Articles

	How analytics helped an auto insurer detect fraud Rakesh Pande Head - Insurance Analytics, WNS Global Services
	Some months ago, a New York City court convicted 13 people including six medical professionals who had, over several years, milked auto insurance companies of millions in fraudulent claims. How did they do it - by staging ‘fake’ accidents in rental cars and then ‘treating’ the alleged victims to a battery of unnecessary tests including expensive EKGs and MRIs.

	Lessons from CPG companies for the home entertainment business Sanjit Bhoumick Vice President, WNS Global Services
	The movie business is undergoing a major transformation. Gone are the days when studios were great movie idea incubators. Now they also need to be “brand businesses,” scouting for projects that can be transformed into successful franchises with worldwide appeal to boot.

	Five trends for the airline industry in 2010 Todd Dirks Vice President, Travel and leisure
	In 2010, things are expected to look a lot brighter for the airline industry buffeted by one of the severest economic recessions in 2008-2009. To cope, in the past year, airlines have been forced to respond by cutting back on flights, rescheduling existing routes and searching for new revenue streams such as charging for aisle seats and baggage.

	The benefits of price optimization Rakesh Pande, Head Insurance Analytics, WNS Global Services
	As the economic slowdown continues, insurance companies continue to worry about how to retain their most profitable customers. Customers who continue their business relationships with the insurer are more than revenue generators. Satisfied customers are, indeed, a company's brand ambassadors.They spread the word about positive experiences they have had with their insurer to others they come in contact with.This word-of-mouth marketing is valuable for a company, especially in these tough times.

	Insurers’ six customer care challenges Jeremy Owenson Senior Vice President, WNS Insurance Services
	This is not the best of times for insurance companies. To better understand the decline in the industry, there is a need to examine customer satisfaction trends. Customer experience can make or break a deal for insurers. The older – more traditional – players have had to invest significant resources to move to a direct-to-consumer business model as compared to the more traditional third-party broker or independent insurance agent model. Insurers must overcome six challenges which affect the growth of their businesses.

	Getting to better Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	Better, faster, cheaper... Companies justify shared services and outsourcing, and promise a step change in delivery to end users based on this trinity. Yet few actually take time to determine what constitutes better.

	The lonely planet guide:Succeeding in the role of transformation leader Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	It may be the loneliest and toughest job on the planet. Abused by providers,repudiated by the business lines, asked by management to scale mountains in nanoseconds equipped with very few resources. Only the bravest and thickest skinned need apply. How can these agents of change thrive, and survive, the almost impossible job of changing global services delivery?

	Upward,Onward,Onsource! Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	The magnifying glass is on the performance of the estimated +2,500 shared-services operations worldwide as they stabilize and reach performance maturity. What's next for these business support units as the pressures of competition and globalization demand more, more, more...

	How outsourcing can help overcome the underwriting crunch Rajesh Desingu Vice president, Insurance Practice - North America, WNS Global Services
	Underwriters assess risks associated with new products and determine payments of premium. As a result of increasing attrition and the need to launch new products including niche ones, underwriting talent has become scarce. One estimate suggests a 40 to 50 percent shortfall in underwriting talent in North America alone. And only a few companies can afford to invest in training, contributing to the lack of trained resource.

	Making Change - The challenges of outsourcing in professional services firms Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	When a company's intrinsic value rests on the ability to attract, satisfy and retain very smart people whose production is intellect, outsourcing presents a very special change challenge. Because law firms', accountancies' and consultancies' core assets consist of the intellectual prowess of their people, unlike companies who produce products or deliver standard services, individual approaches and behaviors celebrated and accommodated. As a result, outsourcing flies in the face of traditional professional services firms' ways of working. In this article, take a look at some of the specific challenges professional services firms can expect to face when implementing outsourcing. Early acknowledgement of these challenges can drive a response model that supports successful implementation of outsourcing.

	Don’t just survive. Take the growth trajectory. Michelle Scarsbrook Senior Vice President, WNS Travel and Leisure Services
	One of the key performance indicators for an airline revenue accountant should undoubtedly be "effective management of processes that positively impact company’s cash flow and profitability". This is even more important given IATA’s 2009 prediction of a 15 percent nosedive in airline industry revenues.

