if your own share of them seems to shrink by the day…). Once outsourcing built up a full head of steam, and companies got to grips with the advantages and attendant risks (and how to manage them) associated with the practice, it was only a matter of time that the deals taking place grew to occasionally jaw-dropping scale. Of course, that created a whole new realm of risk…
“The ‘mega-deal’ not only helped the outsourcing industry address the needs of large, multi-national companies, but it also elevated outsourcing decisions to the highest levels of the buyer organization, which in turn helped establish outsourcing as a permanent option for operations strategy. Ironically, the ‘mega-deal’ also exposed some of the limitations of the outsourcing business model, as it magnified the impact of execution and governance failures. Service providers, buyers and their advisors continue to look for ways to address the limitations and risks exposed by the mega-deal,” says Eugene Kublanov, Director, Shared Services and Outsourcing Advisory at KPMG.6. Best-practice vision for support functions
Some of the developments that have contributed to the evolution of shared services and outsourcing have been very tangible – technological advances being a case in point. Others, however, have been extremely abstract – and an example of this is the emergence of the concept of best practice within support functions. Abstract or not, however, the impact of this concept has been all but immeasurable: the idea that support functions – particularly within finance – could be optimized and made efficient in the same way as an assembly line or a supply chain has revolutionized the back office and helped drive some of the most important advances in business practice in living memory. “Shared services started in the mid 1980s in finance functions with some enterprising US-based corporations who took a look at finance costs as a percentage of revenue, realized they had a full accounting function in every manufacturing plant or depot, and thought they could halve the cost or better by co-locating it,” explains Philip King of Atos Consulting. “The name ‘shared services’ was invented to make it more palatable to concerned stakeholders. It was purely a cost-reduction play at the time. And to some degree this is still paramount – but, as most people who reads these pages know, there is more to it than that. The words ‘shared services’ now have real meaning: shared resources, shared responsibility and real customer service provision. However the real added value from shared services is realized when it is an integral and fundamental part of a functional transformation preferably aligned to business strategy or transformation. And this is applicable to any support function – e.g. Finance, Procurement, HR, IT, Facilities & Estates, Customer Management/Service.
“One of the key developments that have sustained and enhanced the role of shared services is the development of the best-practice vision for support functions. This can be traced back to consulting firms in the 1990s that began to spread the gospel of ‘the future of finance’ with a best practice organizational architecture including corporate ‘centers of excellence/expertise‘, ‘business partners‘, and ‘shared services’ – the three key functional sub-divisions of an optimal support function organization. This has since been applied to all support functions – the terminology might be slightly different, but the principle is the same. Focusing the right activities in each area and aligning the appropriate resources multiplies the benefits: e.g. shared services support the business partner role by taking away the distractions of routine transaction processing and providing consistent data. The organization will benefit from the strategic value the business partner can provide if the right type of resource is deployed and the objectives of the role are clear.
“Done well all three parts of this support function vision are complementary and the value of change is multiplied. If done poorly this leads to a lack of clarity and belief in the shared services idea, as the full benefits are not realized. The terminology differs slightly from one function to another, but the concept is proven. Many organizations still have not fully grasped this fundamental vision, but it is even more important in the current climate, so for those who have not yet picked up on this key development, I’d urge you to work at it.”7. Increased buyer savvy
Outsourcing providers might be tempted to provide just a minimum satisfactory level of service (well, it’s human nature, maybe) but even if that weren’t a rather short-termist proposition, in today’s outsourcing environment it’s tantamount to commercial suicide. A major reason for this – alongside the proliferation of competing providers eager to snatch away every unsecured morsel of trade – is the increased savvy among buyers of outsourced services. As the industry has matured, so too has buyers’ understanding of what exactly can be gained – and at what cost – from the various providers offering their services.
“Outsourcing and shared services are now central to enterprise strategy and higher up the value chain, with most businesses having invested in new skills and re-organized themselves to identify optimum sourcing strategies, execute deals and govern the new service models. Whilst we still have further to go before sourcing can be thought of as a truly mature industry the trend is increasingly for more educated buyers, investing in new capabilities and expecting more from providers who in turn are maturing, consolidating and specializing to meet increased client expectations. These factors taken together have changed our view of what can be successfully externalized or optimized to include value and knowledge based requirements as well as commoditized services,” says Tony Rawlinson, Managing Director, Financial Services Advisory, Europe & Asia Pacific for EquaTerra.8. The rise of India (and the rest)
“Outsourcing” might be excessively closely linked with “India” in the minds of many consumers in the developed world but there’s a reason why that link was forged in the first place. India has been the powerhouse of the offshore outsourcing boom: its hyperpotent combination of technological prowess, well-educated and -skilled employees and that all-important labor arbitrage has propelled the sub-continent to the very forefront of this dynamic space, resulting in vast gains for the Indian economy – and for many companies worldwide who’ve taken advantage of this incredible boom.
“The unmatched ability of top tier India-based outsourcers to recruit, train, hire and onboard hundreds of thousands of people each year established the offshore delivery center as a viable service delivery model for services providers. It also established a new competitive segment of outsourcing service providers that did not originate in the U.S. or Western Europe. This in turn led to new entrants not only from India, but from various other developing countries that began to compete with the top tier, multi-national service providers,” asserts Eugene Kublanov of KPMG.9. Changes in the accountancy environment
Of course outsourcing and shared services aren’t just about finance – but a significant proportion of activity within the space remains driven by the finance function, and a proportion of that drive comes from the developments within the global accountancy environment which have had such an impact on business within and beyond shared services and outsourcing in recent years. Sarbanes-Oxley and similar regulatory efforts have created new realms of complexity which businesses have had no choice but to address – and shared services has become both a useful tool to address this, and profoundly affected by the very changes which new legislation has driven.
