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HR TransformationThe HR Shared Services Way

HRO Handbook 2011

Report Structure

Section 1

Section 2

Section 3

Section 4

Section 5

‘What’ of HRO• Summary• Trends & Focus 2012

Industry SpeakRef: PeopleStrong HR Roundtables

The ‘How’ of HRO• The HR Shared Services Way• Ready Reckoner• HR on Cloud

India Way by ‘Everest’ Dispelling Some Common Myths on HRO

Delivery Model & Impact by PeopleStrong

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7-18

19-30

31-37

39-43

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We are happy to bring to you this edition of the HR Transformation series.

The world today has become really flat, and an impact in one corner can surely put the globe off balance. As we go through highly volatile economic conditions, it has become almost mandatory for businesses to proactively catch on the signs of change and consequently push for a more rigorous approach to transformation.

Most of the HR Leaders across the world have a changed strategy which is the cause of the business impact they are creating. This impact is largely an outcome of two forces - Changing Business Metrics and Changing Workforce Trends.

Both of the above immediately impact the way HR gets delivered in the organization and how HR equity is perceived within the organization. The vital sharing of the Board Room by the HR Leadership is just one indicator out of many. Another fundamental shift is the new HR Delivery Structure, with a confluence of Business CoEs and Delivery CoEs through HR Shared Services.

The key objective that we intend to discuss in these series is the building of HR Shared Services to drive the change in HR delivery. This edition brings to you the views of the India HR leadership on Transformation, which was shared in two roundtables. Also, Industry experts Everest Consulting share their views on the HR Outsourcing Industry at large.

As we go through a wave of consolidation in the Indian economy, HR Shared Services acts as a great leverage in building consistency and efficiency in HR operational processes, together with a great employee experience, where an employee sitting anywhere in India goes through a consistent experience of employee delight.

Governance, Scale and Building Predictability in Business - are the top three key drivers that today compel us to move to Shared Services. Cost is one of the key factors. It, however, is not the only factor. There is a 10%-40% cost advantage that the organization benefits from over a 3-4 year horizon.

HRSSC also provides the necessary 'mindshare' and 'heart-share' to the HR teams to spend time on truly value added activities and not only on just pure transactions. There is a release in 30% to 40% of the bandwidth of the HR teams, allowing them to focus more on the Business.

Via these series, PeopleStrong endeavors to demystify HR Shared Services, paving the way to create further benchmarks and an evolved roadmap in businesses.

For any input or suggestion to make it even better please reach out to me at [email protected] Happy reading!

Shelly SinghCo-founder & EVP

Foreword

‘What’ of HRO• Summary• Trends & Focus 2012

Section 1

2012 - The way forwardHuman Resources Outsourcing predictions for 2012

HR Outsourcing Industry Summary

Overall HRO predictions

Multi-processHRO (MPHRO)

Single-process HRO (SPHRO)

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Beyond cost-reduction focused considerations, buyers will seek to capture more strategic value in their HR outsourcing initiatives

The appeal of a platform and SaaS-based HRO offering will increase

Beyond MPHRO, global sourcing will increasingly become a key component within SPHRO as well

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A testing year for the comprehensive MPHRO model; improved decision making environment will help market reach US$3.1 billion in annualized spend

The end-of-term cycle will play an important role in the market evolution as deals worth US$2.7 billion will come up for renewal in 2011

Service providers not finding success within MCPO will look to focus on SPHRO area(s) to drive growth

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The recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) market will continue to see higher growth and a more robust global RPO solution will emerge

The growth in the benefits administration outsourcing (BAO) will be driven by the Health & Welfare area

Multi-national companies will accelerate their initiatives around multi-country payroll outsourcing (MCPO)

After the lean period of the last two years, the learning services outsourcing (LSO) market will see recovery but st a slower pace

The past ten years have been an epic journey of partnership between companies outsourcing HR and for the providers of those services. Both have endured significant challenges in their laborious endeavors in findingformulae that worked. In the end, the struggles yielded two important truths:

• After years of technology implementations and process improvement efforts, most HR functions still are far from becoming operationally efficient.

• The benefits of HR outsourcing will not be fully realized without at least some degree of functional transformation, such as process optimization, role redesign or other service delivery improvements.

As we enter the second decade of HRO, it is clear that outsourcing is here to stay: It has become a critical component of a cost-effective delivery strategy. By building outsourcing efforts upon the above truths, HR will be better prepared to navigate the challenges of implementation and create a model for improved operational effectiveness.

With the pressure on back-office support and service delivery amplifying, there is no doubt that HR departments are also amplifying their focus on transitioning their activities to high value service offerings. The need to slash transaction costs and minimize time-inefficient activities, while developing an engaged workforce led by transformational leadership, has become the heart of this year's agenda.

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2012 - The Focus Areas

In 2012, we are turning the spotlight on to two key focus areas:

• Strategic implementation to align with business goals

• Driving value-added initiatives and evaluating cost reduction methods to stretch ROI

• Drawing the end-to-end roadmap to implement the concept of 'HR functions aligned to business goals' successfully

• Cutting administrative tasks to deliver HR's value proposition to the rest of the business

• Standardizing processes globally to reduce errors and deliver uniform services

• Enhancing employee self-service to reduce workload and channel efforts to value-add activities

• Advancing and improving HR processes, functions and delivery by focusing on opportunities to be a profit generating centre

• Understanding what the business sees as high value

• Leveraging on advanced technology to improve functionality & service delivery

• Enhancing employee engagement to optimize retention of high performers

• Evaluating the most effective charge-back structure

• Doing MORE with LESS

Industry SpeakRef: PeopleStrong HR Roundtables

Section 2

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In today's HR scenarios, we have met a lot of clients and had a discussion with them about the best HR practices. Many people asked us that there are so many conferences and seminars to discuss how to implement best practices in Human Resources however, not enough debates & discussions happening on - what HR really want to do?

So, PeopleStrong came up with the predominant idea of organizing Roundtable, where a small and closed group of CXOs & HR Heads from the industry have an exclusive discussion on how to transform HR functions.

1st Roundtable

HR Transformation: What’s inside?

The 1st Roundtable was organized in Mumbai on 28th April, 2011. We discussed about - what are the key ingredients in HR function which helps an organization to grow, succeed and transforming HR from a support function to strategic function.

Excerpt of the first roundtable published in People MattersHR becoming the strategic business partner; "entering the board room"; has been the key focus areas for almost a decade now for all HR Leaders. However, there are several ways to do the same: can it be done by thought leadership, effective succession planning, leadership building and so on and so forth?

However, the entire strategic part of HR keeps struggling to crack the secret of efficiently and effectively transforming the HR processes to achieve this shift.

India as a country has been evolving and hence the industries have been growing as well, with different industries at different points in the maturity curve. It becomes very imperative in the constantly evolving and changing dynamics to find the right balance between standardization vs localization; growth vs consolidation.

