Best practices in Shared Services Centers

Shared Services Centers - Define reasonable guarantees of compliance, confidentiality and availability

Article

ADP’s CSO in Europe Philippe de Araujo discusses Shared Services Centers in defining reasonable guarantees of compliance, confidentiality and availability.

Setting up a Shared Services Center (SSC) means rethinking the ways individual exchange information. These flows of information must be made secure so that the service expected by clients and users is reliable.

Whether internal or external, a Shared Services Center involves a change in the way individuals relate to administrative departments. The Shared Services Center transforms a one-on-one relationship into a many-to-many relationship.

A Shared Services Center activity relies on its information system. Therefore, it must be well protected by backup systems, access control, etc to guarantee maximum availability.

Shared Services Centers become often international, especially within major groups, as geographically scattered teams become consolidated. For cost-savings purposes, these Shared Services Centers may be partly or completely situated in emerging countries.

Process modeling ensures that the results obtained and the quality of service provided by the Shared Service Centers, whether internal or external, will be in line with the commitments made to the client.

In order to check compliance with Shared Services Center’s processes and possibly to audit them, it is vital to ensure traceability.

It all comes back to the Shared Services Center’s job of fulfilling its commitments to its clients in terms of service and quality.