Shared services: a licence to print money

The shared services projects that the NAO is tracking sound like the usual expensive mix of systems integrator, software vendor, and management consultants (National Audit Office criticises shared services arrangements). They all make sure there’s just enough failure and expense to justify canning the programme and starting again, making the same mistakes!

For true collaboration to work, you need simplified systems that support the people, and how they want to work. Don’t force them all to use the same screens, which don’t fit real-world processes, and which then cause spreadsheets to proliferate.

Technology should be a simple enabler. ERP? BPM? SCM? CRM? Since when has an acronym enabled anything?

Darren Woods