Now, Wal-Mart gets one invoice showing all of our brands. Both GBS and the IT shared services unit allocate their operating costs back to the business units. Specific criteria set by business units measure how each group performs. Sharing the Load Bristol-Myers isn't alone. Nearly half of the Fortune 500 have set up shared services organizations, primarily to support financial transactions, followed by human resources and IT activities, according to Martin Hammer, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers in New York.
Technology enables just about every type of shared service.
However, IT isn't always part of an organization's mix of shared services. Pa.-based Unisys Corp.'s shared services group in Bismarck, N.D., which handles accounts payable, travel reimbursements and sales commissions, must go through the company's central IT department to submit suggested changes to Unisys' three cash disbursement systems. The IT department's advisory board then prioritizes the requests. The IT group at Rogers Shared Services handles all desktops, networks and call center support for its parent company, Toronto-based Rogers Communications Inc., Canada's largest cable and wireless company. Ronan McGrath, Rogers Shared Services' president, says the group spent two years streamlining its IT infrastructure, implementing Microsoft desktops, Oracle databases, Cisco internetworking and EMC storage.