No matter which industry or location it is, there are reference points and challenges which keep showcasing that HR Processes are something that keep giving all HR Leaders sleepless nights.

To unravel the riddle and to find out the 'microprocessor' inside the HR function, which is enabling the HR engine to drive the organization, we have picked up multiple threads:• Experience and priority in different industries• Designing a HR transformation roadmap• Harmonizing HR policies and compliance with the HR Service Delivery model• Global trends of HR Transformation : Shared Services, Automation, Outsourcing • Implementing an effective model to roll-out HR technology and process changes • Enabling an efficient, agile recruitment engine and reducing recruiting costs • Measurement : C-Sat, productivity gains

The complex and rapidly changing business dynamics continue to pose a challenge before organizations to transform themselves and adapt to the new realities. While HR transformation is also a consequence of such dynamics, the benefits of transforming the way talent is hired, managed and utilized is emerging to be a strategic differentiator in it. Many CEOs are revisiting their entire people strategy as a result of the changing business scenario. The strategies that helped companies succeed during the downturn will not be applicable anymore. Progressive organizations will focus on rethinking and restructuring the HR function to align with the company's growth ambitions. This makes HR transformation a necessity for organizations to prepare themselves for the next wave of growth. “The moment HR can commit to output, business will accept HR as a partner because the value they bring to the table is business critical,” says Pankaj Bansal, Co-Founder and CEO, PeopleStrong.

Changing talent demographics and the availability of talent is also impacting the way companies are looking at talent acquisition and retention. On one hand, the demand-supply gap in India has forced organizations to pioneer new practices where HR proactively involves itself in the search for solutions, not only for their own company but also for the overall industry. On the other hand, the changing workforce demographics, their expectations and ambitions, require organizations to adapt themselves to create new ways of engagement at work. “An individual today lives in a connected world and has many different opportunities that he/she can align with and pursue,” says Sunil Chitale, EVP and Chief Strategy & Marketing Officer, Patni Computer Systems Ltd. “In such a scenario, business needs all the help from HR to build a compelling story that can be communicated in a way that will attract and retain the right people who are aligned to the vision of the organization,” adds Chitale.

The rules of business have completely changed after the Lehman era and some other infamous ones like Satyam, and Debacle of the microfinance industry. “The ways we measure business has radically changed,” says Shelly Singh, Co-founder & Vice President, PeopleStrong. The importance of metrics today is not only a business need but also governance imperative. Governance is no more a responsibility only of the legal and finance functions but it is equally a HR mandate. As KS Kumar, VP-HR, Castrol India shares, “In the backdrop of the economic crisis, HR must emphasize on governance and ensure that the people processes add value to the overall business and is in compliance with corporate governance.”

1st Roundtable

CEO and the boards have realized that values and culture of the organization are crucial ingredients in building a sustainable and differentiated business. The HR function has been specifically held accountable for embedding the culture and values in all employee lifecycle events as HR processes provides the right levers to build the organization's culture. Therefore HR transformation emphasizes HR's increased focus on nurturing organizational values and culture, while outsourcing the other more transactional activities.

There is a need for HR transformation both at the strategic and operational level. “It is not an 'either-or' decision as it requires both strategy, which is built around the corporate brand, and the business context, along with a seamless, scalable and efficient HR operation,” says Bansal from PeopleStrong. The critical question that CEOs and boards have for HR in devising a process to continually build on people and organizational capability mandates a radical shift in both HR strategy as well as HR operations. Excellence in HR operations is important because it allows HR leaders to find the bandwidth for strategy without compromising on efficiency, scalability and predictability. The manner in which the HR team is structured will define the extent to which they would be able to implement the strategy in its entirety. If looked closely, 80% of HR's mindshare should be invested in strategy whereas we see 80% time is instead focused on delivering the operational piece. “From my interactions with organizations, I see that the HR team is structured in exactly the reverse manner of what the business requires”, says Singh of PeopleStrong. The owner of this transformation should be the HR teams, actively supported by the line, CEO and technology head. HR needs to be the leader and not the victim of this transformation.

HR transformation will require HR teams to define what is 'high-touch' and what is 'high-transaction' when deciding what is core and what is not. Further, they must look at outsourcing everything that is high-transaction. “Increasingly, we will see this trend, and the value that HR will bring to the table would really have the ability to define what is the best way and the best partner to deliver services to the organization, understanding the context, culture, and history of the organization,” adds Gautam Chainani, CPO, Aditya Birla Financial Services. While defining what is core and what is not, each company should look at their HR processes to identify the best way to support business requirements. HR teams hence need to 'let go' of transactional work and take on a role that supports organizations with strategic inputs and execution towards business plans.

Decoding HR Transformation

What is core HR and what is not?

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1st Roundtable 1st Roundtable

Once the HR teams identifies the work that is not business critical, the next question is to find out who will take on that work. For this, the management will have to create the mindset of service delivery, quality and performance in an internal team, drive SLAs and deliver performance; secondly, the commitment to invest on technology is critical. Technology will play a crucial role in creating value for the transactional team by providing bandwidth, and the commitment to invest in technology will determine the success of this internal initiative. Finally, the organization's accessibility to best practices in the transactional space is important in making such a decision. “In India, in the same way that we saw the telecom revolution taking people from 'no phone' directly to 'cell phone', without the traditional step of 'landline', we will also see companies directly moving from 'no shared services' to 'outsourced services',” adds Bansal from PeopleStrong.

The role of HR in the new business environment is to support business transformation. The need of the hour is for HR to spend majority of its mindshare in the 'thinking' and minority in the 'doing'. The 'thinking' aspect of HR's role will need to be kept within the organization and cannot be outsourced. The success or failure of HR will not be based upon how long it takes to answer a call in the contact center, rather around a much broader set of business metrics. “HR is the leader in this change management operation; this is the opportunity for HR teams to step out from the backroom to the boardroom,” says Singh from PeopleStrong.

The new HR function today has the following business mandates:

HR as a flawless executorThe present scenario has witnessed a shrink in the strategy - execution cycle. “Operational brilliance is the foundation for any transformation in HR”, adds Saagarika Ghoshal, Chief People Officer at Reliance BIG Entertainment. HR can build credibility only if their internal HR execution capability is operationally excellent.

HR to align with business and organizationThe HR team will need to focus on understanding the business realities much deeper than before and justify its involvement in strategic decision-making.

Advocacy & HR functionThe new role will require HR to play advocate to the critical requisites of business excellence – promote organizational value and culture to create the right alignment of employee contribution and organization's vision; add value to the table by enhancing people capabilities.

HR as a multi-dimensional disciplineHR will need to adopt a multi-dimensional solution process approach to any business reality. For example, when looking at attrition, it cannot address the concern by only looking at one aspect but must view it as an integrated solution that looks at all touch points from profiling, employer branding, compensation philosophy, career management etc.

What defines the HR function today?

