1. Projecting the identity of the SSC and Branding Justin Borradaile
CIMA Loughborough Shared Services Forum
17th October 2012

2. Content Why is having an SSC identity important?
The dimensions of an SSC brand
How do you develop your SSC Brand?

3. Why is having an SSC identity important?
Shared Services are changing rapidly in terms of the services and value delivered – Maintaining an identity is more important than ever
Build loyalty - Internal and External  
Develop and represent distinct values
Provide leverage for change 
Attract the right people
Reference Satish’s presentation – historical context - How SSCs deliver services and value has changed significantly over time.
Therefore, to remain relevant, it is important for an SSC to maintain its identity when dealing with customers.
Need both an internal and external identity…
Internal
Your internal organisation needs to foster a culture of service delivery and a “selling” mindset.
If this culture is not developed, existing issues will be inherited, no better off than before etc
External
Your customers need to understand and buy into other value creating aspects of your SSC.
If they don’t, shadow organisations will emerge – value leakage, no loyalty/reputation, hard to develop SSC etc
Prevent Value leakage
A common method of representing and projecting an identity is branding...

4. Dimensions of a Shared Service Centre Brand
Leadership
Business acumen, vision and integrity of leadership
People
Knowledge, experience, dedication and helpfulness of staff
Value
Cost, price transparency and value delivered
Quality
Consistency, timeliness, reliability, responsiveness, completeness and accuracy of services
Relevance
Business impact across service portfolio
Insight
Creativity, innovation and relentless pursuit of transformation

5. SSC Brand development – Practical Actions
Identify and celebrate
success
Keep yourself
current and relevant
iii
Developing
your brand
Champion customer
relationships
Drive your added value

6. SSC Brand development: Keep yourself current and relevant
Continually revisit your model
Are you in tune with what customers want?
iii
Developing
your brand
Having the
right people
Revisit your
model
Solve the
customer’s
next problem 1 2 3
Solve the customer’s next problem
What is their business going to look like and need from you in the next year?
Having the right people
Do you have the right skill sets to meet the current (and future) business needs?
Revisit model
First, get back to basics. In looking at your service delivery model, consider what’s closest to your internal customers and what most influences their perception. Are you in tune with what they want? In response, make sure customer relationship management is a key part of your model (will come onto this later)
Solve the customer's next problem
Don’t spend too much time looking backwards. Customers need confidence that you’re in control, that you know why a key performance indicator turned red and that you’re resolving the problem etc- but that shouldn’t take majority of meeting time. Talk about what’s happening that customers should know about? What down-the-road
changes are being contemplated and why? How can you and your customers collaborate to better predict and
manage service demand? What should you be thinking about or doing differently to better meet your customers’
needs? What is their business going to look like next quarter or in a year or two? How can you keep yourself current given your customers’ business needs.
Having right people. Assessing your leadership team as the SSC matures. Do you have mechanisms to support role rotations in the SSC and the business units? Do you have the right job profiles /skillsets to keep your SSC current?
Always be on the lookout for fresh ideas, new talent and skills – and not just at times of attrition. As part of your customer engagement model, consider partnering with your business unit leaders to identify high-potential personnel.

7. SSC Brand development: Drive your added value
Reposition services
Are you viewed as solely a transactional processor or can you move into higher value activities?
Developing
your brand
Be a knowledge
centre 4 5 6
Think laterally
Be a knowledge centre
Are your service level scorecards relevant?
How is the SSC helping the wider business deliver against its key metrics?
Reposition
services
Re-engage
stakeholders
Reposition services
It’s hard to be relevant to customer executives if you’re viewed only as a transactional processor.
To be truly relevant, you should extend the service line to specialized services egs…
Start small, gaining credibility takes time. Use pilots with “friendly” customers, and begin by taking over high quality
processes and staff.
Confirm that your SSC team is thinking about transactional work in the same way as your
customers. Eg in AP your customers aren’t interested in how many invoices you entered in a given day. They’re interested in managing cash flow and supplier risk and using AP data to improve sourcing decisions. Get thinking in this way to increase your relevance to customers
Be a knowledge centre
Part of increasing relevance is reporting relevance. Many SSCs develop service-level scorecards
that focus on volumes, productivity, accuracy, and time lines, but, again, customers are usually more interested
in broader business outcomes.
Develop dashboards that answer the right questions and can drill down from summarised to
detailed information for depending on the audience.
Think laterally
Act as a knowledge manager - Eg if O2C team learns of someone in a customer organisation who developed
a reliable way to predict sales and manage promotional spending by modelling consumer behaviour. Identify what
analytical tools or third-party relationships are being used, document that practice, make that person a champion,
and share the solution so other order-to-cash teams throughout your customer organisations can get involved
in the process.
Think laterally
Identify best of breed practice and share them across the organisation – Be a driver for change
Reposition services
to become relevant

8. SSC Brand development: Champion customer relationships
Developing
your brand
Relationship
managers
Manage the noise
Re-engage
stakeholders 7 8 9
Continually re-engage stakeholders
Are your stakeholders sufficiently involved in the “SSC conversation”?
Manage the noise
Do you know what your customers think of your SSC? – Do you respond to feedback?
Reposition
services
Relationship managers
Do you have named single points of contact points of contact for each “customer”?
Re-engage
stakeholders
Re-engage stakeholders
Most SSC leaders talk about “partnering” with their customers but many don’t know how.
Involve your stakeholders in the SSC conversation. Solicit customer input in setting and prioritising investments. Use customer managers as champions when launching new SSC initiatives. Include customers in continuous
improvement programs. Communicate what’s going on at the SSC to all levels of your customer organizations.
Invest in the relationships, demonstrating interest and insight at every opportunity.
Manage the noise.
Are you still spending sufficient thought on change management? Your SSC will have both champions and detractors. Find out who’s working against you, and why. Is it change resistance leftover from the early days? A new issue with performance? Get this information through face-to-face conversations, customer surveys, the grapevine, or whatever other means available. You must know your customers, what they like and dislike, who the decision-makers are, who has influence, and what’s important to them.
Relationship managers
SSCs increasingly are appointing service delivery managers. These relationship managers are typically dedicated to the needs of one or more customers, or they serve as the single point of contact for an end-to-end process, such as p2p. They oversee the customer experience and serve as the primary point of accountability for customer satisfaction. Important to build room in your budget for service delivery managers to periodically meet face-to-face with customers.
Think laterally

9. SSC Brand development: Identify and celebrate success
Re-engage
stakeholders
Seek &
Celebrate
success 10
Developing
your brand
Celebrate success
Ensure the wider organisation is aware of the good work that you do – introduce a customer nomination award programme
External awards are a good way to promote yourself internally
Solve the customer’s
next problem
A number of industry organisations routinely evaluate and publicise successful SSC organizations.
Winning an annual award from a group like this can be a useful way to self-promote your capabilities.
External recognition can improve your internal reputation, sending the message that you’re an award-winning organisation that is always looking for ways to serve customers better.

10. Any Questions?

11. Thank you