Wednesday 8 January 2014

5 point checklist to watch out for when recruiting a Financial services outsourcing partner



Financial aspects of business may not be the core of a business, but they are by no means an aspect that can be overlooked or taken lightly. After all, it’s finance that we all work for. However, handling financial operations of a business is no longer as easy or as simple as plain old book-keeping oriented accounting as in past. 

It is because the environment today is technology driven as technology is what brings in security, accuracy and precision. Also global businesses and operations require multi-cultural, multi-policy-compliant approach to finance and accounting.


Most businesses today therefore, prefer to hire an outsourcing service provider to handle their in-house F&A services, in order to be cost, efficiency and performance-driven by hiring quality-centric service providers.

If a business plans to hire a shared service partner, it is always prudent to check for a few basic non-negotiable parameters as listed below:

  •  ·         Fast-paced ability to keep up with regulatory and accounting changes.
  • ·         End to end process delivery expertise.
  • ·         Excellence driven work culture.
  • ·         Impeccable data security.
  • ·         Global delivery model potential.


To elaborate on the above, a brief understanding of the current business scenario helps. In today’s business environment, stringent policies and regulations are a part of everyday financial and accounting domain. Governments, tax departments all across the globe constantly bring in new regulations that businesses are supposed to be compliant to. In such a scenario it is of paramount importance that your service partner has a potential for fast-paced ability to keep up with regulatory and accounting changes. This is only to ensure that your business isn’t later penalized for some violation that happened only because your service provider wasn’t upbeat.

Finance and accounting can be never isolated as a process in business. Hence it is important that your expert understands the various multi-domain relationships that affect the financial performance of your business. They should have end to end process delivery expertise to ensure that if need be they can begin from scratch and can drive your financial management to its peak.

It is only a service partner who performs in an excellence driven culture that any business deserves. Irrespective of the size of the outsourced operations, it is paramount that your business outsourcing partner just doesn’t believe in fulfilling the execution of the work but also in driving it towards excellence and strives for perfection. 

Data security is an absolute non-negotiable. The data of a company, specially the financial data is one of the most valuable resources and should be kept confidential at any cost. There is no way that the security of your data can be compromised upon. Hence it is important that your outsourcing solution expert has the necessary know-how and technical strength to maintain the confidentiality of your data.

Global delivery model potential is a must – have for your outsourcing service provider specially if they are not a part of your domestic market but are located internationally. This means that irrespective of where they are located, they can deliver their services according to the rules and regulations of your country and follow the law of your land. It also means that their technical and manpower resource has a potential of addressing your eventual global needs as well, if you choose to expand.

As discussed above, before you decide to opt for a financial services outsourcing model, it is important that you plan it with a longer vision and select a service provider with a potential of addressing your growing business needs in the longer run.


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