Shared Services, in theory, epitomise what governments should be: one body acting in a unified direction, with common objectives, goals and requirements. As an outcome, citizens and other external stakeholders can engage government as a single entity. Via Shared Services, all the related government entities can operate on common platforms, thus delivering consistent offerings and services to citizens.
Why should it be considered?
A Shared Services model nominates an existing or new internal agency to become the service provider for other agencies. This lead agency then implements the sharing strategy on behalf of all agencies.
The potential advantages of a unified infrastructure are:
- Better security via a common security platform, which could mean common security policies that are faster to react to and easier to control
- Easier support and upgrades when using common applications
- Cheaper procurement and easier management of refresh cycles when using matching servers and other hardware
- Efficient procurement process and lower costs due to volume purchases as well as unified strategy
- Quicker and more focused implementation because of common goals: 10 people working on one project is more efficient than 10 people divided among 5 projects
- Increased career and job prospects flourish because the unified pool of resources creates new opportunities for professional development
- Consistent citizen experience via a unified platform that ensures a “single window” of engagement
Situational Overview
Today, many agencies operate as stand-alone entities. Some countries have well over 150 different divisions with as many IT departments. CIO’s run a complex array of different systems. The Canadian government, for instance, has over 100 email formats, over 300 data centres, and over 3,000 “overlapping” electronic networks.
Often, department heads have been selected because of their ability to manage autonomous organisations and develop independent strategy. One of the essential characteristics of leaders in a shared services environment is to collaborate and manage co-dependency, which by nature is the opposite of purely autonomous thinking.
This allows each entity to understand what are the on-the-ground requirements, create a strategic road-map, and implement based on available resources.
Challenges
As there are good reasons to adopt and consider the Shared Services model, there are also many possible pitfalls and issues. Many governments who have tried adopting the Shared Services model end up in failure. Western Australia, for example, ended the pursuit of Shared Services in the middle of 2011 after spending almost US$500 million since 2003 on them. Queensland, Australia, did the same, after a health care payroll failure.
Many of the common challenges are listed below:
- Compromise is required as this model leads to the critical need to rely on another party to get an agency’s work done: something the agency may not be used to
- Trust is another issue: questions will centre on if the service level is fair, and if there is going to be consistent value to each of the contributing agencies
- Integration cost is a consistently overlooked danger; the case of Western Australia combining 11 HR systems into one is a huge undertaking in resources and monetary costs
- Loss of Strategic Capacity is rarely addressed but a real concern; after all how can one progress if the ability to do so is taken away?
- Stifling of Innovation is a common issue raised as the reduced manpower and loss of skills may prove detrimental to future
- Opposition to Sharing perhaps is ingrained in each of us—the fact that if money were no object, would shared services still be considered?
- Political Clout is something else that needs to be addressed because there might be questions about whoever is yielding the control and on their motivating factors.
Shared Services Checklist
While shared services can be the ideal, there are precautions and strategic planning that need to be put in place before embarking on the ambitious (but rewarding) journey:
- Determining the right leader ensures a fair representation of the various agency needs. Just like any elected public official, the leader is the glue that holds this puzzle together. Understanding and acting on requirements is essential.
- Realising value from the ground-up is a must. Understanding the benefits of lower costing, standardisation, and efficiencies must be derived from the agencies, and not simply driven down from a higher power (i.e. Ministry of Finance). History shows that forcing action from the top rarely ends up working for very long. In short, buy-in has to be established ahead of time.
- Empowering the agency leads is crucial to ensuring that everyone has a say on the direction and outcome. A shared services model may function as one, but must let everyone do their own job to meet their respective KPI’s. KPI’s should be adjusted to promote collaboration and collective responsibility.
- A chargeback model is essential to ensure accountability and assess consumption. In the instance of two comparably sized agencies, this ensures the pay-for-what-you-use model instills fairness because an education agency, for example, with 1,000 users may not use up as many resources as a defense agency with 1,000 users, regardless of budget.
- Location is a key consideration for new members of a shared services agency, as removing some key members may result in losing touch of the actual issues on the ground. Keeping relevant staff at their respective agencies will assure a common goal, with individual viewpoints.
The Road Ahead
There are many advocates for this model, and in many cases it has worked as intended. There are variations of hybrid models where there are mini-implementations of shared services around the world. Some countries pool together their defense strategies and IT roadmaps; some do it by region, or function. This helps mitigate risks and leverages commonalities between related agencies.
By design, shared services are much easier to implement in the private sector. Every corporation has common goals, driven by accountability, costs, efficiencies and processes. A public sector body, on the other hand, may have different objectives and very different functions.
Shared services can potentially be viewed as the human equivalent of cloud computing; it is scalable, flexible, cost-friendly and allows a homogeneous operating environment with individualised segments. The question remains, is Shared Services a risk that has to be taken?
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Rahul Joshi
Quelle/Source: FutureGov, 18.01.2012
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