Meet Our Expert Advisors

Tom Olavi Bangemann is an experienced manager, coach, mentor and board member with proven content and managerial track record. Currently he is an independent advisor and Head of Data Development and Research for SSON Research & Analytics. Tom worked at Arthur Andersen for 9 years, and at The Hackett Group for 19 years. He has profound experience in delivery, sales, business development and international consulting practice leadership. He is also a subject matter expert for GBS, benchmarking and KPI models.

Tom was a regular Board member of a publicly listed software company. He was also named “HR Superstar” by HRO Magazine 5 times between 2005-2019 and has mentoring and coaching experience up to the level of mentoring CHRO of 1bn listed company.

Tom has been a regular event speaker, chairman and panelist, and author. He has been voted onto SSON expert panels G6 Europe, G6 Australia, D6 Germany and C6 China. He was Chairman of the Arab Outsourcing event twice and chaired GBS events in China for 10 years. Tom received the award of "Thought Leader of the Year" from SSON in May 2010.He is also the founder of several GBS communities, and proactive supporter of new business setups. Tom has written a book "'Shared Services in Finance and Accounting" and produces research and articles on a continuous basis.

A senior HR practitioner and a veteran of 7 global HR Transformations over 25 years. This includes 3 GBS start-ups and HRIS implementations of Workday, Oracle and SuccessFactors.

Simon has global HR experience with GlaxoSmithKline over 10 years within global Shared Services. He has also led HR Shared Services Europe for the Coca-Cola Company. This was extended to Eurasia and Africa, and later Simon helped to set up the new Global Business Services for Coca-Cola.

Simon ran HR Shared Services and Employee Relations for NCR Corporation - EMEA and led HR/GBS Change Management initiatives for CWT, BD, and GKN Automotive. He is a Conference speaker, HR Strategy columnist, podcaster, and reporting and analytics consultant for SSON Research & Analytics.

Bob Cecil is a trusted strategic advisor with over 30 years of experience helping organizations optimize general and administrative structures and services to advance overall strategies and drive cost savings. He leverages both breadth and depth of understanding across improvement levers, including shared services, outsourcing, process re-design, and deployment of advanced digital technologies. He is an intellectually curious and transparent advisor to boards and C-suite leaders with a robust network of relationships that facilitate learning and the adoption of leading practices.

Bob was previosuly a Partner at KPMG, EquaTerra, and Exult/Gunn Partners. He led complex multifunctional, global improvement engagements for many of the world’s most respected companies across a broad cross-section of industries, including consumer markets, life sciences, industrial manufacturing, technology, and services.

Former Managing Director and Country head – Allstate India

Chetan Garga brings an enviable combination of technology and operations leadership with deep financial service expertise over 30 years and multiple geographies. As an independent consultant and GCC Specialist, he helps companies with Shoring and Sourcing strategies, starting centers, scaling or creating COE’s, having setup multiple Global Capability centers.

Under his leadership, Allstate India won the Kincentric ‘Best Employer India’, The Economic Times ‘Best Workplaces for Women, and Certified as a Great Place to Work Organization for multiple years. He has also been recognized as one of India’s Best Leaders in Times of Crisis 2021 by the Great Place to Work Institute and The Economic Times Most Promising Business Leaders of Asia 2022 and a top 25 GCC leader in 2023.

Before joining Allstate, Chetan served as Senior Vice President of Wealth Management and Banking at SunGard in India, where he managed teams in India, China, and Tunis, and prior to that setup Operations for Northern Trust in India.

Chetan is the ex-chair of the NASSCOM GCC council for Karnataka (Sector body for IT and ITES companies in India). He is a visiting faculty with IIM Bangalore and is often seen on panels of leading sector bodies like NASSCOM.

He is on the advisory board of an NGO providing schooling for BPL children and guiding a Business School/University in their strategy. Additionally, he is on the advisory Board of 2 startups in the Retail and Data space.

A high performing C-suite executive with a successful track record of over 3 decades in country and global roles. Worked with Unilever and Philip Morris in India, Singapore, UK and Switzerland.

Cross-functional experiences spanning Finance, Treasury, Tax, Accounting, Operations, Supply Chain and Global Business Services. Intimate knowledge of working in many cultures. Key roles include Global Head of the GBS at Philip Morris, CFO for Unilever International in Singapore and National Head of Supply Chain at Unilever India (Foods).

