Q&A with:

Ben Huang

Head of Global Business Services Centre

Panalpina Logistics (Wuhan) Ltd

What’s your shared services background? e.g. What is your role within your SSC? How long have you

worked in shared services? What type of centre do you work in (Captive, Hybrid, Outsourced)?

“I am in charge of a multi-functional global business shared service centre (SSC) for the Panalpina group in Wuhan, China.

I have been working in the shared services sector for the past five years in international container shipping and logistics industry. In Panalpina, shared services are run in hybrid model, meaning that we outsource all our finance & accounting activities to external BPO vendor while running our own captive business operations for global business services.”

1

How long have you been working in shared services and what was your path into

the industry?“My first working experiences in shared services started about five years ago when I was working as Migration Project Manager covering APAC to move finance activities from countries into our captive global business services centre.

After completing that project, I transitioned into the captive shared services to set up the collection team. Later on, I took on the role of Operational Excellence Lead to work with external consulting firm to drive productivity and quality improvement programs within

2

How long have you been working in shared services and what was your path into

the industry?

the group logistic captive finance SSC.

Two years ago, I joined Panalpina as the site lead for their GBS site in Wuhan, China. So generally speaking, I have accumulated hands-on experiences of shared services end-to-end management experiences via the past five years of role changes within the shared services sectors.”

2

What has been your biggest challenge in your shared services career and how did

you overcome it?“The biggest challenge I ever encountered so far was to close down a separate shared service centre to consolidate it to my current site within a 3-month timeline, which means employees working in that phasing out SSC would have to leave the company since none of them was willing to relocate to the combined centre for family reasons.

That was the earliest one set up many years ago to cater to a district in the south but it is no longer economically efficient to have two centres in one country.”

3

What has been your biggest challenge in your shared services career and how did

you overcome it?

“What we did that really helped with the success of the project was to make sure we had complete honesty in face-to-face communication, timely project updates to all relevant stakeholders, especially those that were directly impacted by the change, and proper compensation packages for them to accept and agree to cooperate with us to move their work to a separate location.”

3

What has been your biggest challenge in your shared services career and how did

you overcome it?

“Those employees from that phasing out site demonstrated very high level of professionalism in the handover of their work which played a key role in ensuring the success of the move.

We earned their trust and understanding with transparent communication and fair compensation.”

3

What is the best aspect of your role/what do you enjoy most about it?

“The part that I enjoy most about my role as site lead is that I am not only managing the operations, but I am also in charge of the site’s continuous improvement team, human resources, IT, and administration functions, which makes me an overall P&L owner since our site runs as an independent legal entity.

With such full-function coverage, I could better integrate the support functions to enable the operations steering towards more efficient improvement directions.”

4

What is the best aspect of your role/what do you enjoy most about it?

“What’s more, I get to directly design and drive the site talent development indicatives, and to see the talents grow and become stronger is just very fulfilling.”

4

What is your shared services centre’s biggest achievement and how did you get

there?

“Our biggest achievement so far is the 30% productivity improvements as of Jan-Aug 2016 in our Business Operations department (the most transactional and largest department in FTE) compared to the same period last year.

For an SSC that has been around for 7 years and is still able to deliver such a significant improvement result is a very positive surprise, not only to our global leadership teams, but also to us.”

5

What is your shared services centre’s biggest achievement and how did you get

there?

“When we set the 30% improvement objective in Nov 2015, almost everyone thought it was crazy and impossible, but now, eight months down the path, no one doubts about it anymore; of course, it does not mean that it was easy. We were able to do that because of three main reasons.

First and foremost, we got endorsement and empowerment from the senior leadership team to embark on an organisational lean transformation program that gave me the authority to design the centre towards a leaner and more comprehensive SSC structure.”

5

What is your shared services centre’s biggest achievement and how did you get

there?

“Secondly, we were able to use the reliable rolling forecast from our business partners to right size our capacity and implement an agile workforce scheme which got rid of a lot of capacity waste during slack seasons. Last but not least, we have a very young and

bright site management team that are eager to learn and explore new ways of working, without which the transformation program would not have taken place so efficiently and effectively.”

5

What motivates you and keeps you engaged in your role?

“It motivates me when I see my teams grow and become stronger by transitioning into more professional SSC experts.

And it is really fulfilling to see those who leave their jobs achieve higher success in their careersbecause of their work experiences at our centre.”

6

Do you see any significant trends in shared services & outsourcing at the moment? And

how do you think this trend could change the industry (or is already changing it)?

“The biggest trend I observed in the China market is that not just the MNCs are setting up their SSCs, but many state-owned enterprises and even private companies are also taking up this path.

However, so far, most SSCs in China are still captive, single finance function, and many of them do not yet see the possibility and value of what an integrated multi-functional SSC could create for their organisations.”

7

Do you see any significant trends in shared services & outsourcing at the moment? And

how do you think this trend could change the industry (or is already changing it)?

“And many of them are still on the way of figuring out on how to build up a proper performance management and value creation strategy or framework.

Plan and execute well – this would help them to stay competitive in the current global economy slowdown; otherwise, it will hurt their organisations more with increased costs and bureaucracy.”

7

What advice would you give to someone who is just starting on their company’s shared

services journey, or to someone who is just starting their shared services career?

“Spend ample time to work out your strategy and organisational design for the first 3 or 5 years, including migration policies, value tracking and internal transfer pricing scheme.

Also, make sure to be strict on corresponding headcount reduction in the business units after moving to SSC unless the employees could be redeployed to handle new business/scopes.”

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You’ve reached the end of this Q&A!

We hope you’ve found it both informative and inspiring.

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