Tag: Global In-house Centers

Coronavirus Service Delivery Update | Blog

This is the third in a series of blogs that explores a range of topics related to these issues and will naturally evolve as events unfold and facts reveal themselves. The blogs are in no way intended to provide scientific or health expertise, but rather focus on the implications and options for service delivery organizations.

These insights are based on our ongoing interactions with organizations operating in impacted areas, our expertise in global service delivery, and our previous experience with clients facing challenges from the SARS, MERS, and Zika viruses, as well as other unique risk situations.

Over the past two to three weeks, media focus has shifted away from China, where the growth rate of new infections has slowed markedly. Hubei province remains the epicenter of the disease, but 8 of the 10 provinces that make up that core group of provinces where the disease has been most prevalent, have seen no new cases for several days. Hubei and the coastal province of Zheijang alone among the 10 are reporting new positive cases. There have been no public reports of service delivery interruption from any of the 44 Global In-house Centers (GICs) inside the core group of 10 provinces. Indeed, the last week has seen a steady return to work outside Hubei province.

The new global focus is on a group of high-risk countries including South Korea (Daegu and Cheongdo), Iran and Italy (specifically the whole of the north of the country and not just the provinces of Lombardy and the Veneto), and on a secondary group comprising Japan, Singapore, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and Myanmar.

Data from Everest Group Market Intelligence (EGMI) shows that there are 470 Global Inhouse Centers (GICs) – or shared services centers – and 196 service provider delivery centers located in China and across these additional nine countries. Based on travel advisory and media reporting of regions that are more or less severely impacted, China still has the greatest exposure to delivery risk, with 73 delivery centers in high impact areas, and a further 272 in areas that are likely seeing little or no impact. Italy has 14 service provider delivery centers in the high-risk Northern provinces. South Korea has one or two GICs in Daegu, the city most affected by coronavirus infections. See details by country and sector in the two tables below.

exposure by country

exposure by sector

In view of restrictions imposed by governments, or companies implementing business continuity protocols, or simply out of fear of contracting the virus through proximity to large numbers of people, it is highly likely that most, if not all, of the delivery centers in high impact areas are closed and will remain so until further notice.

Many multinational corporations with offices in China and Hong Kong have imposed either complete travel bans (Amazon, Apple, Citigroup, Credit Suisse, Ford, Goldman Sachs, Google, HSBC, JP Morgan, LG, Salesforce) or have banned non-essential travel (GM, Johnson & Johnson, P&G, PwC, Siemens) to and from mainland China, Italy, Japan, and South Korea. In some cases, cross-border travel has been suspended indefinitely.

The same imposition of a work from home policy for all staff of multinationals in China and Hong Kong, which is beginning to ease, is now the norm for many businesses in Milan, the capital of Lombardy. The cancellation of meetings or conferences involving even modest numbers of international participants is now a daily occurrence.

The outward spread of the disease has also started to impact major service delivery locations, especially India, which comprises 40 percent of the world’s global services delivery capacity. As of March 6, 2020, 30 Covid-19 cases have been confirmed in the country. Initially, only passengers from high-risk countries were being checked at airports, but the government has implemented universal screening for all passengers flying into the country. Multiple companies such as Cognizant, PayTM, Wipro, and KPMG have temporarily closed select offices in Delhi NCR and Hyderabad and stepped up their employee safety efforts. In addition to encouraging the remote working model, these efforts include disinfecting and sanitizing office spaces, putting hand sanitizers at entry and exit points, discouraging staff from conducting physical meetings, restricting the entry of outsiders in office premises and distributing N95 masks amongst employees.

We continue to monitor these locations.

Visit our COVID-19 resource center to access all our COVD-19 related insights.

Top Concerns in Talent Management for Shared Services: Lessons to Future-Proof Your Workforce | Webinar

60-minute webinar held on Tuesday, February 4, 2020 | 9 a.m. CST, 10 a.m. EST, 3 p.m. GMT, 8:30 p.m. IST

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Changing expectations for how Global Business Centers deliver value and innovation, combined with the increasing adoption of intelligent automation technologies, are dramatically impacting the talent equation across shared services and outsourcing activities.

To address these challenges, this session will provide you with actionable insights on related topics, including:

  • Workforce planning for the future
  • Talent scarcity challenges and options
  • Getting more from the existing workforce

We will answer the following questions:

  • Why and how are talent needs evolving?
  • What are the options to address future talent needs?
  • How do you balance the talent demand-supply dynamics?
  • What are best-in-class organizations doing to cultivate a future-ready workforce?

Who should attend and why?
This webinar will provide leaders of Shared Services, Global In-house, and Global Business Centers with critical insight around current vs. future talent needs, how best to navigate shortages in skilled talent, and key takeaways from best-in-class talent management practices.

