How GCCs Can Be Platforms For Corporate Entrepreneurship

In recent years, multinational companies have leveraged Global Capability Centers (GCCs), which serve as offshore units to deliver a wide array of services to parent organizations. These centers have emerged as internal departments within the global corporate structure and offer specialized services. These include core functions, such as Information Technology (IT), Research and Development (R&D), and customer support.

GCCs are now becoming crucial in the current corporate entrepreneurship landscape for achieving cost savings, promoting collaboration, and tapping into diverse talent pools. Drawing from practical experience and innovation, these centers prioritize developing effective ways to tackle real-world business challenges. In this way, they strengthen entrepreneurial resilience and drive sustainable growth.

GCCs as Innovation Hubs 

For global enterprises, Global Capability Centers have evolved into critical innovation hubs that enable them to stay ahead in the highly competitive business landscape. To maximize their impact, these enterprises are aligning their strategic priorities with the capabilities of these centers.

GCC innovation involves developing advanced applications for emerging technologies. These include:  

• Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Machine Learning (ML)
• Advanced data analytics
• Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
• Internet of Things (IoT)
• Blockchain

GCCs delve into these technologies in-house at Centers of Excellence (CoEs). CoEs enable global enterprises to make breakthroughs in technological advancements, use them innovatively, and create Intellectual Property (IP). This gives entrepreneurial GCCs an advantage over their competitors.

While CoEs offer several advantages, companies may also find value in partnering with start-ups or academic institutions, especially when they have already made significant progress in a particular domain.

This way, GCCs gain access to cutting-edge expertise, faster innovation cycles, sharper customer focus, a competitive edge, and the possibility of unlocking new revenue streams. These collaborations can take various forms, including innovation labs, start-up incubators, hackathons, or even direct investment in promising ventures.

Building Entrepreneurial Culture 

To achieve true success, GCCs need to incorporate corporate entrepreneurship in a way that transcends their traditional role as cost-saving centres. This involves creating an environment that encourages, actively pursues, and rewards innovation.

To build such a culture, GCCs require empowering their employees at all levels to take ownership, challenge the status quo, and come up with new solutions. To bring in this transformation and build an entrepreneurial GCC, leadership takes a central stage.

Leaders need to focus on promoting curiosity while providing access to resources for experimentation. One of the crucial aspects of such an environment is the creation of a safe space where new ideas can be tested, even if they don’t succeed immediately.

This also requires investment in continuous learning and development endeavors that equip teams with a forward-thinking perspective and skills in emerging technologies. Ultimately, a GCC with corporate entrepreneurship focuses on proactively identifying new opportunities and developing cutting-edge solutions thereby creating significant value for their parent organization.

Success Metrics 

Global Capability Centers (GCCs) are evaluated on multiple fronts to gauge their value on business impact. Key metrics include: 

• Cost Optimization & Efficiency
  The key indicators of GCC’s success include measuring the impact on operational costs, i.e., the total cost of ownership. To gauge the level of corporate entrepreneurship, improving the cost-to-revenue ratio and efficiency gains achieved through better turnaround times and productivity remain key indicators.   

• Revenue Growth and Scalability
  Parent organizations evaluate the GCC’s capability to scale rapidly. Simultaneously, they need to ensure that GCCs do not compromise on quality while contributing directly to revenue generation, especially through market expansion.

• Talent Development and Innovation
  Another aspect includes tracking talent attraction and retention rates, along with the impact of skill development programs. Parent companies should also assess contributions to GCC innovation by coming up with novel solutions, IP, and leveraging local ecosystems.

• Strategic Alignment
  Parent organizations also require assessment of GCC’s contribution to the broader corporate goals. These include digital transformation or market entry, and its ability to promote collaboration across business units.

• Technology Adoption and Digital TransformationAnother key indicator involves the measurement of the level of technological integration and the automation driven by the GCC.

• Risk Mitigation and Resilience
  This includes evaluating the GCC’s ability to monitor risks relating to cybersecurity, data protection, and ensuring business continuity during disruptions.

• Governance and Compliance
  Teams also need to check whether the GCC adheres to local and global regulatory frameworks. The maintenance of transparency and accuracy in financial and operational reporting is another key indicator to watch out for.

Real-World Examples 

A prominent US financial institution, specializing in commercial banking, faced significant hurdles in its digital transformation journey due to a severe shortage of skilled technical talent. This led to escalating hiring costs, prolonged recruitment cycles, and high candidate drop-off rates, all of which threatened to impede the bank’s digital ambitions.

Recognizing the need for a strategic solution, the bank partnered with ANSR to establish a state-of-the-art Technical Center of Excellence (TCoE) in Bengaluru, India. By integrating corporate entrepreneurship in their CoE, they addressed the talent shortage head-on while paving the way for streamlined operations and optimized financial processes.

Ready to build an entrepreneurial GCC working as agile innovation hubs that drive real impact? From setting up Centers of Excellence (CoE) to promoting a culture of entrepreneurship, ANSR’s proven expertise ensures GCC becomes a true growth engine. Contact ANSR to explore the full growth potential of a Global Capability Center.