HR as a leadership coachHR will become the coach to leadership in the company. HR's role will actively involve connecting with business leaders to help internalize HR's role in realizing organizational strategy and vision.

HR as a program managerA new role that will be added to the HR department will be that of 'program management', either for HR vendor partners or for running internal shared services. HR will focus their efforts in identifying business critical activities and take on the responsibility of finding the right vendors, managing them and assessing quality of service delivery.

With workforce emerging as the undisputed competitive advantage across industries, HR's role will transform dramatically to meet the new demands of business. The essential competencies for the HR team going forward will be aligned to this new role. While knowledge of operations will continue to be important, the specific understanding of the business and organizational context will be most relevant. Just as the CEO is not an expert of all functions it is responsible for, the HR function too will not be required to be an expert in all HR areas but they will require a good understanding of the business and the organizational context to make the right judgments.

In the new HR backdrop, the key competencies that HR will need to actively hone include adequate business acumen, coaching and mentoring skills for CEO and the leadership team, ability to design and architect service delivery models, program management (managing vendor partners), understanding of technology trends and options in HR for driving scale and innovation, finance and budgeting, and ability to sell and position HR with internal and external stakeholders.

Is HR ready for the required transformation?

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1st Roundtable Leaders/Industry speak

Scott Bayman (Ex CEO Genpact) & Dr. Santrupt Misra (CEO - Birla Carbon & Group Director HR, Aditya stBirla) facilitated our 1 Roundtable on HR Transformation: What’s Inside along with group of 20

CXOs & HR Heads.

We have seen this happen in the US and we are seeing the same trend catching up in India at a faster rate. At an organizational level, there will be a shift on how things get done. While HR will continue to be accountable, they will not be delivering a lot of the routine and repetitive tasks

Scott BaymanFormer CEO GE India & Chairman, Lumis Partners

The role of HR will significantly move towards being able to identify and manage service providers while delivering strategic services that impact Business Performance

Dr. Santrupt MishraCEO, Carbon Black Business Director - Group HR Aditya Birla Management Corporation

Strategies will provide the direction and alignment to business goals, and executing those strategies effectively, efficiently and as per compliance will be instrumental in the success of business.

Gajendra ChandelHead HR, Tata AutoCome

HR comes in the picture when we grow more than 100 people but the challenge over there is what HR can deliver largely depends on the individual who is playing that role.

Sandeep Sinha Co-founder & MD, Lumis Partners

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The stage for HR is set as workforce emerges as the greatest asset for any company.

Judhajit DasChief, Human Resources ICICI Prudential Life Insurance

Increasingly, we will see this trend, and the value that HR will bring to the table would really to have the ability to define what is the best way and the best partner to deliver services to the organization understanding the context, culture, and history of the organization.

Gautam ChainaniChief People Officer, Aditya Birla Financial Services

In the backdrop of the economic crisis, HR must emphasize on governance and ensure that the people processes add value to the overall business and is in compliance with corporate governance.

K.S. KumarVP-HR, Castrol India

Rajendra Ghag EVP HR & Administration, HDFC Life

This opportunity compels us to address the concerns of people who are bored with the mundane and routine jobs, by seeking external expert assistance who can take over such transactional HR activities, allowing the HR team to instead concentrate on engagement activities and work towards enhancing workforce productivity

The business side wants HR to transform to be able to make people available who are productive from the moment they join.

Vijay SinhaSr. VP, Tata AIG

Leaders/Industry speak

HR Transformation: What's in, What's out?Excerpt of the second roundtable published in People Matters

The growing appreciation of the value of a company's assets is steering HR to move towards metrics and measures to gauge its contribution to business. The first PeopleStrong Roundtable series established the essence of HR transformation and business drivers.

The second PeopleStrong Roundtable brings together views from the business fraternity on what HR needs to do 'more of' and 'less of' in this new context. The Roundtable on 'HR Transformation' saw HR and business leaders discuss the roadmap for human resources as a function in the increasingly complex work environment. The question is whether or not HR demonstrates a clear contribution to business productivity.

HR outsourcing emerged from the need to contribute to business value and move away from focusing on transactional HR activities. This new approach helped many organizations to decrease their administrative and transactional burden. While HR has embraced this transformation, the question now is about how efficiently this change can contribute to business.

It is an accepted fact that HR plays a significant role in building organizational capability, a dynamic and meritocratic culture, ownership and accountability in all the employees. To build organizational capability, HR needs to invest time in coaching and enabling people to upgrade their capabilities, keeping in mind the present and future business requirements. Along with that, HR must also become 'champions of change' and create a culture that will allow it to be agile to meet the changing market dynamics. To take on its new responsibility, HR has to redefine its priorities in order to make time and bandwidth for the same. As Bhasin explains, “Much like in Genpact, while thinking of any process or business, the discussion has been about effectiveness versus efficiency. The HR function today must look at its role in the same light.” As a strategic business contributor, the function is moving towards questioning how HR can be more relevant to business. In order to contribute to business HR needs to identify its core competencies like productivity, leadership development & coaching, capability building, knowledge retention, leveraging technology, connect & engagement, and business planning.

In order to gain respect from business leaders, it is important that HR lays emphasis on demonstrating productivity and value. For this, HR needs to put in place appropriate metrics to measure its contribution to the business agenda. It is essential to align HR to the strategic objective of the company.

2nd RoundtableThe 2nd Roundtable was organized in Delhi on 18th August, 2011. In the second of the PeopleStrong roundtable series HR and business leaders discussed the road map for human resource as a function in the increasingly complex work environment.

HR will have to concentrate more on leadership building and be able to identify the leaders in the pipeline nurturing them for future leadership role. This will help strengthen the leadership pipeline that is ever ready to fuel business growth. Developing a decision matrix to identify the right talent, to manning critical positions, developing a simple yet robust process for enhancing individual & organizational capability, and running it with precision will be the key differentiator for an organization. HR has to bring in the right mix of science and art in decision making and for this, HR professionals need to spend time in understanding and creating such matrices. Elizabeth Nanda, Chief of HR & Training, Fabindia, explains, “HR needs to be focused on helping employees design their own career paths in the organization and equip them with the tools and knowledge to be able to do so.”

The role of HR is to create an environment of knowledge sharing through a culture that encourages and facilitates the process of getting the right information to the right people at the right time. Pankaj Bansal, Co-Founder & CEO, People Strong articulates, “HR should create a knowledge warehouse consisting of the best learning practices. This will minimize the effect of attrition in an organization, since it is an integral aspect that every organization needs to cope with.”

Payroll processing, maintenance of establishment, simple compliances and routine activities, which do not require human interaction are better handled by such experts outside the organization through a technical internal interface. HR necessarily needs to be involved in business planning, formulating business strategy and driving strategic goals. It must take lead in planning for challenges by understanding workforce trends, identifying potential resource opportunities and gaps and developing effective initiatives. HR must focus its time and resources on strategic imperatives and outsource administrative responsibilities. Anand explains HR's business role as, “With new talent challenges emerging from rapidly changing workforce demographics, the HR function can play a critical role in addressing future talent challenges by helping organizations improve its future capabilities without a dip in productivity or morale. HR must help organizations understand the talent market's changing requirements in order to make the employer more attractive to top talent.”