Can’t join us live? Register anyway!
All registrants will receive an email (typically within 1-2 business days of the live delivery) containing the link to session slides and on-demand playback. In addition, we’ll also provide details on how to take advantage of a special offer to be made during the live delivery.

Presenters
Eric Simonson
Managing Partner
Everest Group

Rohitashwa Aggarwal
Practice Director
Everest Group

Why Pharma Companies View their Indian Shared Services Centers as Growth Partners |Blog

India is clearly becoming the “it” destination for pharmaceutical companies’ shared services centers (SSC) – or Global In-House Center (GIC) – organizations. Why do we say this? Because global pharmas with headquarters in the U.S. and Europe employ more than 11,000 FTEs employees in their India-based shared services centers to deliver not only table stakes transactional finance and HR services but also highly complex processes across all stages of drug development, including drug R&D and clinical trials.

What’s India’s appeal? There are four factors.

Established/Mature Location for Global Pharma Services Delivery

India is a time-tested, proven GIC destination for a wide range of industries. Many of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies started delivering their global services support operations from India back in early 1990s. Now, pharma majors like AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, and Novartis are delivering complex, judgment-intensive services such as product R&D, biostatistics, and clinical trials site management from their India GICs. Hyderabad, Chennai, and Bangalore are the preferred locations, housing more than 80 percent of the pharmaceutical GIC talent.

Skilled Talent Pool

Talent availability, at scale, is one of India’s strongest value propositions. In recent years, many pharma companies have been able to successfully scale their delivery teams supporting diverse functions such as R&D, commercials, IT, and finance. For example, a leading pharma GIC houses 2,000+ resources providing IT services for various pharma functions. And multiple other pharma SSCs have scaled teams (400+ resources) that support R&D services, and dedicated resource groups comprised of doctors, PhDs, and biostatisticians, for complex drug R&D processes like development of computational solutions for analyzing clinical trials.

Opportunities for Cross-functional Collaboration

India’s availability of diverse talent profiles at scale allows India-based pharma SSCs to support multiple functions. And because many of them house IT resources with R&D and commercial business teams, they have multiple opportunities to collaborate on and insource IT work for drug R&D (e.g., to build IT platforms for drug development and IT services for lab support), and commercial operations (e.g., IT services for finance.) The value of this collaboration? Tighter integration of functions, better understanding of business requirements, and faster execution.

Mature Market for Digital Services Delivery

Leading India-based pharma GICs are working on digital initiatives including analytics and automation, and some are serving as global automation CoEs for their parent enterprises. Many are developing analytical tools for marketing & sales operations, competitive intelligence, and incentive planning. They are also investing heavily in automating less complex and high-volume transactional processes such as expense management, purchase order creation, offer letter generation, résumé screening, and management reporting, and deploying RPA bots to read files, extract data, and report adverse events. As part of the broader digital agenda, some centers have also started exploring the uses of artificial intelligence/machine learning to recruit patients and select sites for clinical trials, and for channel sequencing and optimization in their enterprise’s sales & marketing function.

Going forward, pharma companies not only expect their India SSCs to grow in scale and expand the scope of their process delivery, but also play a significant role in their digital transformation journeys by leading initiatives across all stages of the product R&D lifecycle. To satisfy these expectations, the GICs need to build deep domain capabilities and acquire or train talent to deliver increasingly complex, higher up the value chain services and next-generation digital initiatives.

To learn more about why pharma companies consider India their preferred service delivery destination, please read our recently published report, “Healthcare and Life Sciences – GICs in India Fast-tracking Enterprises’ Digital Agenda,” or connect directly with the report authors Anish Agarwal, Bharath M, and Rajeshwaran Pagalam.

Global In-House Centers (GICs) Play Critical Role In Enterprise Digital Adoption, Innovation | Press Release

Insourcing of IT services has grown from 20% in 2010 to 28% in 2018—Everest Group

Enterprises are increasingly leveraging global in-house centers (GICs), often called Shared Services, as strategic partners that play a central role in digital transformation and innovation initiatives. According to Everest Group, GICs are playing a critical role in helping enterprises adopt new digital technologies such as advanced analytics, machine learning, robotic process automation, blockchain, IoT and artificial intelligence.

“As GICs continue to evolve and deliver value beyond arbitrage, their role is becoming a more involved and critical one in supporting their enterprises’ innovation agenda and sustained competitiveness,” said Rohitashwa Aggarwal, practice director, Global Sourcing, at Everest Group. “Most mature GICs have evolved to drive impact through high-value capabilities, operating as an integral team with core business teams, building the next-gen talent pool, and leveraging ecosystem partnerships to capitalize on digital opportunities.”

