Shared Services Initiative / Guiding Principles

• Delighting the ultimate customer or end user is the top priority
• Using service level agreements, metrics, etc. extensively to foster accountability and emphasize roles and responsibilities and measure cost containment, unit cost, and savings realized
• Standardizing processes to drive out cost, improve service, achieve consistency, and reduce rework
• Fully-communicating to customers, stakeholders, functional staff, technical staff, etc.
• Involving people in these projects with creativity, vision and openness to innovation
• Recognizing technical diversity; priority is to standardize where possible but recognize the need for flexibility when necessary as it supports the academic enterprise
• Ensuring that a change management process occurs throughout the organization such that the full benefits of innovation are realized and embraces principles of continuous quality improvement
• Ensuring that policies are examined for the benefits provided and impediments removed when possible
• Aggregating transactions at a division, campus or system level as it makes sense to do so taking into context:
  • Standardized policies exists
  • Cost/benefit analysis suggests it is a good fit
  • Level of automation achieved in the transaction
  • Quality of service provided
  • Degree to which knowledge of the activity around which the transaction is generated is necessary
  • Not a one-size-fits-all and should be determined function by function

Reviewed 2011-05-02.