Enterprise shared services office established for higher education system

Client background

A large higher education system located in the Midwest comprised of multiple institutions, colleges and universities. Serving hundreds of thousands of students annually, the system plays a pivotal role in the state’s educational landscape.

The business challenge

The higher education system faced the critical challenge of enhancing organizational effectiveness, technology, student success and equity across its 31 institutions. The need for a cohesive shared services office arose from fragmented administrative processes, need for enhanced technology systems and disparities in student outcomes. Industry trends towards digital transformation and increased focus on equity in education further underscored the urgency for a unified approach. The system sought Baker Tilly’s expertise to develop a shared services office that would streamline operations, foster collaboration and strengthen the system’s overall performance and support for students.

Strategy and solution

To address the challenges faced by the higher education system, we supported the establishment of Enterprise Shared Services (ESS). This included developing governance structures, operating models, key tools and processes to support project ideation through to completion. Our solution utilized a standard set of templates and operations to ensure consistency while remaining flexible for various project sizes and complexities. After the development of ESS, we then supported managing a number of pilot initiatives to test the operations and effectiveness of ESS.

The benefits of the ESS were:

• Improved efficiency: Standard processes and tools increased the efficiencies by the system for project ideation, ingestion, management and close
• Enhanced collaboration: Increased cross-institutional, fostering a more unified system
• Student success: Aimed to enhance student outcomes by having all shared service initiatives target student success (either directly or indirectly)

The system plans to continue partnering with Baker Tilly to further refine their ESS framework and explore additional opportunities for enhancing organizational effectiveness and student success.