Coming soon · Book Profile
Shared Services Value
A practical guide for corporate leaders on how to design, implement, and manage a shared services organization to reduce costs, improve service, and enable business units to focus on strategic growth.
A profile of this book is on the way.
What it’s about
In today's competitive landscape, large corporations are burdened by duplicative and inefficient support processes spread across multiple business units, driving up costs and distracting leaders from their core mission. 'Shared Services' provides a comprehensive blueprint for tackling this problem by consolidating non-strategic activities like finance, HR, and IT into a single, highly efficient internal organization run like a business. Written by leading PricewaterhouseCoopers consultants and the executive who spearheaded this transformation at Lucent Technologies, this book is a step-by-step guide through the entire journey—from assessing feasibility and building the business case to managing the complex implementation, navigating international challenges, and establishing metrics for continuous improvement. It's an essential resource for any leader looking to unlock significant value, create a 'one company' culture, and gain a lasting competitive advantage.
The through-line
- Who it’s for
- A corporate leader (e.g., CEO, CFO, CIO) or business unit executive in a large, complex organization with multiple divisions, who wants to increase shareholder value by improving efficiency and enabling their business units to focus on strategic, customer-facing activities.
- The problem
- Duplicative, costly, and inconsistent support processes (like finance, HR, and IT) are spread across various business units, increasing SG&A expenses and distracting management from core strategic goals. They feel frustrated by the lack of control over rising administrative costs, the inconsistency of service levels across the company, and the inability to focus their teams on what truly matters—serving external customers and driving growth.
- The plan
- Mobilize your effort by understanding the concept, building the compelling business reason, and assessing if shared services is right for you.
- Assess the relationship between shared services, process reengineering, and IT, and consider the alternative of outsourcing.
- Design the shared services organization by planning the approach, selecting a location, creating infrastructure, developing service-level agreements and pricing, and building a final business case.
- Implement the plan through structured project management, effective change management, and the establishment of performance measures for continuous improvement.
- The payoff
- Reduced SG&A costs, improved working capital, and enhanced shareholder value. · Business units are freed from transactional burdens and can fully concentrate on strategic, customer-facing activities that drive growth and competitive advantage. · A cohesive 'one company' culture emerges, with standardized best-practice processes and consistent, high-quality service levels across the entire organization.
See our guide
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Additional reading
- Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary · Merriam-Webster
The book recommends this as the most essential desktop reference for a secretary, covering spelling, meaning, usage, and pronunciation for daily work.
- Roget's Thesaurus · Peter Mark Roget (and subsequent editors)
Cited as a valuable resource for finding synonyms to improve the quality and variety of language used in correspondence.
- Bartlett's Familiar Quotations · John Bartlett (and subsequent editors)
Suggested as a useful tool to have on hand if an employer frequently includes quotations in dictation, to ensure their accuracy.
- Official Airline Guide · Official Airline Guides
Recommended as a key resource for secretaries who frequently make travel arrangements, providing comprehensive flight schedules.
- Hotel and Motel Red Book · American Hotel and Motel Association
Listed as a valuable guide for selecting lodging, as it provides descriptions of hotels and their toll-free reservation numbers.
- U.S. Postal Service Domestic Mail Manual · United States Postal Service
Referenced as the authoritative source for detailed requirements on preparing mail to qualify for presort and other postage discounts.
- A Basic Guide to Exporting · U.S. Department of Commerce
Recommended for small businesses looking to enter international markets, explaining how to begin exporting and locate foreign buyers.
- Shared Services: mining for corporate gold · Barbara Quinn, Robert Cooke, and Andrew Kris
This is the previous book by co-author Andrew Kris, and it is frequently cited and referenced throughout the current book as a foundational text on the topic.
- The Complete Lean Enterprise: Value Stream Mapping for Office and Administrative Processes · Drew Locher and Beau Keyte
The author recommends this book as the definitive resource for Value Stream Mapping, a core tool that is referenced but not covered in detail in this book.
- Lean Thinking · James P. Womack and Daniel T. Jones
Referenced as the source for the four key concepts of Lean: value, flow, pull, and perfection, establishing the philosophical foundation for the book's methods.