“The evolution of the accountancy space over the past couple of decades has really provided a huge driver for many of the developments we’ve seen in back-office structures and the outsourcing profession,” says independent finance professional Keith Osborne. “Added complexity in terms of compliance frameworks – not to mention the increased severity of sanctions for those failing to comply – has driven compliance up the corporate agenda and created an opportunity for shared services to become centers of accounting excellence, alongside the need to keep down costs during this leap in complexity. And of course several of the leading accountancy firms have been at the forefront of the outsourcing and shared service revolution in an advisory capacity as well as transforming their own businesses…”10. Governments’ acknowledgement of outsourcing’s influence on the economy
The impact of the outsourcing boom on the Indian economy was mentioned above – but of course it isn’t just India that has enjoyed the fruits – and had to deal with the issues arising from – the globalization of outsourcing. Both provider locations and governments of countries from which work is being outsourced have had to face up to the ways in which outsourcing impacts upon local and national economies, and international trading relationships. Policy must now encompass the economic realities which outsourcing has forced upon pretty much every country on earth – giving rise to many challenges to which the solutions have not yet been found.
“Various governments in the developing world (India is a salient example) have acknowledged the shared services and outsourcing sector as a substantial and positive influence on their economy. That acknowledgment has led to policies which encourage human capital development, and the modernization of infrastructure and commercial regulation. This in turn has facilitated the globalization of the shared services and outsourcing sector beyond its geographic origins,” believes KPMG’s Matamba Austin.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
As Ed Kirkby, Senior Consultant at EquaTerra, recalls: “Having been involved in the IT industry since 1983 I have seen many changes – and much re-inventing of the wheel. Apart from the technology drivers and the advent of offshore (e.g. India) there are other developments over this period of: one-stop shop versus selective outsourcing (‘best in class‘), new business models (ASPs/ISPs and Legacy), Business Process Outsourcing, complexity and future proofing considerations, more sophisticated financial engineering, partnerships and joint ventures, commoditization of ‘me too’ deals in mature markets as well as Sole-Source versus Competitive Tender. These have all combined to make outsourcing one of the most interesting market sectors to be in, both from a historical perspective and the place to be in the future – why? Because outsourcing works!”
Recently SSON reached out to a number of experts and commentators from around the shared services and outsourcing space to give their thoughts on the developments which have made the space what it is today. Now, we present the result: our Top Ten Developments Which Changed Shared Services & Outsourcing. Enjoy!
1. Technological advances
No surprises that this one’s on the list; pretty much every one of our contributors mentioned technology in one form or another, whether it be the incredible facilitating impact of the internet or the development of specifically process-related tools boosting companies’ efficiencies and productivity. It’s impossible to imagine life today without many of the technological innovations which have taken place, or reached maturity, during the period of time in which the shared services and outsourcing space has blossomed and boomed; it’s even less possible to imagine that space without the technology upon which it is supported.
As The Hackett Group’s Tom Bangemann says: “the one big enabler is technology, because without technology developments – especially ERP 20 years ago – no global business service or shared service organization of any sort would work.”2. Globalization
Alongside purely technological advances, of course, must be placed the dramatic changes in the relationships between nations and individuals, and the contracting or removal of previously obstructive chasms between locations and businesses, which have become known as globalization. It is possible to conceive of a form of shared service, and a variety of outsourcing, emerging in a non-globalized environment – but it’s absolutely impossible to see how either of those two concepts could ever have reached the levels of complexity, or resulted in the remarkable gains in efficiency and effectiveness, which they have achieved thanks to what journalist and academic Frances Cairncross has so elegantly termed “the death of distance”.
“The key development that makes shared services and outsourcing the successful model it is today is globalization,” says CenterPoint Energy’s Julienne Sugarek. “Through technology, we can be connected instantly to people in other cities, states and countries. We can pass work products back and forth as if our offices were down the hall from one another. In addition, the promotion of free trade has led to reduced transportation costs and the harmonization of intellectual property laws has opened the doors to a new way of doing business – business without borders.”
The Hackett Group’s Tom Bangemann concurs: “There are today tens, possibly hundreds of locations able to provide GBS services. The supply side is also bolstered by the growth of the BPO and ITO industries. Without adequate supply the can be no match between supply and demand! Globalization has also led to organizations taking a more business and less local or nationalistic view on labor issues, hence the willingness to deploy GBS SDM has increased and today almost all medium and large organizations use this SDM (to some extent).”3. The development of outsourcing as a distinct profession
As outsourcing first touched upon, then burst into, the economic and corporate mainstream, it of necessity became an activity which required increasing specialization and particularization on the part of those engaged within it. Whereas at the beginning of the outsourcing boom developments were being driven by experts in other fields who were able to envision how radically outsourcing would impact upon business practice, today’s outsourcing practitioners are finely-tuned specialist professionals (you know who you are…) with an understanding of their environment immeasurably broader and deeper than that of those first pioneers.
