The cost-effectiveness of staffing solutions for GCC projects
Global capability centers (GCCs) offer tremendous value for companies that have operations all over the world. Specifically, they are cost-effective while still offering access to a great talent pool and high-quality infrastructure. Additionally, GCCs also allow large companies to embed their values and culture and seamlessly achieve operational excellence in countries and locations that are away from their global headquarters.
Typically, the success of a GCC depends on the people it hires, the processes it follows, the technology it embraces or sets up, the way it secures, processes and mines data and the way the operation itself is run – ethically, based on the company’s values and guiding principles.
Of these parameters, the first one, people, is the most crucial ingredient for a GCC’s success. This means getting the right people, with the right skills, the right values and at the right cost, on board the GCC. Achieving this is no mean task. It is not impossible either. In fact, doing this well is an art by itself.
Let us look at some of the important factors that contribute to the cost-effectiveness of staffing solutions in the GCC space.
Have a flexible operating model
The pandemic showed the way for remote working. Over time, businesses have learned to do this efficiently, effectively, and reliably. GCCs by nature were built for on-site work. But given the continued demand for remote working, GCCs must offer a hybrid operating model. They must allow people to work on-site and remotely. This is a surefire way to not only keep staff motivated, it can also significantly keep the cost of operations low. It is a truism that when people are feeling valued, they deliver high performance. So, offering both on-site and remote working options, which is, a hybrid operating model, companies can leverage three outcomes: Lower costs, high performance, and the opportunity to have committed, high-quality talent on board.
Talent acquisition using artificial intelligence
The numbers of people employed at GCCs are mind-boggling. Recruitment teams cannot cope with sourcing these number of resumes, sorting them, interviewing these people, and onboarding them through manual operations. They need to use artificial intelligence efficiently. AI can screen thousands of applications in a short span of time. It can even sort applicants for jobs based on their experience, qualifications, gender, and their current location. These tasks may have otherwise taken recruiters weeks to accomplish. Importantly, AI-powered algorithms help pull out the most relevant resumes that recruiters must consider on priority. When looking for talent in a pool being accessed by their competitors, recruiters need to be quick to make a move. Besides, the entire recruitment process must proceed fast and seamlessly. AI plays a big role in enabling this. When the entire recruitment and onboarding process is done quickly and qualitatively, there are huge cost savings for a company.
Building niche capabilities with talent
Top skill sets in demand in the market today are AI, machine learning (ML), block chain, data science and UI/UX. Basically, among all the talent available in the market, people with these skills are sought after. Having these skills sets on a team means that the organization can lead the emphasis on product innovation and creating cutting-edge technology-based solutions. So GCCs with an eye on developing these niche capabilities will onboard such talent quickly. When you have the best players in your team, you significantly enhance your chances of winning in the market. You win because your ability to innovate has gone up, your go-to-market time has shrunk and, therefore, you are more competitive. This also means you have saved hugely on experimentation costs and related delays in launching new products or in entering new products.
Having the right staffing partners
In a manufacturing context, supply chain efficiency holds the key to profitability. Similarly, in a GCC, having the right staffing partner or partners is very important to achieving scale and operational excellence. What is crucial is finding a partner whose values are aligned to your organization’s values. This is half the battle won. By investing in identifying and tying up with the right staffing partner, a GCC operation can again save staffing costs. This will directly impact the GCC’s profitability directly.
Co-managed services
GCCs can also team up with relevant partners to create a co-managed services operating model. In a co-managed services model a smaller company offering a capability that the GCC needs ties up the GCC. So the smaller company’s team becomes the GCC’s extended arm. The benefits for the GCC in a co-managed services model are: One, that it can get immediate access to a capability that would otherwise have taken it months to set up. This saves costs. Two, it can create and deliver value to the rest of its organization and its customers instantaneously. This makes it more competitive and saves costs again. It need not carry the overheads of setting up infrastructure or human resources to create that capability. This again saves costs.
Conclusion
GCCs need to be moving fast to build and operate centers on excellence. They also have to achieve this in record time. Much of a GCCs ability to evolve into a center of excellence depends on its business leadership team. This team will do well to understand that without the right people on board no infrastructure or technology can help achieve high performance. Getting the right people alone is also not a solution by itself. These people must be onboarded in an efficient manner so that there are huge time and cost savings. Only that can a GCC be truly competitive – and profitable.
