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Sections work just like pages, except there is a section image (like the one above). You can click on the iMoving transaction-based business functions such as Accounts Payable (AP) and Accounts Receivable (AR) to in-house (captive) or outsourced shared services centers is a straight-forward decision for most organizations. CFOs see the centralization and standardization of key business services as a simple way to reduce costs and increase operational efficiency. However, factors such as the complexity of global operations, the need to support multiple business models, or the need to provide services across disparate technology systems can prevent shared services centers from delivering maximum value to the organization.

Too often, inefficient, rigid processes are quickly moved to shared services centers in order to reduce the cost of providing services. Once in place, however, organizations can find it difficult to introduce innovation or adapt processes to meet changing business requirements. Whether it is due to a lack of expert knowledge in service centers or the strict service terms, processes run by service centers can remain frozen in time, unable to align with strategic objectives or accommodate new growth.

Organizations moving to shared services centers must consider more than costs. They must consider how to keep processes nimble and how to maintain transparency and control as they move to this new model. Organizations should not have to sacrifice efficiency or oversight when they start to separate tasks between low skilled workers in remote centers and high skilled workers in the rest of the organization. Without considering all the elements of a process that provide value to the organization, the organization risks losing the expected productivity gains and can potentially hurt its ability to respond to critical business issues in a timely manner.

Large international conglomerates and those organizations operating in a single national environment alike should start by considering the internal and external drivers. Then, align these drivers with the organizations' short and long term business goals. Consider how the organization will respond to rapidly changing business, fiscal, and regulatory requirements. Think about how technology can enable these business objectives. Organizations running large enterprise systems like SAP are at an advantage, because they already have a powerful and flexible system in place that enables them to bring all of these objectives together and centralize and standardize processes according to their unique local and international business requirements.

This white paper discusses how organizations can leverage their existing investment in SAP to support a comprehensive in-house or outsourced shared services center strategy. It discusses the common process and business challenges organizations face as they move to shared services center models. It references the steps organizations should follow to develop a shared services strategy that will maximize the value to the organization. It discusses how to simplify the process of moving to a shared service center model by leveraging the power and flexibility of SAP systems and how to incorporate Dolphin's Shared Services solution to roll out, support, and monitor best practices for AP and AR processing in that environment. With SAP systems at the heart of a shared services center model, organizations can stay nimble and retain control and transparency over their shared services center so they can quickly adapt to changing business needs without breaking the budget.mage to replace the image. Images should be wide and short, and high definition for large screens.

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