Long-term collaboration, not costs savings, is the most important part of successful shared services partnerships, claim leading public sector IT professionals.
Speaking at a BT-sponsored roundtable event in London, heads from local government partnerships discussed the benefits of sharing ICT, HR and other business services.
Because of the deficits many councils face, they're looking to be more efficient and effective, said Andrew Bacon, strategic director of BT's local government department. Shared services can offer efficiencies of per cent and cost savings of five to seven per cent a year, Bacon said, which is why they model has been so successful.
Liverpool Direct Limited (LDL), for example, is a joint-venture partnership, 80 per cent owned by BT and 20 per cent owned by the Liverpool City Council. As a company, it offers services to businesses inside the council's usual remit, such as providing ICT to 200 schools, but also to outside SMEs, from the local convention centre to the Amateur Boxing Association (ABA). Its contact centre handles three million calls a year for its various clients.
LDL offers savings on ICT, HR and other business services through economies of scale. For example, it buys PCs by the tens of thousands, so it's can supply the 20 computers the ABA needs, for example, at a low unit cost, LDL chief executive David McElhinney said.
"Sometimes its not lowest cost, but it is better quality," he said. "And our added value is quite significant." While a local SME or charity might not bother to invest in a back-up database, data centre or high-level anti-virus, it's all part of the shared services package, so costs little or nothing for LDL to supply.
Bridget Taylor, the chief executive of Suffolk's Customer Service Direct (CSD), a similar joint venture with BT, said that using shared services to flexibly manage demand for local services is more important than creating efficiencies. "These partnerships aren't just focused on saving money," she said. "They are designed to deliver a more diverse range of services which meet the long-term needs of our customers and their communities."