HR has to move away from its power-centric mindset and be open to the use of technology to bring in more transparency in operations. As P. Dwarakanath, Director – Group, Human Capital of Max India says, “HR needs to come out of the mindset issue that managing payroll will give them power.” HR will also have to take note that one size will not fit all. By using self service and flexible offerings, there is an opportunity for HR to meet diverse needs of a multi-generational workforce, which needs to be customized so as to meet the requirement of its employee base. In this backdrop, HR will have to prioritize and do away with certain activities which will derive the same value even when outsourced or automated.

Transactional HR: HR processes which are transactional in nature like payroll processing, maintenance of establishment, simple compliances and routine activities which do not require human interaction, are better handled by experts outside the organization and can be done efficiently through automation and hence can be easily outsourced. There is no merit in spending time on transactional activities which can be better managed by experts who can handle it for multiple organizations, thus aggregating it for cost benefits.

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2nd Roundtable

HR should create an effective environment where business can happen efficiently and to add more space to strategic function of HR, mass hiring/commodity hiring should be avoided in house & outsource to a specialist to be more outcome driven.

Suresh TripathiPresident - HR, SRF

HR needs to look itself and focus more on the strategic part rather than spending on the operation part which is transactional in nature. HR needs to be converted from line staff to business view where they can align it with the business strategy and bring talent, leadership and various kinds of value added to the organization.

S VaradarajanHead HR, Tata Teleservicesa


Pramod BasinNon-Executive Vice Chairman andformer President & CEO, Genpact

HR needs to redefine the counters and be sure that what they should do to add the value to the business and what they should give to somebody else. Transformation is required in HR to be effective and play a strategic role in the business and take it to the next level.

N S RajanPartner - Global Leader,

People & Organization, Ernst & Young

What are we trying to achieve qualitatively vs. what we end up measuring?HR should focus on up scaling the organization and spend more time on

talent building, knowledge management & capability development.

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It is a mindset issue before capability, and HR needs to come out of the mindset that managing payroll will give them power. For HR to become strategic it requires the respect and trust from the CEO, leadership and colleagues. HR must earn its seat at the strategy table. In the last 10 years, HR people have become arrogant.

P DwarkanathDirector-Group Human Capital, Max India

HR needs to look itself and focus more on the strategic part rather than spending on the operation part which is transactional in nature. HR needs to be converted from line staff to business view where they can align it with the business strategy and bring talent, leadership and various kinds of value added to the organization.

S Y SiddiquiMEO (Admn, Finance, IT & HR), Maruti Suzuki Ltd

The competencies required by the HR team have to be changed. HR should understand the organization needs and then design their own goals and offering in the given context. With the knowledge of organization needs and expectation they can access their own effectiveness with their own expectation.

Elizabeth NandaChief of HR & Training, FabIndia

Outsourcing will make meaning of work more relevant for employees as it will make them concentrate and involve in the core business activities with non-core ones being outsourced. In the next orbit, employees will assume the role of ‘volunteers’ and salaries will be based on delivery of work / output.

Pankaj BansalCEO, PeopleStrong


The ‘How’ of HRO• The HR Shared Services Way• Ready Reckoner• HR on Cloud

Section 3

Human resource management is a process of bringing people and organizations together so that the goals of each other are met. The role of the HR manager is shifting from that of an administrator and screener to the role of a planner and change agent.

Charles Handy also advocated future organizational models. Such organizational models focus on people centric issues and call for redefining the future role of HR professionals.

CEO's envision that the HR function should be focused entirely on strategic activities, and not on performing regular transactional activities. This mandate from the CEOin no way compromises employee related transactions that sustain the satisfaction for employees, but is based on the well proven premise that contribution and real value for HR lie elsewhere.

The structure which emerges for HR is a team consisting of high-level contributors, perhaps internal consultants, HR process designers and change champions — leaving all the transactional and administrative activities to vendors for which those processes are core.

More than a decade after large U.S. companies began to adopt shared services in human resources (HR), this delivery model has proven its worth by cutting administrative costs, reducing transaction errors and generating greater employee satisfaction with basic HR processes. In India as well, companies form their human resources vision and charter to give them a competitive edge in talent acquisition, retention and management, and developing / aligning employees to meet business goals. HR shared services has thus entered an era of increased relevance and value.

World over, Shared Services is the key trend shaping the future of HR. Traditionally, HR has been a support function to support business critical processes. But, as organizations are striving to be best in both growing and maturing markets, the focus on performance and efficiency has grown manifold. And companies are increasingly looking to partner with vendors that provide the know-how and expertise to take it forwards, which has led to overall rise of HR Outsourcing. In such relationships, a company contracts with a vendor that rents its skills, knowledge, technology, service and manpower for an agreed-upon price and period to perform functions the client no longer wants to do.

With increasing focus on HR, there are business benefits to specific standards for HR Shared Services (HRSSC), further enabling movement up the value chain by leveraging an equally shared partnership between the supplier and buyer. As HRSSSC evolves, organizations have new choices for delivery options that reflect the strengths of their prospective role of a business partner. Some of these investments will produce real benefits for the HR industry in general. It is up to you to make critical decisions about how they will impact your organization.

HR Transformation: The HR Shared Services WayNew wheels of HR - Shared Services Way

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High High High High High High

Low Low Low Low Low Low

Compliance

TransformHR’s role

Supportgrowth

Reducecost

HRmetrics

Standardization

If the rank of first 4 bars is above 5, it makes a good Business case for HR Shared Services.

HR Shared Services varies based on company-specific circumstances. However, certain common elements are usually present when you are thinking to outsource the function:

• Companywide consistent policies and processes, from which standardized, automated transaction processing can be achieved

• A central knowledgebase

• Embedded platform of employee and manager self-service applications from a Web portal

• A single HRIS platform

• A contact center, internal or outsourced, for fielding queries and handling other tasks by phone, e-mail and chat

What does HR Shared Services mean?

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What is it really that makes you dwell on the thought to move to a HR Shared Services Structure? To understand this, let uslook at the diagram below:

HR Transformation: The HR Shared Services Way

HR Shared Services Leads to an Overall ImpactFunctional Scope


Relocation

Expat

Management

Employee

Relations

HR Reporting & Analytics

Performance Administration

HRIS Support

Leave Administration

Compensation Administration

Training Administration

Benefit Administration

Compliance

Retirals

Staffing & Recruiting

Payroll

Personnel/Data Administration

Less Prevalent More Prevalent

As one would make the decision, there are certain perceptions and concerns that an HR leader would need to be taking care of

Loss of controlLoss of control is typically seen as a fear in the stakeholder's mind of losing control over the provider and that the function will be now dependent on the vendor (whether internal or external – perhaps leading to loss of cross functional skills, informal networks and corporate learning. Also, most prominently, the conflict of interest between the parties will never work.