“There was a time when professionals with general transaction skills were the primary architects of outsourcing transactions, and buyers typically engaged in shared services and outsourcing relationships with limited or no specialized expertise. Over the past 10 years, outsourcing advisory has grown into a distinct specialization for lawyers, consultants and procurement professionals. A host of certifications have also been created to validate this specialization. The specialization of these intermediaries has led to increased competitiveness and standardized industry transaction practices,” maintains Robin Rasmussen, Director, Shared Services & Outsourcing Advisory at KPMG.4. The rise of value-adding finance roles
Just as the development of outsourcing has required the development of outsourcing specialists, so too changes in the nature of the finance function (with the evolution of shared services a notable contributory factor) have required the emergence of a new set of roles within finance – a development which is still very much ongoing. The requirement for added value, and the response of businesses to changes in the nature of businesses themselves, have created a new generation of professionals with remits often far beyond those of their predecessors, wrestling with challenges which previously might not have existed, or might at least have been considered to reside well outside the responsibilities of finance teams.
“Perhaps more ‘work in progress’ than completed development, the growth of value-adding finance roles outside both the traditional finance department and the shared service arena has certainly changed the culture within which SSO and BPO programs are implemented,” believes independent finance and shared services expert Jim Whitworth. “Early shared services had to fight their way through considerable resistance, often from finance management who sought to protect the traditional departmental structure and roles that had shaped their careers to date and had been expected to continue to do so. Businesses fuelled the conflict by failing to get to grips with building and executing a vision for the contribution that finance professionals could continue to make outside the newly acquired SSC or outsource partnership.”
Whitworth continues: “Fortunately, we’re now seeing many more alternatives for finance careers outside the Manager – Controller – Director route in a traditionally structured finance organization. Developing systems and processes in a technically complex world, ensuring compliance and controls to meet ever-increasing regulation and partnering business leaders in decision making have all become careers in their own right in recent years. As this greater range of options continues to develop, the shared services practitioner may no longer be the enemy threatening the finance management status quo but the key to future opportunity. Greater support brings faster implementation, easier stabilization and stronger sustainability as those retained from the old organization focus on new roles that challenge and add value.” 5. The rise (and fall) of the mega-deal
It’s an old lesson in business as well as in math that the numbers just keep getting bigger over time (even if your own share of them seems to shrink by the day…). Once outsourcing built up a full head of steam, and companies got to grips with the advantages and attendant risks (and how to manage them) associated with the practice, it was only a matter of time that the deals taking place grew to occasionally jaw-dropping scale. Of course, that created a whole new realm of risk…
“The ‘mega-deal’ not only helped the outsourcing industry address the needs of large, multi-national companies, but it also elevated outsourcing decisions to the highest levels of the buyer organization, which in turn helped establish outsourcing as a permanent option for operations strategy. Ironically, the ‘mega-deal’ also exposed some of the limitations of the outsourcing business model, as it magnified the impact of execution and governance failures. Service providers, buyers and their advisors continue to look for ways to address the limitations and risks exposed by the mega-deal,” says Eugene Kublanov, Director, Shared Services and Outsourcing Advisory at KPMG.6. Best-practice vision for support functions
Some of the developments that have contributed to the evolution of shared services and outsourcing have been very tangible – technological advances being a case in point. Others, however, have been extremely abstract – and an example of this is the emergence of the concept of best practice within support functions. Abstract or not, however, the impact of this concept has been all but immeasurable: the idea that support functions – particularly within finance – could be optimized and made efficient in the same way as an assembly line or a supply chain has revolutionized the back office and helped drive some of the most important advances in business practice in living memory. “Shared services started in the mid 1980s in finance functions with some enterprising US-based corporations who took a look at finance costs as a percentage of revenue, realized they had a full accounting function in every manufacturing plant or depot, and thought they could halve the cost or better by co-locating it,” explains Philip King of Atos Consulting. “The name ‘shared services’ was invented to make it more palatable to concerned stakeholders. It was purely a cost-reduction play at the time. And to some degree this is still paramount – but, as most people who reads these pages know, there is more to it than that. The words ‘shared services’ now have real meaning: shared resources, shared responsibility and real customer service provision. However the real added value from shared services is realized when it is an integral and fundamental part of a functional transformation preferably aligned to business strategy or transformation. And this is applicable to any support function – e.g. Finance, Procurement, HR, IT, Facilities & Estates, Customer Management/Service.
“One of the key developments that have sustained and enhanced the role of shared services is the development of the best-practice vision for support functions. This can be traced back to consulting firms in the 1990s that began to spread the gospel of ‘the future of finance’ with a best practice organizational architecture including corporate ‘centers of excellence/expertise‘, ‘business partners‘, and ‘shared services’ – the three key functional sub-divisions of an optimal support function organization. This has since been applied to all support functions – the terminology might be slightly different, but the principle is the same. Focusing the right activities in each area and aligning the appropriate resources multiplies the benefits: e.g. shared services support the business partner role by taking away the distractions of routine transaction processing and providing consistent data. The organization will benefit from the strategic value the business partner can provide if the right type of resource is deployed and the objectives of the role are clear.
“Done well all three parts of this support function vision are complementary and the value of change is multiplied. If done poorly this leads to a lack of clarity and belief in the shared services idea, as the full benefits are not realized. The terminology differs slightly from one function to another, but the concept is proven. Many organizations still have not fully grasped this fundamental vision, but it is even more important in the current climate, so for those who have not yet picked up on this key development, I’d urge you to work at it.”7. Increased buyer savvy
Outsourcing providers might be tempted to provide just a minimum satisfactory level of service (well, it’s human nature, maybe) but even if that weren’t a rather short-termist proposition, in today’s outsourcing environment it’s tantamount to commercial suicide. A major reason for this – alongside the proliferation of competing providers eager to snatch away every unsecured morsel of trade – is the increased savvy among buyers of outsourced services. As the industry has matured, so too has buyers’ understanding of what exactly can be gained – and at what cost – from the various providers offering their services.