While enterprises continue to predominantly rely on service providers for IT services delivery, they have started leveraging the GIC model, which is consistently driving the share of GICs in the overall sourcing mix for IT services. Insourcing has experienced constant growth, with the share of GICs in overall IT services delivery for global organizations increasing from 20% in 2010 to 28% in 2018.

The GIC segment accounted for 26% of the global offshore services market (estimated at US$196 billion in 2018). The GIC market has now grown to reach more than 3,100 centers and more than 1.4 million FTEs across leading offshore and nearshore locations.

The GIC market saw a 20% year-on-year increase in 2018 in the number of new GIC setups, driven by new setups from the manufacturing; healthcare and life sciences; retail and consumer product goods (CPG); and banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) sectors.

The research supporting these findings is summarized in “Global In-house Center (GIC) Annual Report 2019: Enterprises Insourcing IT Services to Their GICs,” a report recently published by Everest Group. This report provides a deep dive into the GIC landscape, year-on-year analysis, and the GIC trends in 2018, comparing them with trends in last two years. The research also brings out key insights related to the GIC market across locations, verticals and functions and concludes with an assessment of the increasing insourcing of IT services delivery in GICs.

More GIC Landscape Trends:

  • Europe-headquartered firms are setting up GIC centers in Central and Eastern Europe given proximity and language-skills requirements, while US-based companies are more inclined to leverage India due to the availability of large-scale talent for English language delivery.
  • A majority of GICs focus on a single function (such as operations, IT or voice-based business process services), but many have multi-functional capabilities.
  • Technology and communications firms lead GIC activity in terms of the number of centers (37%), but the BFSI vertical has the highest share of FTEs employed by GICs (36%).
  • GIC setups by small companies have increased on the back of higher demand for R&D and innovation. In 2018, small companies’ GIC setups increased by 65% over 2017.
  • While business process/operations continue to be the dominant function served by GICs, R&D GICs have gained traction during the last couple of years to help develop digital products and services such as machine learning, artificial intelligence, IoT, mobility, analytics, cloud and cybersecurity.

***Download a complimentary abstract of the report here.***

About Everest Group
Everest Group is a consulting and research firm focused on strategic IT, business services, engineering services and sourcing. We are trusted advisors to senior executives of leading enterprises, providers, and investors. Our firm helps clients improve operational and financial performance through a hands-on process that supports them in making well-informed decisions that deliver high-impact results and achieve sustained value. Our insight and guidance empowers clients to improve organizational efficiency, effectiveness, agility and responsiveness. What sets Everest Group apart is the integration of deep sourcing knowledge, problem-solving skills and original research. Details and in-depth content are available at http://www.evererstgrp.com.

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Is Your Shared Services Center / GIC Driving the Digital Agenda? | Webinar

Complimentary 60-minute webinar held on Tuesday, October 16, 2018 | 9 a.m. CDT, 10 a.m. EDT, 3 p.m. BST, 7:30 p.m. IST

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Questions we’ll address:

  • For what kinds of digital initiatives are enterprises leveraging the shared services / GIC model?
  • How are shared services / Global In-house Centers (GICs), and corporate digital teams working together?
  • What supporting programs should you implement to develop and retain top digital talent?
  • How much are organizations investing in digital initiatives, and are they satisfied with their investments?

Businesses around the globe are exploring and adopting digital services at a record pace, driven by changing consumer demands, emerging disruptive technologies, evolving regulations, and increasing cost/margin pressures. Many organizations are finding that their shared services centers / GICs are ideally positioned to orchestrate their digital services management and development, enabling tight integration between the delivery center(s) and the core business while also ensuring optimal growth.

Who should attend, and why?
This webinar will offer real-world insights into how organizations can effectively leverage their delivery centers for digital enablement.

The content is geared to senior enterprise executives – CIOs, CTOs, Chief Digital Officers, Heads of the Global In-house Center (GIC) / Shared Services Center (SSC) / Global Business Service (GBS), Senior Strategy Executives, and Global Sourcing Managers.

Presenters
Michel Jannsen
Chief Research Guru
Everest Group

Rohitashwa Aggarwal
Practice Director
Everest Group

Parul Jain
Senior Analyst
Everest Group

Moderator
Alan Wolfe
Senior Vice President
Everest Group

Talent Management in Global In-house Centers: Are You Future-Ready? | Sherpas in Blue Shirts

There’s no question that digital technological advancements, evolving business requirements such as changing consumer needs and faster time to market, and a heightened focus on customer experience are significantly changing the profile of skills needed to deliver services. As most global in-house centers (GIC) are already facing challenges in hiring people with the right skills for the future, it is concerning that their talent-related preparation for such a tectonic shift is lacking.