Confusion among employees and dissatisfactionChange management may never work as the perceptions would need to be managed upfront, for example, a) it is easy to walk over to the desk of an HR representative than raising a request to an HRSSC Centre, b) the person answering my call/handling my request is not known to me and I cannot disclose sensitive information to an outsider, and c) there would be too much back and forth between two parties.

General tendenciesBesides the above mentioned points, some generic apprehensions always come from various stakeholders who want to ensure no stone is left unturned before the decision is made, such as – Will this step fail to fulfil corporate responsibilities to preserve jobs, this may undermine loyalty across organization and perhaps we would never terminate the employees who would not transfer to the provider. Secondly, concerns around how our customers will take this step, is there a risk of losing them? As per our observation, a majority of times, stakeholders would want to first get completely convinced by running a small piece as a pilot to prove that this idea works.

HR-SSC empowers leaders to have real-time views of their organizations for their vision and charter. At the end of the day, the success or failure of HR will not be based upon how long it takes to answer a call in the contact center but rather around a much broader set of business metrics.

You may call it as a “Business process outsourcing” “Business Improvement” or may be reengineering for that matter. Maybe “HR transformation,” or something else entirely? Whatever you choose to call it, the name signifies a lot about mindset, objectives, and approach to implementing HR Shared Services.

None of the above is accomplished without some pain. Standardizing and then centralizing processes are the first two steps toward creating an HR Shared Services model, whether internal or outsourced. In highly decentralized companies, this can take several months. Some adopters choose to begin with only certain aspects first, and do the rest over time.

Already, areas of HR that lend themselves to better standards via HR Shared Services include the obvious services surrounding employee recruiting commonly known as RPO, payroll and other Retirals administration activities, as well as identification and administration of benefits plans.

In addition, HR Shared Services are developing capabilities that will help oragnisations produce better results when it comes to managing workforce productivity, reducing liability exposure for employee relations issues, or being able to model global workforce changes to mirror changes in the business requirements.

The journey of HRO process would evolve in three stages to reap the actual benefits:

Building Blocks for HRO

Standardization• Standardize processes and policies• Minimize variances across policies,

systems and processes

Centralization• Move to a Single location• Streamline Roles, Processes• Outsourcing/ Co-Sourcing

Redesign• Establish a service culture• Organize around end-to-end processes• Benchmark to best practice processes

Examples

• Have one system across locations• Implement global standards• Digitization of processes

• Central shared service center• Lean Processes• Defined roles for HR Specialist

• Process driven organization• Key Performance Indicators through

exhaustive service levels

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As one prepares to launch this transformational exercise, one needs to check the preparedness both in thought and process.

• This is a redesign of the service delivery model

• Internal HR team had new responsibilities

• HRSC is to build on and improve HR's experience in leading change efforts

What needs to be done next once you have made the decision? There are four key factors that would need to be kept in mind while you are to follow the next steps. Four parallel tracks would need to be developed to ensure there are no loopholes, which are:


Implementation & Readiness

CommunicationThe HRO solution includes a new HR service centre, several new technology applications such as an applicant tracking system, increased manager and employee self-service, a new benefits management tool, a new time and attendance system, and the transfer of contact center responsibilities and technology maintenance to PeopleStrong.

HRSC requires that the joint client/PeopleStrong team implement many new processes, tools, and responsibilities.

A Steering Committee comprising senior client and PeopleStrong executives oversaw the project. A business case, showing the investments and returns expected, was approved.

There was also a significant redesign of the retained HR generalist organization. Previously, these generalists had supported all types of HR activities, including administration, delivery, employee relations, staffing, training delivery, and, when possible, strategic consulting to the business. Now, however, the new technology and self-service capabilities from HRSC allowed for fewer generalists focused on higher value activities for the business.

Because of the significant changes involved, HRSC also requires upfront and ongoing stakeholder communication and change management. There are many stakeholders affected by HRSC, including senior executives, HR employees, line managers, employees, other external vendors, and a host of people involved in the project itself. HRSC employs a change and communication plan, with dedicated resources, to help ensure the stakeholders' understanding and readiness.

A separate, but related, effort is needed to implement the new HR generalist organization. This included redesign of the future roles and competencies, as well as evaluation of the current team on capability and assessment in line with new structure.

Some team members will be reassigned within HR or outside HR. Rigorous communication and training helps prepare the team for their new roles, processes, tools, and relationships.

Integrating change management and communication activities into the overall project plan helped to make stakeholders aware of, and involved in, the implementation.

A company can launch HR shared services with more than one platform, but it isn't easy. It is far better to standardize on a single platform for payroll and HRM databases. A company needs to budget time and money if the move to HRO will require a new implementation of standard software.

Examples of these activities include:• Regular broad communications from the senior Head of HR, to different stakeholders in the

process – very key to address the Business leadership team• Monthly “awareness sessions” with HR leaders and their customers (i.e., business managers)

focusing on the changes affecting them• An email box to solicit ongoing feedback and questions from key stakeholders, used to compile

FAQs; Involvement of end-users during design validation sessions (e.g., different stakeholders validating the process workflows)

• Focus groups/interviews with each process regarding stakeholder impact• Throughout, in the process it was made sure that stakeholders' needs were met and that teams

were coordinated toward the broader business goals

People

Technology

People

Communication

Process

Technology

• Scope of work

• Service levels

• Service delivery model

• In house system• Case management tool• Voice system• Infrastructure• Servers

• Roles

• Aspirations

• Deployment

• New way of working

• Business expectations

• Cross functional support

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ProcessesOne of the pluses of going through the design process is that you will learn much about your organization.

The Shared Services process forces you to understand how your processes are being handled currently and how they compare to others in the industry. A detailed “As is understanding” of the process through scientific diagnostic tools helps to evaluate where you currently stand.

This end result will not be some fancy consulting report but a set of expectations that will chart out deliverables for Business. These decisions will really focus thoughts about what you need or do not need, since you will be immediately translating them into real money.

Let us take the example of Recruitment process – One has traditionally looked at “cost per hire” and “time to fill”. However, a measurement through HRO throws some startling metrics to watch out for. One could calculate the cost of every resume that is put in the process. With outsourcing this process – one will have a saving of 30% and processing cost of each resume is 0.7x, you have put some money on the table to think about.

To illustrate this further, let us say on an average your HR junior management team spends 40% of their time on employee query management and your middle management tier is spending 20% of their average time on escalation related to employee queries. With an HR team of 20 people with 3 managers, your organization spend is 8.6 FTE (Full time equivalent).

