What stays behind also need to change

Do you or your company move to a shared service center? Did you company invest a lot in the change process to help the SSC understand the company?

I noted that in most outsource or off shore projects there is only little attention of what is left behind. There is an urgent need to understand that also the retained organization needs to change to enable an efficient and effective shared service center. The people that stay behind in the retained organization are the people that are used to execute and do the transactions themselves.

However when these activities have been moved to a third party that has less experience and business know-how there is a need to monitor their activities. This means that the retained staff needs to change their modus operandus into a ‘monitor’ in stead of being an ‘executor’. This is commonly underestimated and leads to a lot inefficiencies but also leads to a lot of mistakes.

In all transfers of the Financial SSC’s I noted a raise of the receivables overdues and increase of the overdue payables. This is not solely caused by the relative unexperienced SSC staff. This is also because nobody is monitoring the SSC actvities content wise. Remember therefore that there needs to be also a change program and restructuring for the retained organization. Monitoring requires a different skillset with analytical skills. These skills need to be taught to the existing staff or you need to replace them with people that already have these skills.

We all know that when you see people make mistakes in an area where you are knowledgeable that you immediately take over and correct the mistake yourself. My advice is not to go this way, because the SSC staff will never learn from their mistakes and will never reach their maturity. In order to avoid this development please do not forget to change the retained organization. It will help you to get the best out of your SSC including your savings.

Etienne Herlaar

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