Cover Sheet Shared Services: Lessons from the Public and Private Sectors for the Nonprofit Sector

This paper provides an overview of literature relating to shared service providers and arrangements. We first discuss what is meant by shared services providers and outline the benefits of this approach according to the literature. Given that the bulk of the literature dealing with shared services is primarily focused on the business sector, we then move onto a report of the critical success factors for implementation and ongoing operation of these arrangements as identified in the business sector. Lastly, this paper seeks to review the literature relating specifically to nonprofit shared service arrangements with a review of proposing five models or broad approaches to shared services in the nonproft sector.