And on top of this there is no definitive service level measurement. However, with an Outsourcing relationship, HR decision maker is empowered with that information and can demand about service level measurements: not whether they should be 99.5 percent versus 99.9 percent but whether these are the measurements that really impact the mission of the organization.

A case in point, one of the Financial Services Company, Business leaders initially resisted because they wanted their HR people to work on their problems. HR had to lead the way saying 'HR will solve the problems, it's just going to be in a different fashion – a more predictable and dedicated channel”.

The company wanted HR team at the business units to focus on human capital issues not on administrative tasks and that mandate had to be driven with both HR teams and the Business Line Managers as well.

Some of the tangible benefits of HR Shared Services are going to be:• Streaming process work flow and optimize if applicable• Improved data and content accuracy• Automate redundant tasks and eliminate errors and rework to 100%.• Reducing/eliminating print, distribution (forms, manuals, newsletters, etc.)• Identify non value add HR operational activities.


And the most important is the cost benefit for the savings from centralization. It could range anything in range of 10% to 40% depending on the stage of the organisation. One metric is the HR FTE to employee ratio - which one could use to measure the obvious ROI from an HRO model.

The figure illustrates one of the most widely researched ROI for effectiveness of HRO in terms of direct cost savings.

The savings most often come from reduced staffing in HR. In the Hackett study, "world-class" HR organizations-defined as the top quartile of 125 companies benchmarked- spent on average 13% less on HR per employee (see chart 1, "Total HR Cost per Employee," above) and they had 15% fewer full-time HR staff per 1,000 employees than the others in the study.

Total HR cost per employee, 2006World class organizations spent 13% less on human resources coasts per employee than the peer group in 2006.

Source: The Hackett Group

Peer Group

World-class

Difference between peer and world-class

$1,864

$1,61413%

Ready Reckoner

• HRSSC is an overall strategic goal business first and then for HR

• Build around four key ingredients - Process, Technology, Communication and People - not as a separate initiative

• Internal HR organization needs to complement the new processes and technology - with aligned roles and training

• Communication is the game changer - consistent set of key messages

• Governance framework needs to be followed religiously

• The change process is stressful, so be proactive in helping people maintain performance and build their readiness - do not wait for reactions

• Brand it well


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HR on Cloud

Technology innovation like Cloud computing has been changing how most people use the web and how they store their information and the advantages of using a cloud computing HR system is an acknowledged fact. You do not need any infrastructure, you do not need maintenance, you do not need storage space, you do not need extensive training, you do not need ultra fast connections and you do not need expensive software. All you need is a simple web browser like Internet Explorer or Firefox and you can connect to any cloud system and use all these facilities online.

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility (very much like electricity) over internet.

That's a long-winding definition; simply put it the package of applications delivered through web without having to worry about where to host, how to host and what to host. The most famous is the facebook, you just are a user and need not bother about all the paraphernalia.

When web applications hosted by an application service provider are delivered over Cloud, it is called Software-as-a-Service (SaaS).

SaaS applications come in various flavors, the most scalable being the ones developed using a multi-tenant architecture. A good analogy to a multi-tenant architecture is an Apartment where multiple Tenants (or Customers) share various common services and infrastructure, because of which the overall cost of an apartment considerably reduces & quality of life significantly increases vis-a-vis an independent unit. Also, similar to an apartment, there are multiple layers of security in a SaaS application making it much more secure than a traditional on-premise application.

SaaS HR applications delivered over Cloud are rapidly disrupting the market traditionally dominated by on premise HR applications. The benefits of HR on Cloud are manifold:

• It is easy to deploy and use (you just need a web browser and an internet connection)• There is no need to procure & manage IT Infrastructure resulting in savings on administrative

costs & overheads• Upgrades are instant and far less cumbersome as it is done by the service provider behind the

scenes• The elasticity of a cloud platform makes the solution scalable as your company grows• Pricing model is simple, predictable (typically per employee per month) and cost-effective

An integrated Product Suite for Human Resource Management, Payroll, Recruitment & Helpdesk with capabilities rivaling best-in-breed point solutions. The objective is to relieve Organizations from the complexity of managing multiple HR technology & service providers with a single compelling solution.

Demystifying the Cloud

EmployeeSelf Service

Frontend Interfaces

Survey

Payroll

LeaveTime &

AttendanceExit

Helpdesk

Recruitment

HRIS Performance Learning

On Premise

Apps

Backend Integration withERP / Biometric systems

ManagerSelf Service

HR on cloud

Leveraging the Cloud

Flexibility

Built on a scalable, multi-tenant architecture that helps us in securely & efficiently managing & supporting hundreds of customers thereby making the solution very cost-effective.

Over the years with an experience of working with multiple customers across various industries, we have made our solution very configurable to meet every customer need. Configuring the flow of any business process, notifications, rules etc. is a breeze with our workflow engine.

HR on Cloud

30

India Way by ‘Everest’ Dispelling Some Common Myths on HRO

Power of Insight

Interoperability

Grows with you

BI Engine monitors the entire Employee life cycle from Recruitment to Exit and provides insights that help Organization to manage & retain the Talent. Reports & dashboards enable HR & Leadership to take the right business decisions

The solution is built on a service-oriented architecture and support industry standard HR-XML formats. It enables web service based integration with multiple ERP software / Biometric systems for seamless delivery of business processes.

With modular approach, it is possible to start with any module and as the business grows other modules can be added at the click of a button. The integrated service-cum-technology approach gives Customers the power to outsource their entire HR process management to us whenever they are ready for that.

Finally, there are two factors which will help you take off this smoothly

ROI: It's a subscription-based model, one do not have to spend on Infrastructure and heavy license cost, and there is zero Capex that company has to spend. The purchase decision becomes easier through this change

Service to end users: The system is intuitive and easy to use that you do not have to invest huge training time to drive adoption and employees effectively use the new functionality. The system is highly configurable to ensure that features and functionalities can be updated based on end-user feedback.

HR on Cloud

Section 4

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India Way by EverestAdopting HR Outsourcing (HRO) in India – Dispelling Some Common MythsRajesh Ranjan, Research Director, Everest Group

Amidst the continued uncertainty around the global economic recovery, the Indian economy growth remains robust with even pessimistic estimates suggesting a GDP growth of at least 7.5 %. Such growth, while providing considerable opportunities, also gives rise to challenges and risks that need to be managed well. This holds particularly true for human resources management. Organizations increasingly demand their HR function to play a pro-active role in meeting their organizational growth aspirations as opposed to just reacting to business decisions. Such requirements call for re-looking at the HR organization design, role, and the adopted practices. HR Outsourcing (HRO) is one of such practices that can help HR managers and leaders to focus on strategic areas such as workforce planning and talent management.

HRO is defined as “transfer of ownership of one or multiple HR processes to a third-party on an on-going basis”. While globally, and especially in the western economies, HRO is already a mature practice now, it is still in the pioneering stage in India. This is truer for multi-process HRO where organizations outsource multiple HR processes (e.g., employee data administration, payroll, recruitment administration). As increasing number of organizations in India evaluate HRO as a strategic option, it is important for them to understand the reality beyond hype or myths to make the right decisions.