An authentic leader who builds deep relationships across the organization and develops leaders and teams through coaching and modelling.

“It’s all about where, how and when the wheel hits the tarmac …”

Advising on Shared Services and GBS since 1993, he has consulted with over 130 companies on where to locate or consolidate processes and functions. His clients are both newcomers to the Shared Services/GBS concept as well as mature Shared Services Organizations.

He has a deep understanding of “what works where” through field work in 47 countries and +350 cities globally, from Tier-1 Shared Services destinations through Tier-4 “Under the Radar Locations”.

An engineer by education, and with senior management positions at Big-4 consultancies refining his skills, Elias combines robust analytics with deep experience-based insights and cultural awareness gained through his work and by living 7 countries.

He regularly publishes of GBS trends and speaks at major industry forums.

Elias teaches International Business Strategy at two universities and is a member of the Site Selectors’ Guild.

Helps leading GBS organizations drive change by rethinking work content, structure, scope, solutions, organizations and roles in the face of four key disrupters: rapid digitization, generational shifts, changing business dynamics and the imperative for performance.

Her career has been focused on the design and management of back-office processes, including managing directorships at FleetBoston Financial's (now Bank of America) Technology and Operations Group, and at Deutsche Bank; consulting partnerships in major firms; and chief marketing officer of an Indian-legacy business process outsourcer. She has also held leadership positions in technology start ups funded by Goldman Sachs and Warburg Pincus. She currently is a board advisor for a hypergrowth data technology start-up.

She is a prolific writer and frequently presents at major industry forums, and is a senior fellow of The Conference Board. In 2022, Deborah received a Lifetime Achievement Award in Shared Services from Deloitte.

Ashish Malhotra is C-suite advisor and an Organization Transformation specialist with an emphasis on global human capital within SG&A, designing and executing transformative strategies, GBS operations, shared services and, outsourcing strategies.

As a practitioner, Ashish has managed $3B+ in third party relationships and helped save $1.2B+ for companies such as AT&T, GM, Verizon, AIG, Citi, Time Warner, several airlines and multiple clients at AlixPartners, ran a services company as President at Parent and CEO of US affiliate, and served on IAOP’s advisory board.

Ashish is among a handful of people with a unique perspective, having held executive roles for 5+ years each as a buyer, seller, and advisor, a deal catalyst with experience across many different countries and cultures.

A strategic and operational leader who has a passion for excellence. Cindy believes solutions are created by addressing outdated and ineffective processes, technologies, and organizational design and replacing them with a data driven environment that drives efficiencies, increases effectiveness, and reduces costs.

Cindy spent 18 years at Warner Media and NBCU designing and implementing global shared services in both a captive model and with outsource partners. Her leadership responsibilities over the years have included R2R, P2P, O2C, Payroll and Travel operations.

She is a motivational leader with a reputation for creating a vision and guiding teams through development, implementation, and stabilization of major transformations. She is proud of the organizations she has designed and the leaders she has mentored over the years and believes successful shared services are a “team sport”.

Working as a top Xerox executive in the 1970s and frustrated by the inefficiencies of paper-based processes. Sid founded HMSL, a market leading document scanning and data storage business, followed by the Invapay B2B payment platform. Having sold these companies, Sid is now investor, board member and advisor in a range of start-ups in AI, data analytics, chatbot training, digital customer onboarding, credit checking, publishing and even luxury watch manufacture. Sid is unwilling to condone archaic practices that don't serve buyers or suppliers, and this remains his driving passion.

Robert is a curious and engaged business leader with a keen interest in emerging digital technologies such as machine learning & AI. He strongly believes sustainability, operational excellence, talent development, data and digitiztaion, and lifelong learning. He is an insightful leader with a strong finance background. Robert has more than 30 years of experience in various leadership positions at multinational organizations and a proven track record of driving successful business transformations in the life sciences industry. He actively supports diversity and enjoys engaging with teams across the globe and to empower people´s strengths. Robert believes that every leader needs to be consciously developmental, as there is always a better version of oneself. Away from work, he loves spending quality time with his family, cycling, running. and working out.