From chaos to clarity: the engine in HR Shared Services

At The HR Fixers, we’re seeing a renewed focus on the strategic value of HR Shared Services (HRSS), not just as a cost-saving tool, but as a driver of agility, employee experience, and operational efficiency. 

In today’s dynamic business environment, organisations are increasingly moving towards centralised HR delivery models to respond faster to workforce needs, manage compliance at scale, and create seamless service experiences. Shared Services is often at the heart of this transformation. 

Let’s explore what Shared Services in HR really means, the capabilities it brings, the types of services and roles it involves, and how to navigate the challenges and competing priorities. 

What is HR Shared Services? 

HR Shared Services (HRSS) is a centralised model for delivering routine, transactional, and standardised HR activities. Instead of every business unit or location managing its own HR admin tasks, Shared Services consolidates them into one team or platform – improving consistency, efficiency, and employee satisfaction. 

This model often sits alongside Centres of Expertise (COEs) for deep functional expertise (e.g., Reward or Talent), and HR Business Partners (HRBPs) who remain embedded in the business. 

Capabilities in HR Shared Services

HR Shared Services isn’t just about processing forms or answering employee questions. Modern Shared Services teams are equipped with capabilities such as: 

• Case and knowledge management: managing employee queries through tools like ticketing systems and knowledge bases. 

• Automation and workflow: automating high volume, repeatable tasks like onboarding, document generation, and approval flows. So Advisors can focus on the complex, human-centred cases.  

• Collaboration, through people insights and reporting: providing accurate HR data, dashboards, and compliance reporting. Servicing HRBPs will insightful data to drive an optimise workforce and remove concerning trends around sickness, wellbeing or poor performance.  

• Service Delivery Channels: supporting omnichannel access – email, phone, self-service portals, chatbots so the whole workforce can access services no matter where they are. 

• Continuous Improvement: using feedback and service metrics (SLAs, NPS) to refine and evolve service delivery. 

Types of services in HR Shared Services

Shared Services typically handles a broad scope of transactional and advisory support, including: 

• Employee Lifecycle Services: recruitment, onboarding, offboarding, contract changes, role moves, secondments. 

• Payroll and Benefits Administration: data input, adjustments, deductions, enrolment queries. 

• HR Systems and Data Management: maintaining employee records, ensuring data integrity across platforms like SAP SuccessFactors or Workday or Hi Bob. 

• Policy Guidance and Tier 1 Advice: supporting employees and managers with basic interpretation of HR policies. 

• Leave and Absence Administration: managing maternity/paternity/parental leave, sick leave, holiday accruals. 

• Training Administration: learning catalogue maintenance, training request processing, scheduling, payments & record maintenance  

• Employment Verification and Documentation: producing letters, contracts, visa support, etc. 

Roles in HR Shared Services 

• HR Service Advisors (Tier 1 Support): first point of contact for queries, managing tickets and knowledge articles. 

• HR Specialists (Tier 2 Support): handling complex or escalated cases (e.g., international assignments, complex leave scenarios). This is a growing field of expertise.  

• HR Systems Administrators: managing system configurations, user access, workflows, and integrations.  

• Shared Services Team Leads and Managers: overseeing team performance, service levels, continuous improvement. 

• Service Excellence Leads: driving process optimisation and employee experience enhancements. 

The Challenges and competing priorities

Despite the benefits, Shared Services doesn’t come without hurdles: 

🚧 Balancing Standardisation vs. Local Needs: multinational organisations often struggle to apply global processes while respecting local legal and cultural nuances. 

🚧 Adoption of Self-Service: encouraging employees and managers to use self-service tools can be a slow and uneven journey. Causing over-reliance on the Advisors and lots of tickets, leading to slow turnaround times.  

🚧 Fragmented Technology Ecosystems: integrating data and processes across multiple HR systems, legacy tools, and manual workarounds can dilute efficiency. 

🚧 Change Resistance: business units may resist centralisation, fearing loss of control or reduced service quality. 

🚧 Service Metrics vs. Experience: meeting SLAs doesn’t always equate to a great employee experience. Balancing efficiency with empathy is critical. 

🚧 Talent Development in Shared Services: ensuring Shared Services roles offer growth and career progression opportunities remains a challenge in many organisations. 

Where to start?

Organisations looking to unlock the full potential of HR Shared Services should: 

Start with the operating model: how will the work be done (why start here, read our blog about Operating models first, structure second).  

• Determine the services this team needs to provide.  
• Determine the capabilities required to offer these services.  
• Design processes around the employee journey, not internal convenience. 
• Invest in enabling technology and automation. 
• Design a scorecard that captures the outcomes to be delivered. Tracking trends and root cause improvement over time.  

Move to the org: who will do the work.  

• Define clear roles to deliver these services. 
• Link to values and culture to ensure collaboration. 
• Enable empowered leaders who will own the service offering and cascade key messages.  
• Ensure communication across the function is organised, alongside channels to communicate to the wider business

Use data and opportunities to listen and gather feedback, to continuously refine services. 

• From within the team  
• From across the business 

The HR Fixers’ difference 

At The HR Fixers, we help organisations reimagine their HR service delivery – from operating models, service proposition, to system optimisation. Whether you’re setting up your Shared Services model or enhancing an existing one, we can help you align service delivery with employee expectations and business strategy. 

Let’s fix HR for the future.