“Outsourcing and shared services are now central to enterprise strategy and higher up the value chain, with most businesses having invested in new skills and re-organized themselves to identify optimum sourcing strategies, execute deals and govern the new service models. Whilst we still have further to go before sourcing can be thought of as a truly mature industry the trend is increasingly for more educated buyers, investing in new capabilities and expecting more from providers who in turn are maturing, consolidating and specializing to meet increased client expectations. These factors taken together have changed our view of what can be successfully externalized or optimized to include value and knowledge based requirements as well as commoditized services,” says Tony Rawlinson, Managing Director, Financial Services Advisory, Europe & Asia Pacific for EquaTerra.8. The rise of India (and the rest)
“Outsourcing” might be excessively closely linked with “India” in the minds of many consumers in the developed world but there’s a reason why that link was forged in the first place. India has been the powerhouse of the offshore outsourcing boom: its hyperpotent combination of technological prowess, well-educated and -skilled employees and that all-important labor arbitrage has propelled the sub-continent to the very forefront of this dynamic space, resulting in vast gains for the Indian economy – and for many companies worldwide who’ve taken advantage of this incredible boom.
“The unmatched ability of top tier India-based outsourcers to recruit, train, hire and onboard hundreds of thousands of people each year established the offshore delivery center as a viable service delivery model for services providers. It also established a new competitive segment of outsourcing service providers that did not originate in the U.S. or Western Europe. This in turn led to new entrants not only from India, but from various other developing countries that began to compete with the top tier, multi-national service providers,” asserts Eugene Kublanov of KPMG.9. Changes in the accountancy environment
Of course outsourcing and shared services aren’t just about finance – but a significant proportion of activity within the space remains driven by the finance function, and a proportion of that drive comes from the developments within the global accountancy environment which have had such an impact on business within and beyond shared services and outsourcing in recent years. Sarbanes-Oxley and similar regulatory efforts have created new realms of complexity which businesses have had no choice but to address – and shared services has become both a useful tool to address this, and profoundly affected by the very changes which new legislation has driven.
“The evolution of the accountancy space over the past couple of decades has really provided a huge driver for many of the developments we’ve seen in back-office structures and the outsourcing profession,” says independent finance professional Keith Osborne. “Added complexity in terms of compliance frameworks – not to mention the increased severity of sanctions for those failing to comply – has driven compliance up the corporate agenda and created an opportunity for shared services to become centers of accounting excellence, alongside the need to keep down costs during this leap in complexity. And of course several of the leading accountancy firms have been at the forefront of the outsourcing and shared service revolution in an advisory capacity as well as transforming their own businesses…”10. Governments’ acknowledgement of outsourcing’s influence on the economy
The impact of the outsourcing boom on the Indian economy was mentioned above – but of course it isn’t just India that has enjoyed the fruits – and had to deal with the issues arising from – the globalization of outsourcing. Both provider locations and governments of countries from which work is being outsourced have had to face up to the ways in which outsourcing impacts upon local and national economies, and international trading relationships. Policy must now encompass the economic realities which outsourcing has forced upon pretty much every country on earth – giving rise to many challenges to which the solutions have not yet been found.
“Various governments in the developing world (India is a salient example) have acknowledged the shared services and outsourcing sector as a substantial and positive influence on their economy. That acknowledgment has led to policies which encourage human capital development, and the modernization of infrastructure and commercial regulation. This in turn has facilitated the globalization of the shared services and outsourcing sector beyond its geographic origins,” believes KPMG’s Matamba Austin.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Choosing b/w Strategic sourcing or Outsourcing advisory consultant
Employing a strategic sourcing or outsourcing advisory guide
Strategic Sourcing and outsourcing advisory consultants are aimed on assisting executives with the difficult project of organizing and efficiently completing an outsourcing challenge inside their organisation. It consists of a analysing methods that include a procurement progression and evaluates and assesses getting pursuits within a corporation in a continuing way.
The key aim for this kind of duties is to assess the offer chain managing and make variations which decrease source chain expenses.
Strategic Sourcing is focused on higher levels strategic business objectives and may well include things like benefitial improvements above and above the direct cost benefits from the fast outsourcing relevant alterations. Achieving top fee, progression and good quality positive aspects can signify replacing technologies, buying new solutions or outsourcing total technology dependent aspects of a organization as perfectly as guide functions which benefit from centralisation or economies of scale and leverage a company's acquiring power.
Quite a few terms are applied to refer to sourcing initiatives, which includes off-shoring, next to-shoring, around sourcing, market-aspect, purchase-side, supplier direction, and can be at managing degree and targeted on i.t outsourcing or rationalisation or at c-suite place bringing together significant initiatives inside a world-wide organisation. Strategic sourcing includes a collaborative and continuous relationship between buyers and vendors.
one of the major gains to having an exterior strategic sourcing advisory to help is that is considerably boosts the visibility of the complete provide chain and allows managing to get a obvious audit of their situation and the truth about their recent financial commitments whilst also generating fee personal savings and improved operational effectiveness.
The savings from strategic sourcing arrive from lots of parts and usually highlight lots of techniques that a provider can increase devote consolidation, cope with demand, enhance internal and outside processes, re-set up aggressive bidding situations and produce relationships with inner and outer distributors.
Sourcing initiatives begin with an audit of the ongoing predicament and assessing a company's shelling out inside the context of their market and identifying the most suitable vendors and providers with respect to an overall coherent technique. This can suggest obtaining new vendors that suit the new requirement, negotiating with existing suppliers, or creating new procedures and structure throughout which to take care of accessible dealers so that benefits of any alterations can be assessed and the method modified to improve outcome.
