“If our master data is wrong or inconsistent, it can lead to major issues that may not be easily identified or rectified, including errors in reporting. We must have strong controls and governance over all of our master data.” This quote can be attributed to almost any CFO. On a recent Peeriosity webcast, member companies […]
While many companies have realized significant savings when first transitioning to Shared Services, uncovering additional saving opportunities can be a challenge without proper focus. One attribute of many successful Shared Services operations is a well-established continuous improvement program that is ingrained within the culture of the operation. Recently a poll, followed by a webcast featuring […]
Optimization efforts generally have the recipe ingredients of parts technology, process, and organization optimization. One of the ongoing benchmark surveys within Peeriosity allows a company to benchmark the “organization” piece of their back-office structure. Finding the back-office structure “sweet spot,” located somewhere between a highly leveraged cost structure and reliable high-quality service, has always been […]
There are about as many philosophies on this topic as there are shared services organizations! On one end of the spectrum are those that do not charge at all and at the other, others with formalized models that detail monthly charges for all services, including shared services leadership as well as center leadership and all […]
I know what you’re saying; “Freight payments? You’re talking about freight payments?” It’s not anything most of us think about much, but maybe we should give it a little more attention – there may be some gold to be found! Generally, freight payments are managed as a sub-set of the Accounts Payable group and managers […]
Consolidating and standardizing functions and getting global leverage makes sense but is it possible to take on a global T&E program in shared services given all the local country variations? On a recent Peeriosity Webcast within the Corporate Card Research Area, a member company talked about the challenges they faced in implementing a global T&E […]
Most Shared Services, and broader transformation efforts, are usually initiated and have as their main scope, Finance related functions. This is not that surprising as many of these activities are high volume, repetitive in nature, and easily quantified in terms of costs and potential synergies. As these transactional Finance activities deliver on the promised savings, […]
While many organizations have implemented customer portals, many have not realized the full potential of integrating the portal as a part of a wide-ranging Order-to-Cash vision to not only enhance the customer experience but achieve significant cost savings. For years, Shared Services has integrated a large number of activities within the Procure-to-Pay process, but for […]
One of the most important activities of every organization is the timely and accurate reconciliation of general ledger accounts. Early identification of accounting and control issues is critical for any number of reasons, especially for public companies. Most companies have ongoing efforts to continuously improve the reconciliation process with the objectives of pro-active early identification […]
A recent Peeriosity webcast featured an organization that has implemented global business process ownership within its Shared Services organization. Even though the company had successfully completed a single-instance SAP implementation, it found that their global end-to-end processes were fragmented and sub-optimized. The Shared Services organization was given the opportunity to implement a business process structural […]