Perspectives on global business services

Perspectives

Perspectives on global business services

Performance improvement through shared services best practices

Implementing global business services (GBS) is challenging, but the potential benefits are significant: service quality improvements and cost savings far above what shared services and services outsourcing can deliver.

From cost center to competitive advantage

Given the complex mix of people, processes, technology, and multiple geographies involved, global business services (GBS) implementation demands targeted and thorough research and preparation. Deloitte GBS Reader is a compendium of articles based on research, case studies, and client work that helps shed light on the challenges and benefits of global business services. Three sections comprise 14 articles covering key principals of global business services:

  • GBS operations—aligning with the bigger picture. Examines the evolution of global business services and highlights the shared services best practices that make global business services organizations successful.
  • Next-generation GBS capabilities: Capturing the full value. Explores the latest trends and developments in this fast-changing field.
  • GBS as a business within a business: Instilling a commercial mindset. Examines opportunities to learn from the external marketplace to operate global business services more like a commercial enterprise.

GBS operations—aligning with the bigger picture

Leap ahead or lag behind? Enhancing value from your service delivery organization
Read this article to understand how Deloitte’s service delivery maturity model can help you quickly assess the current state of your services organization, envision short-term and long-term target states, and apply a combination of levers to make improvements and measure results.

The value of global process owners in global business services
This article describes the evolving role of Global Process Owners (GPOs) and presents five specific ways GPOs can create significant enterprise-wide value. We also describe how leadership can best support GPOs and enable them to deliver real strategic value.

Struggling with unfinished business?
If your organization is not realizing the expected benefits of your GBS implementation, this article can organization, people, process, technology, and governance.

Towards a portfolio approach for GBS optimization
By expanding what, how, and where GBS is applied, forward-thinking companies are reducing the cost of GBS by 25 percent to 60 percent—a function of process standardization, operating efficiencies and flexibility, labor cost arbitrage, and tax efficiency. A portfolio approach can also provide substantial other benefits—reduced risk, greater scalability, workforce flexibility, and access to deeper and broader infrastructure, talent pools, and capabilities.

Getting the retained organization right
With the focus on implementing GBS successfully, many companies underestimate the level of effort required to get the retained organization right—and the extent to which failure to do so may diminish the value of the shared services program. Read this article to help guide investments in the design and operation of the retained organization.

Next-generation GBS capabilities: Capturing the full value

10 ways to get more from your service delivery organization
Think of the value your business could gain if support service quality was consistently high, costs were under control, and the whole thing ran so smoothly that everyone was satisfied with the service they received. This article offers a sample of compelling, concrete ideas for moving closer to achieving all of these goals.

Developing a financial planning and analysis capability in your GBS
Read this article if you’re considering moving to a centralized financial planning and analysis (FP&A) function. The article details significant benefits, addresses concerns, and describes successes from a variety of organizations.

Sharing internal expertise
In much the same way companies use GBS to deliver administrative services, business advisory services can be delivered successfully in a shared services model. Read about the value of building a consolidated, global organization of skilled professionals with the specialized competencies, knowledge, and experience to make strategic business recommendations.

Where will GBS go next?
Deciding where to locate a global service delivery organization? Location decisions today are driven by more than labor-cost arbitrage, but also by critical operating factors, risk appetites, and corporate growth strategies coming into play. This article can help your organization sort through the world of options and frame the thinking on where GBS could go next.

Show me the money—business process robotic autonomics
Autonomics presents the potential for technology to replace humans for transactional work. This can have multiple benefits—decoupling of business growth from labor requirements and freeing human resources to focus on more innovative, value-added work. The question is, is it real or hype?

GBS as a business within a business: Instilling a commercial mindset

Using outsourcers’ secrets to achieve commercial competence
If you want your GBS to match outsourcers at their own game, the first and possibly hardest step is to change the mental model. Instead of viewing the GBS as a cost center, look at it as a value center with efficiencies and cost savings equivalent to revenue. In effect, a GBS’s “value motive” can be just as profitable as the commercial outsourcer’s revenue motive.

The price is right—or is it?
Even for organizations with significant GBS experience, pricing remains one of the most difficult questions: What is the most effective way to price or charge back for services? We asked GBS directors and managers to share their approaches and opinions. Here’s what we learned.

Understanding total cost of ownership
Total cost of ownership (TCO) shows the real and complete cost of delivering services across a global organization. Read this article for an overview on how to perform a thorough, methodical TCO assessment, the crucial first step in the broader transformation effort.

The myth that could be costing you big
Many GBS users are accustomed to working with external vendors who don’t judge their objectives and generally deliver exactly what was asked for. Some may think a GBS is basically the same as an outsourced service provider, just one that happens to live within the company’s four walls. But there are good reasons to hold a GBS to a different standard.

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