Strategic sourcing advisories are there to deliver sizeable existing encounter in dealing with transform direction, bid techniques, venture operations, outsourcing considerations and negatiations with companies and partners. This assistance can be critical when a firm looks to outsourcing for the first time and has minimal inside experience of managing outsourcing on any important scale.
Strategic sourcing advisory providers are inclined to have a group of extremely encountered marketplace professionals who have relationships and a prosperous observe report or functioning at c-suite point to navigate the mine field on difficulties which an inexperienced provider would run into when wanting to attain a successful outsourcing initiative on their very own. Typically these advisories have worked in just fortune 500 and FTSE 500 corporations with prosperous observe records in managing complex sourcing initiatives at a strategic degree in which associations and sourcing dynamics need to be totally understood.
When shopping for a strategic sourcing consultant, examine for senior executives with this practical knowledge to be certain of obtaining the appropriate final results on your outsourcing venture.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
Strategic Sourcing and outsourcing advisory consultants are aimed on assisting executives with the difficult project of organizing and efficiently completing an outsourcing challenge inside their organisation. It consists of a analysing methods that include a procurement progression and evaluates and assesses getting pursuits within a corporation in a continuing way.
The key aim for this kind of duties is to assess the offer chain managing and make variations which decrease source chain expenses.
Strategic Sourcing is focused on higher levels strategic business objectives and may well include things like benefitial improvements above and above the direct cost benefits from the fast outsourcing relevant alterations. Achieving top fee, progression and good quality positive aspects can signify replacing technologies, buying new solutions or outsourcing total technology dependent aspects of a organization as perfectly as guide functions which benefit from centralisation or economies of scale and leverage a company's acquiring power.
Quite a few terms are applied to refer to sourcing initiatives, which includes off-shoring, next to-shoring, around sourcing, market-aspect, purchase-side, supplier direction, and can be at managing degree and targeted on i.t outsourcing or rationalisation or at c-suite place bringing together significant initiatives inside a world-wide organisation. Strategic sourcing includes a collaborative and continuous relationship between buyers and vendors.
one of the major gains to having an exterior strategic sourcing advisory to help is that is considerably boosts the visibility of the complete provide chain and allows managing to get a obvious audit of their situation and the truth about their recent financial commitments whilst also generating fee personal savings and improved operational effectiveness.
The savings from strategic sourcing arrive from lots of parts and usually highlight lots of techniques that a provider can increase devote consolidation, cope with demand, enhance internal and outside processes, re-set up aggressive bidding situations and produce relationships with inner and outer distributors.
Sourcing initiatives begin with an audit of the ongoing predicament and assessing a company's shelling out inside the context of their market and identifying the most suitable vendors and providers with respect to an overall coherent technique. This can suggest obtaining new vendors that suit the new requirement, negotiating with existing suppliers, or creating new procedures and structure throughout which to take care of accessible dealers so that benefits of any alterations can be assessed and the method modified to improve outcome.
Strategic sourcing advisories are there to deliver sizeable existing encounter in dealing with transform direction, bid techniques, venture operations, outsourcing considerations and negatiations with companies and partners. This assistance can be critical when a firm looks to outsourcing for the first time and has minimal inside experience of managing outsourcing on any important scale.
Strategic sourcing advisory providers are inclined to have a group of extremely encountered marketplace professionals who have relationships and a prosperous observe report or functioning at c-suite point to navigate the mine field on difficulties which an inexperienced provider would run into when wanting to attain a successful outsourcing initiative on their very own. Typically these advisories have worked in just fortune 500 and FTSE 500 corporations with prosperous observe records in managing complex sourcing initiatives at a strategic degree in which associations and sourcing dynamics need to be totally understood.
When shopping for a strategic sourcing consultant, examine for senior executives with this practical knowledge to be certain of obtaining the appropriate final results on your outsourcing venture.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
Monday, November 9, 2009
Captives in India: shut down Mode
Capacity addition by 3rd party service providers (‘Buy’) is likely to surpass additions by captives (‘Make’).
The recent announcement of UBS, a global financial services firm, selling its captive in India to Cognizant Technolgies is the latest in a series of such sell-offs. This only reiterates what Evalueserve had predicted way back in 2007 that the capacity addition by third-party service providers (‘Buy’ option) is likely to surpass additions by captives (‘Make’ option). After a study of about 100 captives of western companies in India, Evalueserve confirmed that a majority of these captives are in serious trouble.
Sixty-one percent of the captives studied have faced significant issues, with many of them already shut down. Smaller captives have been the worst hit; many of the larger ones are not in good shape either.
Captives across all segments—Information Technology (IT), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO)—have fared somewhat similarly.Smaller captives Captives across all segments—Information Technology (IT), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)
In contrast, third-party service providers have been scaling up during this
period. Access to new markets and increasing maturity of the service providers have helped them stay ahead.
Majority of Captives Face Serious Issues
In April 2007, Evalueserve predicted in a report titled ‘The future of KPO – Make or Buy? that the capacity addition by third-party service providers (‘Buy’ option) is likely to surpass additions by captives (‘Make’ option). The report also identified three distinct phases in the lifecycle of offshore units in the ‘Make’ model: the set-up phase, the honeymoon phase and the stagnation period.
As a follow-up, Evalueserve studied 100 captives, not only from KPO, but also from BPO and IT segments that have been in operation since January 2006. These included 30 BPO, 38 KPO and 32 IT captives, from the 300-odd captives in India. In cases where the captive catered to overlapping areas (which was the situation in 34 percent of the sample), the predominant area of operation (i.e., IT/BPO/KPO) was selected to classify the captive.