	Flight Path To Survival: Business process outsourcing helps airlines, hotels, car rental industry survive the economic crisis Todd Dirks Vice President, WNS Travel and Leisure Services
	Significantly declining demand. Yo-yo-ing fuel costs. Labor relations issues. Capacity management challenges. Commoditization and lack of pricing transparency. Possible governmentregulated passenger 'bill of rights.' Plummeting revenue per available room night. Intense scrutiny and potential regulation for group and incentive businesses. Sky-rocketing fleet costs. Rate deflation. Failing health of the automobile industry. Is it any surprise the airline, hospitality and car rental industries feel like they’re up the proverbial creek without a paddle as a result of today’s abysmal economic conditions?

	Surviving The Perfect Storm Peter Grover Executive Vice President, WNS Travel and Leisure
	Having met the challenges resulting from 9/11 and changing business models, airlines find themselves again under siege, primarily from rising fuel prices. Spiraling costs and falling demand as the credit crunch bites, has pushed many carriers over the edge. Airlines need to be strategically proactive to weather the storm.

	BPO - A survival tool for the Life Insurance and Annuities Industry WNS Research WNS Global Services
	While insurance companies already outsource highly transactional processes such as claims and payments, new business processing and underwriting support, they can gain significant additional value by leveraging BPO for other processes. For example, outsourcing research and analytics for actuarial support can optimize pricing and more accurate premium calculations helping the company target additional consumers based on demographics, groups and risk profiles.

	Becoming a knowledge competitor via Knowledge Process Outsourcing Jay Venkateswaran Senior Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	The advantages of implementing knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) vary according to the aspiration of the organization. If a company already drives its decisions with knowledge, KPO can help more efficiently and cost effectively retain competitive advantage. If the organization wants to move up the knowledge competition scale, KPO can help more rapidly achieve the end-state. KPO has a role to play in every company – knowledge-novice or knowledge-savvy, regardless of the industry. But how an organization engages KPO depends on where it falls in the five levels of the knowledge competition scale....

	Changing the knowledge centricity game Jay Venkateswaran Senior Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	Organization, culture, skills, talent, tools, standardization – together all these challenge a company's ability to become a true knowledge competitor. But organizations that seek to make rapid, substantive change are increasingly leveraging knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) providers for higher value, complex, specialized skill and knowledge-based work such as research and analytics.

	Achieving knowledge centricity for competitive advantage Jay Venkateswaran Senior Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	Organizations that use knowledge to drive business decisions within all functions and at all levels achieve knowledge centricity which enables highly sustainable competitive advantage. The concept that knowledge is king becomes ingrained in the culture, the CEO's vision, and in every aspect of the company's business. But the goal of besting peer companies by competing with knowledge is an elusive struggle for many organizations. According to research conducted by Harvard University management professor Thomas H. Davenport and consultant Jeanne G. Harris, the first step in becoming a knowledge competitor is assessing the current state of knowledge processes within the organization.

	The current state of knowledge processes Jay Venkateswaran Senior Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	No two companies execute knowledge processes – or research and analytics-based support for all aspects of corporate decision making – in quite the same way. Rather, in various shapes, flavors and forms, they execute them via three methods: internal roles, technology, and the use of third parties.

	Research and analytics can help gain actionable insights across every corporate function Brian P Welsh, Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	Winning companies know that the right research and analytics enable them to gather, synthesize and extract data-based insights about their customers and their rivals, with the resulting insights provide them with monumental, actionable competitive advantage. While these successful examples intuitively make sense as they are highly transactional in nature, the fact is that every corporate function in just about every industry benefits from the insights research and analytics yields. Here are a few examples of how almost every corporate function can benefit from applying research and analytics.

	Winning companies compete with knowledge Jay Venkateswaran Senior Vice President, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	Understanding every aspect of customer behavior. Getting the most out of marketing spend. Driving sales force productivity to the next level. Optimizing logistics to gain supply chain efficiency. Reducing risk. Entering new markets with a targeted strategy. If accomplished, these goals quickly differentiate a company from its competitors. But how does a company achieve those goals? By competing with knowledge, driving decisions with actionable insight.

