Shared Administrative, Financial and Research Support Services in the new Consortium of CGIAR Centers

As part of Phase II of designing the Consortium, the Alliance engaged Accenture Development Partnership (ADP) to undertake a review and analysis of the opportunities for common administrative, financial and research support services. The results of this consultancy will inform the Consortium Board and the 15 Centers on the type of shared services and research support functions the Consortium needs to provide to the Centers and on the most effective and efficient way of providing these services, including the location of the shared services units.

A reference group was established to help guide the consultancy (Shared Services Reference group). The Accenture team have been in direct contact (including site visits and data collection) with all the Centers, the System Offices, Challenge Programs, the CGIAR Secretariat, AIARC and some of the regional hubs (e.g. Kampala, Uganda).

Preliminary findings indicate there are clear opportunities to increase and improve services; increase effectiveness and efficiency of back office and research services; improve the CGIAR’s ability to support growth and change; reduce redundancies in services, technology and costs, and reduce per unit costs as demand and usage of services increase. It may be that there are additional opportunities to rationalize current functions across centres however all these opportunities will be prioritized against a set of defined criteria.

Accenture’s preliminary report was reviewed by the full Alliance with the final report informed by ongoing consultation and completed by 10 November 2009. The results of the consultancy will inform the Consortium Board and the 15 Centers on the type of shared services and research support functions the Consortium needs to provide to the Centers and on the most effective and efficient way of providing these services, including the location of the shared services units.