The captives were selected randomly and were of varying sizes with 54 percent of them having more than 500 employees. The current study confirms the earlier theories. Sixty-one percent of the captives studied have gone through varying degrees of turbulence in the past four years—27 percent of them either shut down or were sold to third-party service providers.
For example, Citigroup sold its BPO arm, Citigroup Global Services, to Tata Consultancy Services and its technology captive, Citi technology Services Ltd., to Wipro technologies. HCL Technologies bought Adaptech’s India technology centre, Symphony Service bought biotechnology firm Biolmagene’s India R&D centre and the AOL contact centre in India was sold to Aegis BPO. Besides, companies such as Bose Corp., PowerGen, Riya, Inc. and BelAir Networks shut their captives in India.
Thirty-four percent of the captives studied either remained stagnant or have scaled down. These captives are under great pressure, and we may see many of them exiting in the next 1–2 years. However, small captives cannot be sold off at a premium, and they will find the exit much harder.
Small Captives Worst Hit; Larger Ones Also Not Spared
It is well established that smaller captives with fewer than 500 employees are likely to face greater challenges to survive. In fact, 74 percent of such captives have gone through a difficult time in the past four years. Employee retention is a serious issue in small captives since they are unable to provide good career opportunities.
An interesting finding from the study is that many bigger captives (with more than 500 employees) have also been under tremendous pressure to survive in the past four years. It is evident from the fact that only half of such captives have been able to scale up during this period.
What Led to The Decline of Captives?
The change in the position of captives from a seemingly ‘enviable’ position to an ‘unviable’ condition can be attributed to several factors. The most prominent of them are the following:
Significant management involvement is required while setting up a captive. If the support is sporadic, the transitioning and ramp-up process slows down, leading to cost escalations. In case of third-party providers, the parent company can manage the vendor as per pre-agreed Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and engagement terms, which does require some effort, but is much less than what is required for a captive.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
The recent announcement of UBS, a global financial services firm, selling its captive in India to Cognizant Technolgies is the latest in a series of such sell-offs. This only reiterates what Evalueserve had predicted way back in 2007 that the capacity addition by third-party service providers (‘Buy’ option) is likely to surpass additions by captives (‘Make’ option). After a study of about 100 captives of western companies in India, Evalueserve confirmed that a majority of these captives are in serious trouble.
Sixty-one percent of the captives studied have faced significant issues, with many of them already shut down. Smaller captives have been the worst hit; many of the larger ones are not in good shape either.
Captives across all segments—Information Technology (IT), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO)—have fared somewhat similarly.Smaller captives Captives across all segments—Information Technology (IT), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)
In contrast, third-party service providers have been scaling up during this
period. Access to new markets and increasing maturity of the service providers have helped them stay ahead.
Majority of Captives Face Serious Issues
In April 2007, Evalueserve predicted in a report titled ‘The future of KPO – Make or Buy? that the capacity addition by third-party service providers (‘Buy’ option) is likely to surpass additions by captives (‘Make’ option). The report also identified three distinct phases in the lifecycle of offshore units in the ‘Make’ model: the set-up phase, the honeymoon phase and the stagnation period.
As a follow-up, Evalueserve studied 100 captives, not only from KPO, but also from BPO and IT segments that have been in operation since January 2006. These included 30 BPO, 38 KPO and 32 IT captives, from the 300-odd captives in India. In cases where the captive catered to overlapping areas (which was the situation in 34 percent of the sample), the predominant area of operation (i.e., IT/BPO/KPO) was selected to classify the captive.
The captives were selected randomly and were of varying sizes with 54 percent of them having more than 500 employees. The current study confirms the earlier theories. Sixty-one percent of the captives studied have gone through varying degrees of turbulence in the past four years—27 percent of them either shut down or were sold to third-party service providers.
For example, Citigroup sold its BPO arm, Citigroup Global Services, to Tata Consultancy Services and its technology captive, Citi technology Services Ltd., to Wipro technologies. HCL Technologies bought Adaptech’s India technology centre, Symphony Service bought biotechnology firm Biolmagene’s India R&D centre and the AOL contact centre in India was sold to Aegis BPO. Besides, companies such as Bose Corp., PowerGen, Riya, Inc. and BelAir Networks shut their captives in India.
Thirty-four percent of the captives studied either remained stagnant or have scaled down. These captives are under great pressure, and we may see many of them exiting in the next 1–2 years. However, small captives cannot be sold off at a premium, and they will find the exit much harder.
Small Captives Worst Hit; Larger Ones Also Not Spared
It is well established that smaller captives with fewer than 500 employees are likely to face greater challenges to survive. In fact, 74 percent of such captives have gone through a difficult time in the past four years. Employee retention is a serious issue in small captives since they are unable to provide good career opportunities.
An interesting finding from the study is that many bigger captives (with more than 500 employees) have also been under tremendous pressure to survive in the past four years. It is evident from the fact that only half of such captives have been able to scale up during this period.
What Led to The Decline of Captives?
The change in the position of captives from a seemingly ‘enviable’ position to an ‘unviable’ condition can be attributed to several factors. The most prominent of them are the following:
Significant management involvement is required while setting up a captive. If the support is sporadic, the transitioning and ramp-up process slows down, leading to cost escalations. In case of third-party providers, the parent company can manage the vendor as per pre-agreed Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and engagement terms, which does require some effort, but is much less than what is required for a captive.