Talent Management GIC_1

Here are four talent management imperatives for GICs to develop the workforce of the future.

1. Identification of Skills Gap

As automation and other technological advancements kick in, human skills, such as innovation, design thinking, problem solving, empathy, and ethical thinking will become more critical. Identification of skills gap will be pivotal for GICs’ talent acquisition and development strategy. A recent Everest Group study of 80+ GICs across India, Philippines, and Poland identified multiple, and difficult to hire, skills that are likely to become more important in the future.

Talent Management GIC_2

2. Upskill/Reskill Current Workforce

Firms’ talent challenges will intensify with the automation of transactional services. They will face the dual risks of a large existing workforce with many skills that are likely to become redundant, while struggling to find talent with the right skills for their future needs. Upskilling/reskilling existing talent is an important lever for GICs to address these challenges while preserving their trained workforce with string domain/industry know-how. (See our detailed report on upskilling/reskilling in GICs for additional perspectives.)

3. Evolve Talent Acquisition and Development Strategy

As GICs look to develop a future-proof talent strategy, they will need to think outside the box to tap into alternative sources of talent. Opportunities include hackathons, hiring from startups and other industries, project-based partnerships with specialist agencies, and flexible resourcing. From an L&D perspective, traditional classroom model needs to evolve as learning is becoming more real-time, customized, and digitized, e.g., MOOCs, simulation, and gamification.

4. Agile Human Capital Planning

With a dramatic decline in skills’ half-life, particularly in the technical space, GICs need to identify and focus on skills that are more likely to be critical for their growth. A more frequent approach to human capital planning might be essential to account for rapid changes in these skills.

While many GICs are still taking a wait and watch approach to the talent management issue, some have already embarked on this transformational journey. And those that are proactively addressing it are reaping big rewards.

Watch this space for more insights and success stories. And if you’d like to share your challenges, successes, or questions with us, please feel free to write us at [email protected] or [email protected].

Six RPA Implementation Pitfalls GICs Must Avoid | Sherpas in Blue Shirts

Enterprises are increasingly leveraging their Global In-house Centers (GICs) to drive automation efforts across the globe. Per recent interactions with over 100 enterprises, GICs, and technology vendors to develop our new report, “RPA Implementation in GICs – Learnings and Best Practices,” we determined that more than 50 percent of enterprises are already driving or plan to drive their global RPA initiatives from Centers of Excellence in offshore/nearshore GICs.

While GICs are well positioned to drive RPA, the extent of success varies and the journey is not easy. To succeed, GICs need to avoid the following six pitfalls, and follow the lead of best-in-class GIC adopters of RPA.

Driving RPA without Enterprise Support

Successful RPA initiatives are a result of strong collaboration between enterprise and GIC leadership. Best-in-class GICs involve enterprise leadership from the beginning of their RPA journey.

Driving RPA in Functional Silos

Successful RPA initiatives involve stakeholders from relevant functions – e.g., IT, operations, risk, and legal – not just the operations team (recipients of automation solutions.) RPA initiatives in some organizations reside under the strategy and innovation function, rather than being led by IT or operations.

Driving RPA in a Decentralized Manner

Through centralized efforts, GICs are able to document and share knowledge across the enterprise, thereby, reducing cost, effort, and time to implementation.

Relying Excessively on Third-Party Vendors

Best-in-class adopters have a strong emphasis on developing in-house capabilities, for example, product development / customizing RPA solutions to suit process requirements.

Selecting Complex Processes at the Start

Successful GICs have avoided the temptation to automate high complexity processes or explore end-to-end automation, and instead have focused on transactional/repetitive/rule-based processes that are easier to implement.

Viewing RPA as a Silver Bullet

Successful GICs view RPA as one of the tools to improve operations by way of error reduction, productivity enhancement, and SLA compliance improvement. Process standardization and reengineering both play key roles in driving the effectiveness of RPA solutions.

Best-in-class GICs have evolved from execution to enabling business units across multiple locations to implement RPA solutions independently. To learn more about the best practices employed by mature GIC adopters of RPA, read our report, “RPA Implementation in GICs – Learnings and Best Practices.” And if you are driving RPA from your GIC, we’d love to hear your story. Feel free to share your opinions and stories on how your GIC is evolving in its RPA journey with [email protected] or [email protected].

Also, keep a lookout for our upcoming report on Enterprise RPA adoption, which leverages our robust Pinnacle Model™ methodology to compare enterprise performance on RPA adoption.

Finally, we’re in the process of conducting a first-of-its-kind survey, the results of which will reveal the state of digital adoption and what separates Pinnacle GICs™ from others. We invite you to join your peers and participate in this survey, today!

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Please let us know how we can help you on your journey.

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