Shared Services & Outsourcing Week Conference

GBS at SSOW

SSON’s Shared Services & Outsourcing Week is your one-stop-shop for global business services content. We’ve compiled 4 days of the very best speakers, sessions, and experiences for you to share with other GBS professionals from around the globe. Register today for your opportunity to be part of the world’s largest and longest running shared services conference.

Featured Sessions

All GBS Sessions

• Professional GBS® Professional Certification

Professional GBS® is a training course that teaches critical Global Business Services (GBS) skills. With the term ‘GBS’ often approached incorrectly, this has led to too many sub-par executions. There is a right way to execute GBS, as witnessed by the incredible success of the model in many of the Fortune 20 companies, including Procter & Gamble, where the term was first invented in the early 2000s. That model has now been encapsulated into five training areas: GBS Foundations, Service Management, Operations Management, Transformation Management and Leadership.

• SSOWomen's Day: Building and Leveraging a Diverse Network: The Key to Success for Women in SSO

Learn how to debunk networking myths, assess the strengths and gaps in your network and harness its power. Identify mentors, role models and influencers that can help advance your career in Shared Services.

• Shared Services 101: The Essentials for a Leading Practice Organization

Unlock the full potential of shared services with our must-have essentials for leading practice organizations. From crafting a clear strategy and compelling business case to implementing with finesse and mastering change management, we'll guide you to success. Stay ahead of the curve and navigate uncertainties with confidence.

- Align shared services with organizational objectives, outlining scope, goals, and expected outcomes
- Justify shared services with a comprehensive case, highlighting benefits and cost savings
- Carefully plan and execute the transition, defining roles and creating a detailed roadmap
- Manage change effectively, gaining stakeholder buy-in and ensuring a smooth transition.

• Designing and Implementing Global Business Services 201

Join us in this comprehensive workshop to delve deep into the intricacies of setting up a Global Business Service. Gain insights into mastering the fundamental concepts, harnessing the power of automation, including robotics, crafting a compelling business case, and rallying your organization behind this transformational endeavor. Specifically, this workshop will empower you to:

- Uncover the essential insights for choosing the right location
- Develop a well-defined roadmap for change, ensuring clarity and a compelling vision for a transformation journey
- Adopt a balanced approach to incorporating automation as part of the setup
- Recognize the critical importance of stabilization, emphasizing it alongside the Go Live

• Frameworks for Designing GBS for Greater End to End Agility

The Global Process Owner (GPO) has hailed as a critical make-it-happen role. In SSON R&A’s recent survey we learned that 96% of leaders are looking or have already adopted end-to-end processes. This client case study will share new strategies for optimizing shared services built specifically for agility and technology adoption. Learn frameworks that allow GBS to pivot quicker than they ever have before.

- Designing end-to-end frameworks with agility in mind

- Enabling process standardization to drive efficiency in execution

- Driving GPO models and governance across your shared services

• Client Case Study: A Fortune 1000 Success Story on How to Transform your GBS

Incorporating GBS into the fabric of business operations has catalyzed the evolution beyond conventional Shared Services models. This pragmatic case study imparts invaluable insights to empower your GBS to propel business and transformational objectives to new heights. Witness the impactful journey of a Fortune 1000 enterprise as it harnesses GBS to:

- Cultivate a global, multifunctional end-to-end approach and deliver seamlessly to your team
- Deliver 24/7 global support to the business
- Drive transformation with an all-encompassing ERP strategy and Intelligent Automation roadmap

• A Global Perspective on How Macro and Geo Pressures are Shaping GBS’s Focus

Get a better understanding of a global perspective while you try to scale your shared service and GBS centers and stay ahead of the curve in facing macro and geopolitical pressures.

- Evaluate areas where the business is investing in
- Identify new locations to drive cost savings
- Assess the roles of technology and BPO providers to meet the future priorities of GBS

• How GBS Impacts Margin, Revenue and Cash

Explore the top drivers for delivering value-based improvements on core business results and hear. How GBS organizations are quantifying the impact.