For more information, please contact us at sachith@recruiseindia.com
Sunday, March 29, 2009
How to Get Hired In A KPO Job
Jobs in KPO or the Knowledge Process Outsourcing are quite in demand these days given the bright prospects in this field. The industry is fast picking up in India given the wealth of well-educated professionals in India who can be hired at relatively cheaper rates. It is a knowledge based industry and in this regard it is quite different from a BPO. In a KPO, employees are involved in knowledge-based work or research in different verticals. So, people with experience in specialized fields are considered for a KPO job. Unlike BPO, it is not just the youngsters or fresh out of college youth who opt for a KPO jobs but experienced professionals from various fields and even retired people are joining the KPO industry to take up lucrative jobs.
KPO jobs involve work in various fields such as finance, legal issues, intellectual property, analytics, market research and data management for a company. Since this is all knowledge based and confidential work, a lot of risk management is required in KPO jobs in India and abroad. The job would require in-depth knowledge of that area of work. Of course, the KPO centre imparts training to its employees for the vertical that it is working in. High-end knowledge work is executed in these KPOs as directed by the client. It could be data management, petition filing, research oriented work or any other such work that involves proper understanding of that field.
Since India offers good KPO services with a lot of cost advantage, it is estimated that by 2010, nearly two and a half lakh people in India would be employed in this industry. This is an indicative number and given the potential of this industry, it may as well increase. In the past decade, there has been a mushrooming of engineering, technical and professional institutes in India. Thus, there is no shortage of skilled manpower in the country which is capable of handling high-end knowledge work in KPOs. Thus, more and more international companies are either setting shop here or hiring the local talent for research and development work or outsourcing such work to Indian KPO companies that specialize in the particular vertical.
Experienced and qualified professionals are choosing this career option because it is very lucrative. A person with two years of experience can expect to earn remuneration as high as around Rs 6 lakh (Rs 600,000) to Rs 8 lakh (Rs 800,000) annually. Someone with higher experience and knowledge of the industry would easily draw anywhere between Rs 15 lakh (Rs 1.5 million) and Rs 20 lakh (Rs 2 million). However, this industry is fraught with attrition. Since people are not properly aware of the potential of this industry, they tend to leave jobs quicker in this industry.
To get hired for a KPO job, one has to have proper educational qualifications unlike BPO where only a good knowledge of the English language is required. Since in a KPO job, the work requires specialized skills, proper educational qualifications are a must. Qualified people from various diverse backgrounds can look at making a career in KPO. It could be teachers or engineers or MBAs or lawyers or journalists or professionals with financial background. Professionals from all such backgrounds are eligible to work in KPOs. The basic skills required of an employee in KPO job are good analytical skills for data analysis, proficiency in usage of resources for information research, ability to make presentable reports from raw data, good computer proficiency and command over English language.
For a KPO job, one would require domain expertise and knowledge for projects that may involve moderate to very high levels of analysis, research, updating, database creation and cataloguing and indexing. Thus, one must have a basic interest and knowledge in specific domains with an aptitude to working with data and information to thrive in a KPO job. During the recruitment process, candidates are first short-listed on the basis of marks and their previous experience of the domain. Their aptitude and attitude towards doing research-oriented work is also tested during the recruitment process. After selection, all employees are given the requisite training in the domain and the projects involved.
KPO industry employs employees from diverse academic backgrounds. There would be a huge demand for engineers, CAs, doctors, MBAs, lawyers, research analysts, scientific researchers and even PhDs in the near future. KPO is one industry where one can make full use of his/her educational qualifications. Also, good performers in a KPO have remarkable growth opportunities in this field because the number of skilled people is less. They can look forward to a good salary package, in-depth domain knowledge, managerial responsibilities and career growth.
KPO jobs involve work in various fields such as finance, legal issues, intellectual property, analytics, market research and data management for a company. Since this is all knowledge based and confidential work, a lot of risk management is required in KPO jobs in India and abroad. The job would require in-depth knowledge of that area of work. Of course, the KPO centre imparts training to its employees for the vertical that it is working in. High-end knowledge work is executed in these KPOs as directed by the client. It could be data management, petition filing, research oriented work or any other such work that involves proper understanding of that field.
Since India offers good KPO services with a lot of cost advantage, it is estimated that by 2010, nearly two and a half lakh people in India would be employed in this industry. This is an indicative number and given the potential of this industry, it may as well increase. In the past decade, there has been a mushrooming of engineering, technical and professional institutes in India. Thus, there is no shortage of skilled manpower in the country which is capable of handling high-end knowledge work in KPOs. Thus, more and more international companies are either setting shop here or hiring the local talent for research and development work or outsourcing such work to Indian KPO companies that specialize in the particular vertical.
Experienced and qualified professionals are choosing this career option because it is very lucrative. A person with two years of experience can expect to earn remuneration as high as around Rs 6 lakh (Rs 600,000) to Rs 8 lakh (Rs 800,000) annually. Someone with higher experience and knowledge of the industry would easily draw anywhere between Rs 15 lakh (Rs 1.5 million) and Rs 20 lakh (Rs 2 million). However, this industry is fraught with attrition. Since people are not properly aware of the potential of this industry, they tend to leave jobs quicker in this industry.
To get hired for a KPO job, one has to have proper educational qualifications unlike BPO where only a good knowledge of the English language is required. Since in a KPO job, the work requires specialized skills, proper educational qualifications are a must. Qualified people from various diverse backgrounds can look at making a career in KPO. It could be teachers or engineers or MBAs or lawyers or journalists or professionals with financial background. Professionals from all such backgrounds are eligible to work in KPOs. The basic skills required of an employee in KPO job are good analytical skills for data analysis, proficiency in usage of resources for information research, ability to make presentable reports from raw data, good computer proficiency and command over English language.