	Single-tower BPO deals - Quick path to cost cuts and outsourcing success Becky Dennis Senior Vice President, WNS Global Services
	While multi-tower outsourcing engagements – in which a range of functions such as F&A, HR, IT and contact center are bundled into one contract awarded to a single provider – may seem an effective way to quickly reduce costs due to economies of scale and presumed truncated solutioning phases, the reality is often quite the opposite. Think back to post-September 11 when cost reduction, just like today, was an outsourcing buyer's primary driver. Then consider the multi-tower deals struck during this timeframe – large utility and insurance company buyers top the list – all of which resulted in missed expectations.

	Nearshoring to Bucharest: Say ‘Salut’ Imrana Khan Global Services Media
	Besides multilingual services capabilities, Bucharesters inherit strong mathematical and analytical skills. This is what makes the city an adorable outsourcing location,not only to the companies that operate in the same time zone, but also to the ones several miles away.

	Business Process Outsourcing: A survival tool for logistics companies in uncertain times Jaison Augustine Vice President, WNS Industrial and Infrastructure Services
	Today's economic climate is clearly causing gloom, doom, fear and often panic for the logistics industry. A host of factors - the credit crunch, unprecedented economic volatility, deteriorating consumer confidence, yo-yoing fuel costs,increased governmental regulations, declining revenues, severe earnings and cash flow pressures, loss of pricing power and excess capacity - together are significantly impacting the industry's bottom line.

	The Financial Offshoring Imperative Rod Newing Reproduced from Best Practice Outsourcing & Offshoring, Lyonsdown Media Group
	Outsourcing finance and accounting processes can achieve significant savings, but organizations can achieve greater value by outsourcing even their strategic financial processes. Some organisations are now outsourcing critical financial functions as well as their transaction processing. This reflects not just cost cutting, but recognition of the value that a third party service outsourcing provider can bring as part of a strategy to concentrate internal resources on the key areas that create shareholder value. In addition to transaction processes, sophisticated finance and accounting outsourcing providers are capable of taking over much of the higher-level value creation work such as data analytics, decision support and financial management tasks, including planning, budgeting, treasury management, performance management and risk evaluation and assessment.

	Business Process Outsourcing: A life raft for businesses striving to stay afloat WNS Research WNS Global Services
	Nowhere to hide. Today's global economic crisis is creating untold challenges for businesses in all industries, in all corners of the world. Business leaders of large and small companies alike are struggling to weather the storm that is affecting the survival of many once solid companies. With no safe harbor in sight, it is time to sort out how to stay afloat.

	The emerging plug-and-play model in Finance and Accounting Outsourcing Manish Vora, Senior Vice President WNS Finance and Accounting Services
	As companies look for ways to derive more value from their outsourcing initiatives, BPU (Business Process Utility) is emerging as an option. By aligning people, process and technology, the BPU delivery model is most suitable for transactional processes that are built around standard inputs with well defined outputs. Under the BPU model, the service provider offers a turnkey solution comprised of best-in-class people, processes and technology. The BPU model lends itself to a unit transaction pricing (aka 'pay-by-the-drink') model and thereby allowing companies to move away from their current 'fixed cost' base to one that provides greater flexibility and predictability in the current economic environment.

	Supporting revenue growth in a time of economic slowdown using predictive analytics Amitabh Bose Senior Vice President and Head, WNS CPG and Retail Practices
	The quake that hit the global financial markets last year left shoppers and retailers bracing for a cold and lackluster Christmas. As anticipated, post-holiday consumer surveys reported holiday sales far below expectations as a result of record low spending. The only winners in the face of the economic downturn were value retail outlets such as Walmart which experienced increased consumer traffic (69% shoppers in 2008 as compared 33% in 2007; source: ARG), as a direct result of aggressive value-for-money promotions and discounts.

