Public sector demand for shared services will outstrip supplier capacity by three to one and the IT industry is not doing enough to prepare for the scheme, says the director of the government programme.

Shared services is a central element of both the Transformational Government strategy published by the Cabinet Office eGovernment Unit (eGU) last November and the Treasury’s efficiency review. The plan is to save money by sharing administrative functions such as human resources (HR) and finance across organisations.

eGU director of shared services David Myers told Computing last autumn that the government will be spending several billion pounds on shared services over the next five years.

But speaking at a conference in London last week, Myers warned that suppliers need to do more to prepare.

‘The supply side needs to get its act together. I don’t think the industry is serving the public sector well in terms of the shared services agenda,’ he said.

‘Demand will outstrip supply by three to one over the next couple of years.’

Suppliers will need to collaborate on establishing common processes, and the market needs to be driven less by products and more by services, says Myers.

‘There are many different types of solution and not much agreement on what is best practice, and there are different methodologies and different products, so it is hard to share,’ he said.

‘The agenda is primarily driven by the desire to replace systems rather than procedures, and that needs to change.’

Plans for a shared HR system between the Cabinet Office, Treasury and Office of the Deputy Prime Minister were shelved in December because of high costs.

A much larger programme, covering as many as 10 Whitehall departments and giving a higher return on investment, is under consideration.

‘We recognise the challenges and call on the eGU to ensure it manages the evolving supplier landscape and procurement processes on the basis of openness and partnership,’ said Sureyya Cansoy, programme manager at high-tech trade body Intellect.

‘The personal engagement and leadership of a senior executive from the user business is essential to overall success.’