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In this episode of SSO Next , host Heather King speaks with Turan Sahin, CEO of Allianz Services, about his journey building one of the world's leading Global Business Services (GBS) organizations from the ground up. Reflecting on his seven-year tenure, Sahin shares how he challenged early skepticism around captive shared services by focusing on market-driven performance rather than mandates. By p...

In this episode of SSO Next , hosted by Sally Fletcher, Global Managing Editor at SSON, we continue the conversation on one of today's most pressing leadership topics: AI in the enterprise. This episode turns the spotlight to the C-suite and explores what it truly means to lead in an AI-driven world. Our guest, Ansgar Thiessen, Head of Global Central Operations at Swiss Re Corporate Solutions, dis...

AI is something that is truly transforming global business services, in particular Agentic AI, and there is an incredible amount of discussion around the right and wrong way to use it and implement it within GBS.  Two of the topics we hear the most questions about at SSON are regarding buy vs. build and platform vs. point solutions. There is a lot of information online regarding this topic, but it...

2025 is an era of transformation for Global Business Services. Whether it's operating model transformation, process transformation, or digital transformation, expectations are high. We expect these initiatives to dramatically reduce operating costs, improve cross-functional alignment, and increase customer loyalty.   However, more often than not, these transformations fail - and one of the primary...

This episode is the 3rd in our careers focused series, recorded on-site at Shared Services & Outsourcing Week America, SSON's largest event. The event bought together over 1100 participants, 100 exhibitors and 200 thought leaders. I took the opportunity to interview some of the shared services leaders onsite about their career-paths. In this episode, we are featuring Lorena Espinosa, O2C Value Cre...

This episode is the 2nd in our careers focused series, recorded on-site at Shared Services & Outsourcing Week America, SSON's largest event. The event bought together over 1100 participants, 100 exhibitors and 200 thought leaders. I took the opportunity to interview some of the shared services leaders onsite about their career-paths. In this episode, we are featuring Adam Holmes,  SVP Head of Stra...

L ast month I was lucky enough to go to Shared Services & Outsourcing Week America, SSON's largest event attracting over 1100 participants, 100 exhibitors and 200 thought leaders.  I took the opportunity to interview some of the shared services leaders onsite about their career-paths. Over the next few weeks we will be releasing several episodes profiling shared services professionals with differe...

The shared services model has typically been one of cost-savings, with organizations saving millions of dollars by offshoring work to low-cost locations. However, as the model has become more mature, creating dramatic cost-savings becomes more difficult – as the changes that produce results (such as standardization and centralization) have already been done. At the same time, many organizations ar...

As we head into 2025, the business world is transforming at lightning speed— we're seeing new evolutions in the world of AI almost weekly, there is a huge and much needed focus on sustainability, a push for automation , a nd naturally, there is an incredibly dynamic political and economic environment, all which have an impact on GBS . They say forewarned is forearmed so i n today's episode, we'll...

Did you know that, according to SSON's State of the Industry Report 2024, over half of the SSO/GBS leverage outsourcing? However, the nuanced landscape of outsourcing can make talent management all the more difficult.  So, in this week's episode, we delve into the critical talent management decisions shared services leaders face. We're joined by Brad Killinger, CEO of Sapience Analytics, who discu...

In this week's episode we delve into the future of order to cash and the trends you should be looking out for in the next 12 months. We're joined by Keith Cowart, Global Market Owner, Automated Finance at FIS, who gives his expert advice on improving order-to-cash processes. This includes how to create a consumer-like experience, assessing customer-risk, artificial intelligence, and payments. List...

In this week's episode SSON talks to Wendy Walker, Solution Principal of Tax Information Reporting at Sovos, about IRS Modernization. Wendy unravells the always complicated world of tax and breaks down exactly what the latest IRS Modernization involves, how it will impact data protection and security, and the steps organizations should take to prepare for these changes. In the episode we reference...

This week we're talking to Jonathan Tam, Head of APAC People Services, foodpanda.  Jonathan is an experienced People Leader with more than 20 years in Operations and Project Management. He has supported areas across Customer Service, Information Technology, Banking and Finance, and Human Resource Delivery.  Jonathan will be speaking at SSON's SSOW Philippines event which takes place on August 6-9...