Let us look at these myths and understand the reality across the HRO adoption lifecycle – planning, service provider selection /contracting, transition and delivery, and end-of-term.

Rajesh Ranjan, Research Director, is a leader of Everest Group's Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) research program. Leveraging his strong consulting, business analysis, and outsourcing industry expertise, he drives the agenda for syndicated research program, and has played a key role in creating industry-leading reports on various BPO market segments including HR Outsourcing. He has advised numerous global as well as Indian buyers in their service provider selection, market maturity assessments,

price and service level benchmarking, and end-of-term considerations. Additionally, he has helped several service providers and investors in market opportunity assessment, competitive positioning analysis, and acquisition target analyses. He is also a frequent participant and presenter at industry forums.Prior to joining Everest Group, Rajesh was a consultant at Wipro Technologies, performing process consulting and business analysis for Fortune 500 clients. He was also a key player in pursuing and crafting solutions for new business opportunities. He started his career as a software engineer at Infosys Technologies. He holds an MBA from the XLRI, Jamshedpur, India, and a Bachelor of Technology from ISM, Dhanbad, India.

Exhibit 1: HR Pyramid

Source: Everest Group (2011)

Planning phaseIn this phase, organizations need to evaluate if HRO is appropriate for them or not. Among other things, it includes assessing the applicability, organizational readiness, business case creation, and stakeholder buy-in. Some common myths include:

HR is core part of organization and can not be outsourced

The reality lies in the details. HR consists of multiple processes that differ significantly from each other in their nature (see exhibit 1). Some are transaction-intensive while some others are judgment-oriented. Some are employee facing while others are back-office in nature. Effectiveness of services is more important for some processes while efficiency is more important in others. Hence, to decide what is core and what is not, leading organizations globally are asking “Is running a particular process in-house provides us competitive differentiation?” A “yes” answer calls for keeping it in-house while a process that does not is increasingly evaluated to be sourced externally. In fact, in some cases, outsourcing itself can create competitive differentiation. For example, in the more mature IT outsourcing space, Bharti-IBM IT outsourcing helped create a competitive differentiation for Bharti

Myth 1

Reality

India Way by Everest

3534

Myth 2

Reality

Myth 3

Reality

Myth 4

Reality

HRO is a western market phenomenon, not applicable in the Indian context

Clearly HRO started in the US and is most prevalent in the North American and the European markets. However, its value proposition is universal. Additionally, unlike some other business process outsourcing (BPO) areas, labour arbitrage is not necessarily the central value lever in HRO within the western market. The value levers include leveraging economies of scale advantage through standardization, centralization, and effective deployment of underlying technology. This makes it quite applicable within the Indian context where labour arbitrage is largely absent.

In addition to serving their local employees, quite a few US / European headquartered organizations utilized HRO to better manage mergers and acquisitions as well as quickly expand into other geographies. As India-headquartered organizations increasingly expand globally, they can potentially look to replicate some of these best practices with customization as appropriate.

Need to choose either internal shared services OR third-party outsourcing

Both these approaches are ways to achieve similar outcomes with their own strengths and weaknesses. However, they need not be mutually exclusive. Hybrid sourcing, which leverages both internal shared services and third-party outsourcing, is a model that supports the flexibility and adaptability required by dynamic economic conditions, and that can be proactively managed as a portfolio. The actual portfolio mix between internal shared services and third-party outsourcing should be based on multiple considerations such as the nature of the processes under consideration, speed to value, internal investment and capabilities, need for IP protection, third-party market maturity, etc.

The business case should be centred around direct cost reduction

The real benefit of HRO rely on creating a holistic business case that not only looks at direct cost impact (i.e. operational HR cost), but also takes into account the potential business and strategic impact (see Exhibit 2). Sometimes the cost may increase but the value to the business come from the consistency in process and practice. A myopic view centred on direct cost reduction can lead to sub-optimal outcomes.


Exhibit 2SMEverest Group’s Total Value Equation (TVE ) framework for HRO

Strategic impact

Business impact

Cost impact

Impact on a company’s...

• Key process or applications

• Quality

• Productivity

• Cost reduction

• Process efficiency

Typical resultThree levels of TVE

• Market differentiators

• Organizational structure

• Direct-cost base

• Internal customers

• HR aligned with business• Employer of choice by attracting and retaining talent

• Quality improvement • Increased effectiveness of the service

Myth 5

Reality

HRO results in loss of control

This perception is primarily a result of lack of clarity or understanding of the respective roles and responsibilities of buyer (i.e. outsourcing organization) and service provider. While the provider does own the day-to-day operation, it is still accountable to the buyer for the outcome. A strong governance model that engages key stakeholders of both parties at the operational and strategic level and clearly documented processes and hands off ensures that focus is on outcome.


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Service provider selection / contracting phaseIn this phase service providers are evaluated, selected, and the contract is executed. Some of the myths within this phase are:

The service provider landscape is quite immature

It is true that only a very select set of providers currently have the experience of delivering multiple HR processes with the similar level of quality and consistency. However, the story is different when the focus is on single process - payroll, core HR administration, recruitment, etc. - with credible options available within each of these segments individually. Further, service provider capability is also evolving fast to serve the multi-process HRO needs. In the last few years, several providers have made investments to broaden their capabilities. The choices are also broadening with not only India-focused providers but the global ones also coming out with solutions addressing the Indian market needs.

A single provider solution is the only / best solution

The choice between a single vendor and multi-vendor really depends on the scale and scope of outsourcing, internal organization sophistication and external market options. Larger scope, higher organization sophistication, and lack of provider options with broad-based capabilities would mean that a best-of-breed solution can potentially be a better option.

Need to have an arm's length relationship with the service provider

Many companies fail to capture opportunities brought by a HRO provider by focusing purely on the commercial and procurement aspects of any solution. Lot many times organizations are too rigid in their service delivery / solution design considerations and simply dictate what they need. This prevents them from leveraging HRO providers' wider experience and knowledge which they have acquired by working with several other organizations. It is important to create a partnership based relationship with the service provider to capture the long term value.

Transition and service delivery phaseIn this phase the new service delivery model is implemented and services are transitioned to the provider. Some myths to address in this phase include

Myth 6

Reality

Myth 7

Reality

Myth 8

Reality


Myth 9

Reality

Myth 10

Reality

Myth 11

Reality

"Change" only applies to the outsourced services

Internal change management is the most underestimated but probably most important areas with significant bearing on end-user satisfaction. HRO is a fundamentally different way receiving HR services and retained HR organization as well as employees / managers need to be prepared for the same. Post-outsourcing, the role of the retained HR department changes from administering the HR services to utilizing the information to make strategic decisions. This calls for a different mind-set and skills. Adoption of self-service portals, centralized help desk services etc. mean that employees also need to change their expectation and practices. A well-planned communication plan, identification of appropriate change agents, and execution of the change management plan goes a long way in ensuring success.

