KEY CHALLENGES PREVENTING A SUCCESSFUL TRANSITION TO FIRST TIME SHARED SERVICE CENTER SUPERVISOR IN THAILAND. The purpose of this study is to find key challenge factors that prevent the successful transition of first-time shared service center supervisor in Thailand using the framework of 12 challenges of the first-time supervisor from the Center for Creative Leader. KEYWORDS: First-time Supervisor/ Transition to Supervisor/ Supervisor's challenges/. Shared Service Center/ Thai Supervisor.
This paper intends to examine the challenging factors preventing the successful transition of the first shared service center supervisor in Thailand.
LITERATURE REVIEW
- Why this paper would like to study about first-time-supervisor?
- Why this paper would like to study a Shared Services Center in Thailand?
- Why this paper research would like to study how first-time supervisor in shared services center in Thailand have challenges in their transition
- What are the main theoretical frameworks related to this study?
Royal Philips Electronics has operated a shared service center in Bangkok since 2002, providing multiple services to customers in 15 countries in 6 different languages, including reporting, accounts payable and receivable processing, planning and purchasing. ExxonMobil, providing services in the petrochemical sector, also established a Shared Service Center in Bangkok in 2003, supporting subsidiaries in the Asia-Pacific region elsewhere in other regions, employing over 2,100 staff, support operations including accounting services , information systems, payroll and human resources data management, accounts payable and customer services. However, government benefits are not the only aspects to set up a joint service center in Thailand.
At the beginning of setting up a shared service center, those multinational companies should send their expatriates from the regional or headquarters to ensure the smooth operation by Thai people. What if the Thai supervisor fails to be a good supervisor and shows that a team managed by the Thai supervisor has failed to work this kind of situation many times and keeps repeating, those companies can reconsider whether they their shared service center in this country needs to expand due to failure of people's abilities, that company may not be able to afford the cost of their expatriates for many jobs in the long term. They may decide to close a shared service center and find other countries that have more capabilities to manage their service.
There are many theoretical frameworks on developing new supervisors or assisting the transition of individual contributors to a first-time supervisor. Therefore, we do not know which framework suits the Thai new supervisor working in a shared service center. This article will use the twelve challenges that the Center for Creative Leadership identified from the data, listed in order of frequency by participants, and test them with Thai supervisors working in a shared service business to identify the challenges they face. have to understand. The expectation of conducting this study is to create awareness about the challenges faced by entry-level supervisors in shared service companies in Thailand.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Semi-Structured Interview with 10-15 Supervisors
Closing Question] If you were onboarding a first-time supervisor, what is your personal advice you would tell them. Note] When interviewees run out of ideas, the interviewer will show them the 12-point list to see if it sparks additional ideas in them. The interviewer will analyze and map the actual wording of each supervisor to 12 definitions of the management challenges first-time supervisor, and project the result of what makes Thai supervisors in shared service centers struggle in the role and also their opinion on how the company can help them remove these obstacles and challenges in a transition.
Internet questionnaires 35 supervisors
- General questions for demographic of interviewees 1. How long have you been in a supervisory role?
- Specific questions for the study analysis
Rating - If you were to rate your willingness to be a first-time supervisor on a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate yourself on your first day as a supervisor? What would you like to know or what could the company train you for as a supervisor sooner? The data will be analyzed and mapped to 12 definitions of the leadership challenges for the first-time supervisor, together with the interview data, and will finalize the findings of the challenges in the transition of Thai supervisors and propose the recommendation to the shared service center- organizations based on the findings.
RESEARCH FINDINGS
Reaction and readiness of being a supervisor for the first time Firstly, the reaction of each supervisor when they know that they were
Some said they are not sure if they will get respect from their team members since they were colleagues of team members. It's scary”, and when the researcher asked for more information, she said that she does not feel ready to be a supervisor at all and has no confidence in being in this role. As well as a few more examples of supervisors questioning themselves and surprised by the unexpected news.
According to the result from the internet questionnaires of 35 Thai supervisors working in the shared service center in Thailand. According to the result of the online questionnaire, the average score of readiness to be a supervisor for the first time is 6.60 out of 10. It is clear that most supervisors felt that they did not feel very confident about being appointed to this position, considering only 35 percent of respondents rated their self-confidence in this role from 8 to 10 (very confident), but a large group of responses indicates in the range of 3 to 6 points (average to low).
