Why professional services outsourcing is the new growth lever for hi-tech GCCs

For hitech global capability centres (GCCs) to evolve from mere cost-saving units to strategic transformation hubs, professional services outsourcing (PSO) has become a critical contributing factor. 

Historically, GCCs have concentrated on leveraging in-house talent and execution-driven functions to get the job done, but in these times where a new change is just around the corner—due to complex technologies and rising customer expectations intertwined with global competition—outsourcing professional services presents a scalable, cost-effective, and consolidated approach to sustainable growth.   

This article delves into PSO, showcasing how GCCs can thoughtfully weave it into their operations, and the significant benefits it brings.  

What is professional services outsourcing? 

Professional services outsourcing refers to delegating specialised business functions to external experts, allowing GCCs to share the load of efficiency and operations. These high-value services, once outsourced, enable GCCs to hone in on their core capabilities and prioritise innovation, all while tapping into world-class expertise.  

Think of it as a partnership that helps GCCs with that extra push to shift from being just support units to their parent organisations and become enhanced business providers through expert-led service delivery.  

Here are the top 4 areas that constitute this partnership: 

Customer onboarding 

A strong and impactful customer onboarding experience sets the foundation for long-term success. It is a known fact that when customers struggle with complicated product/SaaS implementations or face friction during onboarding, retention rates drop. 

One way to circumvent this is to outsource this function to specialised teams with the expertise to handle the onboarding journey. This outsourcing can reduce internal operational burdens and crunch time-to-value for customers, thus improving product adoption and retention. 

Solution design  

Customisation has become a part of every digitally available service, application, and product. Each customer has unique business needs and ambitious goals, making solution design a vital capability. Typically, sales teams engage solution consultants or sales engineering teams to close deals. However, the more distinctive the use cases, the more internal resources are consumed. 

By collaborating with firms specialising in these services, GCCs can deliver custom solutions more swiftly and cost-effectively, leading to higher customer satisfaction and a competitive edge. The resources saved can then be redirected to shaping future products.

Platform implementation and modernisation 

There's no denying that platform implementation is a resource-intensive process requiring deep technical expertise. However, the upsides of outsourcing can be substantial—leveraging global talent pools with diverse competencies across enterprise applications, including martech, CRM, ERP, data and AI, cloud computing, devops, cybersecurity, and API integrations. 

This approach can speed up go-live timelines, reduce implementation and upgrade costs, enhance customer satisfaction, and ensure high-quality deployments without overburdening internal teams. 

Driving product adoption and renewals 

Customer adoption drives platform success. By outsourcing product adoption and renewal management to specialised teams, GCCs can deploy data-led strategies that increase engagement and enhance customer loyalty. 

These teams track usage, flag churn risks early, and act before renewals to boost satisfaction and retention. This combined focus amplifies customer lifetime value, improves net revenue retention, and positions GCCs as key revenue enablers for their parent organisations. 

Why GCCs should invest in the PSO model 

While these four high-value professional resources barely scratch the surface, it’s clear that GCCs can upgrade their operations and the quality of their services, and improve the likelihood of a successful transition from an execution outpost to an innovation hub with PSO. 

Key benefits include:  

1. Increased agility and scalability: Rather than starting from scratch to hire and train new teams, GCCs can tap into external expertise instantly, scale operations on demand, and circle around operational bottlenecks and boast about faster project execution.  
2. Focus on core innovation: By outsourcing routine yet critical tasks, GCCs can free up internal pipelines to engineer and perfect high-impact innovations for their parent organisations, such as AI-driven automation, cybersecurity advancements, and cloud-native engineering. 
3. Optimise cost without compromising quality: With access to global talent pools, offshore and nearshore outsourcing models ensure cost efficiency and top-tier service delivery in a neat and convenient package.  
4. Maximise revenue opportunities: Specialised PSO teams can drive product adoption, renewals, and expansion opportunities, turning customer success into a predictable growth engine. 

 A catalyst for change 

GCCs, whether nascent, evolving, or advanced, can accelerate their journey towards becoming innovation-led growth engines by leveraging the PSO model. Emerging GCCs can scale quickly by outsourcing specialised functions like customer onboarding, while mature centres can drive innovation in solution design, AI adoption, and data-driven personalisation. 

With its flexibility to evolve alongside organisational maturity, PSO empowers GCCs to move beyond execution, unlock global growth opportunities, and deliver greater strategic value to their parent organisations.

The author is SVP at Bounteous x Accolite, a global digital transformation consultancy firm.