There won't be any additional fees beyond what was contracted for

While all care should be taken to fully define the scope of services and associated fees, it is virtually impossible to detail out each and every detail. Further, it is practical to assume that some of the assumptions made during the contracting process may not remain valid or some of the business requirements may change. All these mean that "change requests" will happen. Organizations would do well to keep such buffer in their business case and utilize those judiciously during the transition as well as on-going delivery phases.

End-of-term phaseThis is the phase where the existing contract term period is nearing completion. Organizations need to decide the next evolution of their HRO journey during this phase.

End-of-term strategy need to devised closer to the contract end date

Typically a HRO relationship is a multi-year arrangement. Typically, organization needs as well as external market options will evolve within this time period. Hence, many a times, it makes sense to re-look at the existing solution in a holistic fashion and plan for this sufficiently in advance. It ensures that the organization does not end up auto-renewing the contract with the existing provider due to insufficient time to evaluate alternate options aligned to their future requirements.

Clearly, as HR departments in India look to cement the move from "backroom to boardroom", a well-informed HRO decision can help accelerate that.


Delivery Model & Impact by PeopleStrong

Section 5

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PeopleStrong Delivery model (Business-Operations-Model)

PeopleStrong is the first mover in the Indian market in terms of India to India HR Outsourcing. Being the leaders and front movers, PeopleStrong has matured to an engagement model where PeopleStrong is able to bring business focus in performing HR related transactions.

This evolution was also brought into the picture since the workforce in India was moving from metros and tier 1 cities to remote locations and 'the pin code' areas were becoming the focus for the companies in the fastest growing industries. These companies were struggling with the spread of the workforce and so ever increasing support cost and the homogeneity of the service delivery and employee experience.

PeopleStrong implemented what was already common in the BPO world, by introducing offshore, near-shore and onshore model of delivery within India. So, 80% of the team operates out of the state-of-the–art Gurgaon delivery center, 15% of team work from near shore locations like Mumbai, Hyderabad and rest of the team is deployed onshore to manage the location depended activity and connect with client.

The entire delivery engine is supported through strong technology framework and a business group who enables the strengthened engagement with the client HR organization.

PeopleStrong foresaw that performing the HR transactions in an outsourced fashion would require a definite ability to:

• Designing more efficient processes - The transitions team of PeopleStrong works as the brain and R&D unit of PeopleStrong and re-design the processes to remove bottleneck using latest process improvement methodologies.

• Provide meaningful dashboards - The MIS and reporting need to be strengthening the decision making and business intelligence of the CXO. Finding such inputs in most presentable way would be the key differentiator.

• Maintain strategic element - The engagement gets started through a vision and charter mapped out by the project sponsor team. It remains a constant endeavor of the PeopleStrong team to ensure that the strategic focus is not missed while performing the day-to-day transactions. PeopleStrong thus transforms from being just a true partner to becoming a strategic partner to all the HR related needs of the client organization.

• Strong governance framework - The perceived risks are best mitigated by having a strong governance mechanism in place which ensures that the right things are discussed and resolved at the respective levels at a pre-defined frequency.

To take care of the above mentioned needs, not to forget the basic expectations of the client to deliver right every-time, on-time in the best possible fashion, PeopleStrong presents a unique model of engagement to its customers known as BOM (Business-Operations-Model). This unique model starts functioning from the time even before starting the real engagement and signing of the contract. Given below is the BOM model for delivering HR Shared Services at PeopleStrong:

The Business Group consists of: Transitions Managers - This team consists of process design experts. They are generally trained in PCMM, 6 Sigma and other frameworks and keep working closely with the Operations group and client stakeholders to continuously improve processes and bring new processes within the delivery framework

Business Managers - This team is the combination of sales and HR domain experts who initiate the discussions with clients and create the solutions for them. This team plays the key role since they enables clients to traverse the journey from need identification to implementation. They have the full visibility of the entire engagement and perform the hand-holding role throughout the engagement.

The Operations group consists of:Operation Center of Excellence - This group has a galaxy of HRO experts who have performed strong operational delivery role in varied relevant industries. The team is headed by the Chief of Service Delivery along with service delivery leaders for each vertical.

Service Delivery Leads - This set of team are responsible for overall delivery of each of the clients and ensure that the SLAs are met effectively for the overall function.

Client Managers - This team is dedicated to each account and performs the activities in most efficient way. They are the extended arms of the client delivery owners.

This integrated approach of Business and Operations facilitates ensures that the Transformation is happening for the client in most cost efficient way and brining the optimal results.

BOM is a major factor in PeopleStrong's high retention rate of customers and ever increasing scope of the relationships. It is aligned to PeopleStrong's values and has become a way of life for every associate at PeopleStrong - right till the last man standing.

Business Group

Business Managers

Transitions Team

Client

Delivery Lead

CXOs

Line Managers

Operations Group

Operation center of excellence

Quality

Strong engagement model

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HR Shared Services : The PeopleStrong impact

• More than 15 implementations in HR Shared Services

• 44, 000 calls & emails answered per month

•

• 51,000 transactional activities done per month

• 1 activity every 4.82 sec

• 1,00,000 employees’ HR needs being catered

• 5 delivery locations

• India's first 1800 multi-lingual toll free number

• HR on cloud for over 1.5 lac employees

• 320 HR processes implemented

• 400 locations across India serviced through Shared Services

1 employee query resolved every 4.9 Sec

PeopleStrong HR Services is a leading India based HR Outsourcing company specializing in HR Shared Services, Consulting, Payroll Management and Recruitment solutions.

PeopleStrong offers the best of the breed HR business solutions across verticals, catering to over 40 multinational clients.

PeopleStrong is a venture capital funded company and our investors include CXOs of top global companies such as Quatrro, IBM, Aditya Birla Group and Viacom. Within two years of its inception, PeopleStrong was rated as an emerging RPO Leader from Asia by HRO Today magazine.

Within its first three years, PeopleStrong had won several marquee clients like Nokia, CommonWealth Games 2010, L&T, SRF, Maruti-Suzuki, Aditya Birla Financial Services, Tata Sons, Microsoft, Zapper and Nokia Siemens Networks.

The economic slowdown has failed to act as a deterrent for PeopleStrong, and we have been able to maintain a healthy growth rate with our persistent efforts.

For more than 6 years, our unique combination of domain expertise, operational excellence and innovative technology has delivered happiness among our customers as well as their employees by caringly managing all transactional activities in HR, thus causing an increase in the strategic space meant for developing innovation within their organization. This has lead to higher gain margins, efficient business functions, increased productivity, better ROI and above all 'Happy Employees' for the serviced organization. PeopleStrong is dedicated in the pursuit of Creating Happy Organizations!

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