For a KPO job, one would require domain expertise and knowledge for projects that may involve moderate to very high levels of analysis, research, updating, database creation and cataloguing and indexing. Thus, one must have a basic interest and knowledge in specific domains with an aptitude to working with data and information to thrive in a KPO job. During the recruitment process, candidates are first short-listed on the basis of marks and their previous experience of the domain. Their aptitude and attitude towards doing research-oriented work is also tested during the recruitment process. After selection, all employees are given the requisite training in the domain and the projects involved.
KPO industry employs employees from diverse academic backgrounds. There would be a huge demand for engineers, CAs, doctors, MBAs, lawyers, research analysts, scientific researchers and even PhDs in the near future. KPO is one industry where one can make full use of his/her educational qualifications. Also, good performers in a KPO have remarkable growth opportunities in this field because the number of skilled people is less. They can look forward to a good salary package, in-depth domain knowledge, managerial responsibilities and career growth.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Hiring People in Tough Market Situations
We all know how this is not the employers market. The slump in the market has brought huge challenges to Recruiters whose hunt is still on for the best talent from the market. As the supply of resources flood the market, there surely is a dearth of opportunities within company for open positions. How do we tackle such this situation?
1) Narrow your search: The job portals are flooded with resumes as potential candidates are uncertain about their current job. In a situation like this, it’s very important as a Recruiter for you to narrow your search to the active job seekers than passive job seekers. The active job seekers are responsive to the job offer that you have to offer and they are surely up for grabs.
As for the candidates, its important for you to narrow your search in identifying the right job for you and follow up regularly with the Recruiter on the open head count to have yourself land your dream job.
2) Networking is the key: In a volatile market situation, the job market is the most affected as the perception is LIFO (Last in first out). As a Recruiter, your potential hire is weary of the situation and is not really keen to move out of his comfort zone. The key here would be to build an active network with your potential hires not just for jobs but to gain knowledge on his side of the story. Then it becomes easy for you to present his dream job and then hire him for your open position.
As for the candidates, it helps you to network with the Recruiters and HR folks to gain knowledge on company situation, their hiring prospects, their growth directions just for you to be aware if the move that you are going to make is worth end of it all.
3) Gain business intelligence: Its important to all of us to keep ourselves updated on what is happening around. Gain knowledge on various industries growth or slump. This will help and comes handy if as a Recruiter, you are talking to your potential hire from that domain. This will give you the insight to attract the candidate and also gives confidence to the candidate that he is talking to the right person in the company.
As a candidate, knowledge on verticals not only helps you weigh your option to move to that domain but also helps you compare the industries. In such a turbulent situations, the managers out there want to hire “only the best” who is far beyond excellence. You have to give an impression in the minds of the Recruiter that its you who is cut for the role and nobody else.
4)Reskill and Reinvent: By now, we all know the traditional method of hiring is not the in thing in hiring in turbulent market situations. As a Recruiter, you too have to reskill yourself to reinvent new forms of recruiting. The candidates out there are becoming more and more passive making a recruiter’s job even more aggressive and tougher by the day. Its very important as a Recruiter to bell the cat in finding out what works best in his favour. Hunt for the best resource from the deep caves, which did not exist for many.
Has this Recession led to more Job Offer Declines??
A new trend seen in recruitment during this recession is the increase in the “post-offer declines” from the offered candidates and “pre-offer declines” from candidates when they receive potential offers. A candidate’s reason for declining offers may be their decision to stay back at their present company. While the cause of the same can be easily identified as being due to the recession, here is how candidates may quote this –
-“I’m concerned about possible lay-offs”
-“My job is very secured and I have got good project pipeline in my present company…. I don’t want to take a risk”
As a Recruiter, some of these questions can really put you in a difficult situation to answer when candidates quote some of the examples of their own dear ones losing their jobs. However, there are many ways a Recruiter can turn such cases to successful hires and I believe on the following ones.
1. Help the candidate realise the importance and value of hiring during recession: Of late many candidates ask this question to me as to why are we hiring during recession and I turn this question as an answer to their question. First of all, we should make the candidates understand and realise the importance and value of hiring during recession. Candidates should be given enough information about the roadmap and future of business and also the position they are hired for as to how it can be a possible “recession proof”.
2. Involve Business/Hiring Managers: Asking the Hiring Manager to call the candidate very often after the offer release would definitely help to keep the candidate’s interest level high. Some time candidates may consider Recruiter as more of a job “seller” but their “trust factor” will be more when a hiring Manager calls up the candidate and talk to him.
3. Re-Brief the importance of the role in the company: Re-briefing is very important during a candidate’s post offer to pre-joining phase. Those candidates who are getting interviewed in multiple companies may forget what was explained to them during their interview. The Recruiter should make an attempt to address all queries related to job roles and responsibility.
4. Give personal touch: Perhaps there is nothing better than giving a personal touch to a rapport built with the candidate to avoid offer declines. Add the candidate to social networking sites like Orkut and Facebook, your chat room etc to make him feel more comfortable with the process. Meet the candidate very often both at office and outside, if possible. Apart from being his “career consultant”, talk to him about his personal part of life and make him feel you are not an outsider.
5. Beware of negative candidates/Window shoppers: Don’t be a victim to those ‘window-shopping’ candidates by letting them to make use of your offer to get what they want from their current employer.
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