A new report by PricewaterhouseCoopers says UK companies could save up to £2,000 a year for every new full-time employee by managing staff administration processes through human resource shared services.
New data from PricewaterhouseCoopers in its annual HR Shared Service Index measures how efficiently companies recruit, pay and manage their people through centralised HR departments, and how the costs of these activities vary between organisations.
The biggest differences are seen in recruitment administration. It costs some HR shared service departments an average of around £700 to recruit an external candidate, while others report nearly triple this rate.
This year’s data continues to raise questions about the efficiency and effectiveness of outsourcing recruitment across many HR processes, with many HR departments finding it difficult to achieve lower costs and better service delivery through this route.
The findings also indicate that cost efficiencies across the board usually take four to five years to materialise once the move towards shared services has been initiated.