Multi-function Shared Services: Insights from an Accenture Research Study

In the continuous quest for sustainable advantage,
high performance businesses and governments
are turning increasingly to multi-function shared
services operations. Like the single-function model,
a multi-function organization delivers cost savings,
but it also delivers additional unique and strategic
benefits, Accenture research indicates.

In eliminating redundancies across major functions, multi-function shared services further improves service delivery, drives higher productivity and accelerates innovation and transformation beyond the single function shared services solution. By providing a variety of supporting activities, the multi-function shared services organization moves even closer to the heart of the enterprise. As a model for cross enterprise collaboration and process excellence, it becomes an indispensable strategic partner and a critical enabler of higher performance. The benefits of shared services to date often have been limited by its scope. Many organizations implement shared services solutions within a single function - finance or human resources (HR), for example. Others apply shared services across multiple functions but not in an integrated fashion.

A third group, however, executes true integrated, multi-function shared services solutions. While challenging to achieve, multi-function shared services delivers more benefits than organizations thought possible when they started their journeys, according to our research. Accenture surveyed senior executives in a wide range of industries and government organizations around the world, supplementing their responses with interviews with executives leading multifunction shared services operations.

Accenture define multi-function shared services as two or more major functions such as order management,  customer service, finance, HR, supply chain or IT, combined in a single shared services solution. These functions may be located in the same facility, though not always. A multi-function shared services solution is  characterized by a common leader, budget, service management approach, chargeback model, recruitment and training program, management processes (such as continuous improvement and customer relationship  management), and enabling technologies, such as contact management, imaging and workflow.

 

Abbildung: Single versus multi-functional Shared Services Organizations

Why the interest in a concept that has been around for 20 years?

Perhaps because executives are searching for the next generation of improvements that can be leveraged from the shared services model. The relatively easy changes already have been made. The single-function shared services model is a proven way to reduce costs and improve quality and service. But by extending the model to support multiple functions, organizations can magnify these benefits with strategic gains and additional business benefits. Indeed, 64 percent of the survey respondents not currently running a multi-function operation are considering it.

Shared services executives are seeing the difference between simply centralizing disparate back-office  functions and what one respondent now calls "shared services within shared services." By this he means

a single set of service management processes supporting a variety of functions, such as finance, human resources, supply chain and information technology (IT). These shared processes can include continuous improvement, service management, customer relationship management (CRM), communications, training and IT support.  

Download this complimentary research study on HR Shared Services from Accenture here.