• GBS Future Locations: Where is the Talent You Need to Hire?

Explore the strategic role of “location” in Shared Services and GBS and hear how to fully leverage global footprint in a hybrid world. Delve into evolving considerations such as cost, quality, risk, and access to new skill sets.

• GBS Boardroom

Sustainability refers to long term viability through economic growth, environmental care and social well-being. Sustainability tackles the question of how do we fulfill the needs of current generations without compromising the needs of future generations? Major organizations around the globe are pursuing sustainability initiatives and publicly sharing their achievements. Can Global Business Services play a role in sustainability? During this session we will discuss:

- What is sustainability?
- What are the major trends in sustainability?
- Are there benefits to GBS, by expanding vision to include sustainability?

• Interactive Discussion Groups (IDGs)

- Championing DEI within your GBS

- Best Practices for Deploying Generative AI Tools in Your SSC

- Getting Started: Launching and Growing a Shared Services Operation

- Key Performance Metrics to Drive Your GBS Strategy

- Driving a Winning Global Process Strategy

- How can GBS Take on ESG (Environmental, Societal and Governance) and Sustainability?

Speaker Spotlight

Testimonials

• “I truly feel like I have access to the most creative and advanced thinking in the world of GBS.”

      - llana Vorster, Executive Director, Strategy & Operations, The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.

• “I am most looking forward to networking with other companies who are taking a similar journey as our GBS Organization as well as understanding how they may have solved the same problems we are facing. What I have learned over time is the value of learning from others who have gone before you and how those lessons learned can accelerate your journey.”

      - Debbie Ballard, Vice President, McDonald’s

• "Being able to connect with and speak to other shared service providers who have given me tons and tons and tons of great advice and information. In particular, I was speaking about a challenge that I had and ten minutes later someone came up to me and said ‘Hey, I’ve got an idea and I know that’s going to work.’ That’s the beauty here, the connecting.”

      - Debbie Lougheed, Senior Director of Shared Services, Diocese of Orlando

• “This year, I have the privilege of attending my first SSOW so I’m pretty excited having become a GBS leader in the middle of Covid, just two years. I was really excited first of all to see people in person, being able to reach out, touch, feel, is very very impactful... The networking I’m able to do with peers who are trying to solve the same business issues is amazing. Great opportunity to do that.”

      - Jamesetta Strickland, Senior VP & Head of GBS, Iron Mountain

Additional GBS Resources

Key Trends & Insights, North American Shared Services & GBS Organizations, 2023

With more than two years of continuous upheaval and change behind them, Shared Services and GBS organizations are having a pivotal moment. They have proven invaluable in maintaining continuous and resilient operations despite [perhaps even because of] an increasingly remote and hybrid workplace – enabled by the acceleration of “everything digital,” the recognition that automation is a game-changing capability, and the adoption and expansion of new service lines. This Visual Analytics Workbook provides some of the most influential trends that will impact your Shared Services operation in the year ahead, and ensures you face the future well-prepared.

Shared Services Powering Data, GBS and Digitization For Global Enterprise Success

Find out how organizations are preparing for the workforce of the future and anticipating labor requirements. This 22 page report will tell you what industry leaders are looking to improve in--terms of:

• Productivity increase

• Implementing intelligent automation solutions

• Scope of expansion for their SSCs What they're looking for from outsourcing providers

• How data-ready their organization is

5 Reasons GBS Adds Value to the Digital Enterprise

The attractiveness of shared service centers today, in part comes from their ability to problem spot and pivot quickly. Never before has that been more apparent or important with the increased digitization of the workplace. GBS has access to the data, leaders, and resources that are able to support shared service centers and bring them to the next level. Read the thirteen page report to find out the top five reasons that GBS can add value to your digital enterprise.