Government departments have made the investment in enabling technologies such as Oracle or SAP to support the delivery of shared services, but it will take time for each department to stabilise after their software implementation (Public sector shares admin). The lack of business change skills and investment has restricted the ability of most to realise business benefits but this is starting to happen.

It is hard to see how the Department for Work and Pensions or HM Revenue and Customs can develop shared service platforms for other departments without some involvement from the private sector. I suspect they will have to create new agencies to avoid being held back by the inertia of their own organisations.

The NHS shared service has not been fully adopted by hospital trusts and again this will limit the scope for savings and commercial opportunity for private companies. However, departments have started the journey and there is no going back.

John Turner