	Leverage actionable insights to increase competitiveness in UK’s retail industry Himanshu Pal Manager, WNS Research and Analytics Services
	The success mantra for retailers lies in gaining better and faster insights pertaining to market, consumer, self and competitors and then using these insights to develop and execute business strategies. Identifying and developing these insights to define and sharpen their strategy is impacted by the paucity of talent, time, and analytical expertise. Successful retailers have recognized the power of outsourcing this capability to develop actionable insights.

	Core No More! Implementing Sourcing to Fuel Growth in the Insurance Industry Sumer Shankardass Insurance Practice Leader, WNS Global Services
	A fundamental shift in outsourcing is just now discernable in the insurance industry, triggered by a new definition as to what is the core business. In most industries, outsourcing of business processes has been used primarily as a tool to reduce cost. Identifying the so-called non-core functions, typically from the back office, for consolidation to and delivery by third party providers has been the rule rather than the exception. But outsourcing activity in the insurance industry has begun to veer dramatically from this approach.

	WNS: Making a Groundbreaking Transition from Shared Services Organization to BPO Provider Roy Barden and Philip Carnelley Finance Executive Insight (Case Study), The Hackett Group, Inc.
	Many companies consider turning their in-house shared service organizations into commercial entities, but real-life examples are rare. WNS is an uncommon instance of success in making that transition. The company began life as an offshore unit of British Airways that performed processes such as accounts payable. In 2002, aided by an investment from venture capital fund Warburg Pincus, it was successfully commercialized and since that time has increased its revenues dramatically, providing business process outsourcing services to a variety of industries. The most important lesson from executives who led the initiative is that the WNS experience is not directly replicable...

	Supply Chain Flexibility - Are You Ready To Dance? Jaison Augustine Vice President, WNS Industrial and Infrastructure Services
	As the world watched the captivating fireworks and synchronized movements of hundreds of performers at the Beijing Olympics, the logistics industry was grappling with its own synchronization efforts behind the scenes to keep critical supply chains in motion around Beijing. The Chinese government had ordered the closure of several factories around the city in an attempt to improve the air quality ahead of the Olympic Games. They also imposed severe restrictions on the movement of cargo trucks around the city a month in advance. While these restrictions where challenging for companies operating and distributing in the local area, they also had ramifications for companies sourcing from Beijing, proving that global supply chains must be flexible to deal with surprises and disruptions.

	The Rise of the "Smart Client " Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	In any nascent market, attention is always paid to those who initiate or brand a new idea or service; in the case of BPO, the perpetrator was arguably the provider community. But as the market for BPO services matures, with increased competition and differentiation among providers and more transparent and longer track records, clients have no choice but to take on the dominant role in driving the change represented by implementing new back office process delivery arrangements

	Next Generation Offshoring in the Investment Management Space: The Keys to Driving Success Arijit Sengupta Co-CEO, WNS Banking and Financial Services
	It may be the last frontier for offshore outsourcing of financial services; typically wary of risk and historically cushioned by solid margins, investment managers have historically eschewed offshoring of business processes as aggressively as their counterparts in the credit card or mortgage space. However, as operating models and financial structures change dramatically due to economic conditions, offshoring must, of necessity, become a strategic tool for asset managers to manage costs, transform service levels and support the development of differentiated offerings which can effectively compete in a global, highly competitive marketplace. But it will take readiness on behalf of two parties asset managers and providers to make the change.

	Are You Capable? Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	Whether organizations are transforming business processes by setting up captive, shared services centers, outsourcing or structuring some combination of both, the moves represent a major change for stakeholders, business lines, and end users. Organizations tend to focus on leadership from the top as the critical success factor for implementation of global services. Yet they ignore the fact that visible endorsement cannot substitute for a retained team competent to juggle a myriad of factors when developing a solution, determining the pace of change, dealing with a various personnel issues, and managing a relationship that is based on often alien commercial principles.

	Transition Secrets Of Winston Churchill Deborah Kops Chief Marketing Officer, WNS Global Services
	Try the words of the words of the famous Statesman and Orator, Winston Churchill. "Every day you may make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet, there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know, you will never get to the end of the journey. But this, far from discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of the climb."