Last month, SSON ran one of their most successful Shared Services & Outsourcing Week Europe's ever! Over 900 shared services and outsourcing professionals joined together in sunny Lisbon to discuss everything from Generative AI to change management to process intelligence.   In order to give you a flavour of the trends discussed, we asked 10 speakers for their top take-away from the conference.   ...

This week we spoke with Karan R Bhatia, Head of GBS Asia Hub, Sanofi Consumer Healthcare. Sanofi recently set up a global business service center in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, which was a great success and able to grow quickly.  In this episode Karan talks us through why Sanofi chose to set up in Malaysia, the challenges they overcame and how Karan's own entrepreneurial spirit has been crucial in bri...

There are hundreds of stories of the benefits and opportunities that lie within AI, but when it comes to practical, real-life use-cases, the list gets smaller very quickly. That's why we were delighted to interview Jannette Perez, AVP Finance, L'Oréal and Nathanael L'Heureux, Chief Solutions Ambassador, Oversight, about L'Oréal's recent AI implementation. In this episode our interviewees break-dow...

This week's episode provides something a bit different, a glimpse into SSON's largest event Shared Services & Outsourcing Week North America. The event, which ran at the end of March, attracted over 150 speakers and 1000 attendees. For those of you who weren't able to make it, we wanted to provide a sneak peek and some of the key takeaways from onsite. Note: Listeners to SSO Next are entitled to d...

Last month, at SSON's flagship event in Orlando, Allianz Services received the award for the World's Best GBS.  The award, which is hosted by SSON Research & Analytics, aims to identify a Global Business Services that represents "the world's best" based on contributing core value to the business in terms of cash, impact on working capital, margin and market growth.  This shifts the focus from tran...

Digital workflows are replacing paper-based processes, streamlining operations and improving efficiency. This trend is driving SSO/GBS to equip their workforce with the necessary digital skills to operate and excel in the new technology-driven ecosystem. As a result, talent capabilities are under the spotlight, with organizations focused on upskilling and reskilling employees, developing new talen...

In this episode, Sally Fletcher, Head of SSON Digital, speaks to  Akhilesh Kohli, GBS APAC Head,  Philips, about  the pivotal role played by Global Capability Centers (GCCs) in nurturing talent and fostering future value creation.  Upskilling and ongoing learning are areas that Philips GBS has long prioritized. They also aim to  fuel innovation through cross-functional collaboration and  equipping...

Cost saving has always been an absolute fundamental for shared services, however in the last few years, cost as a theme has slipped into the background, being overshadowed by a drive for value. This is all about to change. Cost as a focus is back, in a big way.  With an age-old topic such as cost-savings, it's important to re-examine best practices and make sure you're still ticking off all the ob...

In SSON's most recent state of the industry report, we found that 63% of shared services are providing Order to Cash services to their enterprise! So we wanted to provide some advice and best practice in this area. That's why this week on the podcast we invited Keith Cowart, from FIS to talk about what he sees as the trends set to transform AR. Some of these trends are risks to consider and some a...

Welcome back to a brand-new season of SSO Next. This season we're talking to GBS C-Suite and global leaders about topics dear to their heart. Opening the series is Eckard Eberle, CEO, Siemens Global Business Services. Consistently one of the most innovative GBS's in the world, Siemens are known for being at the forefront of digitalization and are one of the few to have applied Generative AI widely...

So, we've reached the time of year where we start looking forward to 2024, and examining how we spend our time, where our priorities should lie and what we're aiming to change and achieve for the year ahead. This can be in terms of career goals or goals for your business. In order to kick start that conversation and provide some inspiration we invited Phil Searle, Founder of Chazey Partners, back...

In this week's episode we talk to Cristina Duta,  Director Intelligent Automation, Global Business Services, Aecom, about the topic of How To Embrace A "We Are All Digital" Ethos Through Citizen Developers & Low-Code Solutions . We discuss how, in 2023, the boundaries between IT and the business are rapidly diminishing. The truth is that now "we are all digital!." The growth of low code/ no-code t...