Some supervisors said it was a moment when they felt recognized by their management and happy to know that management trusts them or sees their potential in their skills. Some said they got a good explanation from their management about why they were being promoted and which management could see them contributing to the company in this role. There are different reactions from the interviewees, therefore researcher analyzed data from both sources and concluded that approximately 40 percent of Thai shared service center supervisors were not comfortable and confident when he or she was told to be a supervisor for the first time, even they valued management support and feeling recognized at the same time.
Top challenges of being a supervisor as the first time
- Conflict Management - (5 out of 15 supervisors mentioned during the interview sessions)
- Managing Internal Stakeholders & Politics - (4 out of 15 supervisors mentioned during the interview sessions)
- Motivation of Others - (9 out of 15 supervisors mentioned during the interview sessions)
Not only the level of difficulty in the internet questionnaires, the questionnaire also asked supervisors to choose the top three challenges they face in their supervision. He told me that he could not solve this issue by himself and he had to live with it for many years until his boss moved to another role in the organization. Many supervisors are afraid to confront conflict in the organization, as they do not have any knowledge or ability to deal with it effectively, or even understand them and dare to confront them.
One of the most important changes when moving from individual contributor to primary supervisor is that you are involved in the role more than twice. Conversely, a supervisor has people who cover 360 degrees in the organizational chart and many of them are unfamiliar with managing many stakeholders at the same time in their new supervisory role. According to her, this type of political situation believed that setting expectations for management is one of the political instruments in the organization.
Another big challenge is how the new supervisor can read the context of the organization and understand who needs to gain trust and rapport, or who needs to be aware of managing relationships with each stakeholder in the organization, to avoid a difficult political situation that can affect the performance of the supervisor himself or the team. Most of the supervisors interviewed mentioned this in some part of their conversations with the researcher. Another example where one of the supervisors in the interview expressed her difficulty in motivating her team member during a peak year-end closing season.
Researchers set degree of difficulty as an additional criterion to weigh the most frequent challenge mentioned by supervisors, to find the most frequently mentioned together with the most difficult challenge to cope with in the role, and could conclude that "Motivation of others" can be considered a top priority challenge . Therefore, the top 3 challenges raised by Thai supervisors, "Motivating Others", "Managing Conflict" and "Managing Internal Stakeholders & Politics" will be a good common theme and starting point for the organization to run some initiatives to support their supervisor in the organization.
CONCLUSIONS
From a business perspective, placing someone in a supervisory role is a bit of a gamble where you lose a good individual contributor and gain a bad supervisor in the organization. As a company, especially the shared service center in Thailand, these individual contributors can be well managed and supported in the appropriate transition to the first supervisor. If the organization could set them up for success, not only would they get a great supervisor to manage their operations, but those supervisors could also create another great supervisor as their successors, as a leadership pipeline for the organization.
To conclude this study, the researcher would like to share some interesting personal advice from various supervisors in the interviews about what advice they would give to a new supervisor if they were to become involved. Starting with "Don't take the problem home", "Prepare your mind to be ready for any problem", "Being a good supervisor is not only about the result, but also about the work environment, team member, feeling and empathy", "Observation and listening", " Trying to find talent in others”, “Your job is to nurture and develop your people to deliver the business, not just run the business”, “Look at your team member as if he or she will replace you tomorrow”, “Treat your team the way you want to be treated" and the last one is "This is another chapter of your life, have fun and enjoy the perfect new experience". As mentioned above, this article intends to examine the challenging factors that prevent the successful transition of the first shared service center supervisor in Thailand, and now we know what the main key challenges are, such as “Motivating others”, “Managing conflicts” and “Managing Internal stakeholders and politics".
The researcher may not know which shared service center in Thailand will take the learning from this paper and then do something and create good supporting resources to help their first-time supervisors succeed in their role. With hope that our Thai supervisors can succeed in the organization, the researcher just wants to see something better in Thai organization, whether it is about supervisors, people, system, process, tools. Both supervisors and company should be aware of the top 3 priorities, the company engages the supervisor closely by providing them with the right training programs and helping to solve supervisor challenges, while the supervisor himself needs to embrace the transition, proactively seek support and believe in their abilities .
