A

Accenture

Advises businesses and runs their technology

GBS Operating Model Lead – Senior Manager

Full-Time
No salary listed
Expert
London, UK+3 moreMore locations: Edinburgh, UK | Manchester, UK | Dublin, Ireland
Hybrid
ConsultingStrategy & Management Consulting

About the job

Requirements
  • At least 10 years of relevant experience across GBS, shared services, enterprise operating-model transformation, outsourcing, or management consulting.
  • A balanced understanding of captive GCC, BPO, managed-service, and hybrid delivery environments, with the ability to assess options objectively.
  • Strong understanding of how enterprise services operate across functions such as Finance, HR, Procurement, IT, Data & Analytics, Customer Operations, or other corporate services.
  • Demonstrated experience analysing activity taxonomies and determining what should remain in retained functions, move to GBS or GCC delivery, sit within a Centre of Excellence, be delivered by an external provider, or be enabled through automation and AI.
  • Deep experience designing service portfolios, retained organisations, Global Process Owner and service-owner roles, organisation structures, decision rights, governance, location and delivery footprints, sourcing models, capability requirements, service-management principles, and performance frameworks.
  • Strong experience using operational baselines, benchmarks, cost-to-serve analysis, investment modelling, and benefits cases to support executive decisions.
  • Understanding of how ERP, workflow and case-management platforms, service portals, data platforms, analytics, process mining, automation, and AI shape the GBS operating model.
  • Ability to assess how work should be divided across people, automation, and AI agents; determine where human judgement and accountability must remain; and establish how orchestration, decision rights, exception handling, monitoring, controls, auditability, and human oversight should operate.
  • Understanding of the operating-model implications of regulatory requirements, data privacy and security, segregation of duties, third-party risk, service continuity, location concentration, operational resilience, and clear fiduciary or functional accountability.
  • Ability to establish credibility quickly with C-suite and functional leaders, facilitate difficult enterprise decisions, challenge constructively, and communicate complex options in clear commercial terms.
  • Strong experience in at least one of Consumer Goods & Services, Utilities, Energy, or similar sectors, with evidence that industry economics, regulation, operating complexity, or service requirements materially influenced GBS recommendations.
Responsibilities
  • Lead the current-state GBS diagnostic, establishing an evidence-based view of the existing service portfolio, functional scope, activity locations, delivery channels, organisation, capacity, costs, performance, customer experience, process variation, technology, data, controls, provider arrangements, and root causes of operational pain.
  • Define the enterprise GBS ambition and design principles, aligning executive stakeholders on the strategic purpose of GBS, priority value pools, intended business outcomes, scope boundaries, and measures of success.
  • Develop the target service scope and activity-placement model, determining how work should be distributed across retained functions, GBS/GCC delivery teams, Global Process Owners, Centres of Excellence, external providers, automation, and AI. Ensure decisions reflect scalability, business proximity, judgement, control, capability, and service-experience requirements—not labour cost alone.
  • Design the overarching GBS target operating model, covering the service portfolio, retained organisation, global process and service ownership, organisation structure, roles and decision rights, governance, delivery footprint, sourcing model, workforce capabilities, service-management principles, funding approach, and performance framework.
  • Evaluate delivery-model, location, and sourcing options, including captive, outsourced, managed-service, and hybrid approaches. Develop clear recommendations based on strategic fit, access to skills, service quality, resilience, risk, control, scalability, cost, and implementation feasibility.
  • Define how technology, data, automation, and AI enable the operating model. Establish implications for service scope, work allocation, roles, capacity, data ownership, decision rights, controls, exception management, and human oversight. Translate the model into clear business and operating requirements for technology, data, architecture, risk, and control specialists without owning platform configuration.
  • Develop the economic and value case, including the current-state baseline, benchmarks, cost-to-serve, investment requirements, benefit profile, implementation costs, value-realisation measures, and, where relevant, service costing, showback, or chargeback principles.
  • Establish the overarching governance and performance architecture, including executive and functional governance, process and service ownership, escalation and decision forums, outcome measures, service and experience measures, risk and control accountability, and the relationship between retained functions, GBS delivery, and external providers.
  • Shape the implementation roadmap and transformation sequencing, identifying dependencies across organisation, processes, technology, data, sourcing, locations, workforce, controls, and change. Remain the operating-model design authority through detailed design and implementation, resolving cross-workstream decisions and protecting the coherence of the target model.
  • Lead senior client relationships and complex engagements, taking responsibility for engagement scope, quality, economics, risk, and outcomes. Lead and develop multidisciplinary teams, originate and shape new work, contribute to proposals and account growth, and develop reusable GBS propositions, assets, and points of view.

About the company

Accenture advises large businesses and public agencies on strategy, builds their technology systems and runs ongoing operations. Its teams connect business planning with implementation, covering areas such as cloud migration, cybersecurity and customer experience. Consultants work with clients to redesign processes, while engineers integrate software from technology partners and maintain the resulting systems for multinational organizations. Clients pay for project work or continuing services, including application support and business processes such as finance and customer service. Accenture was founded in 1989 and has its headquarters in Dublin, Ireland.

Company Size

10,001+

Company Stage

IPO

Headquarters

Dublin, Ireland

Founded

1989

Get referred to Accenture

See people who can refer or advise you

Simplify Jobs

Simplify's Take

What believers are saying

  • Business demand grew: October 2026 results showed $74.2 billion annual revenue, up 5% in local currency.
  • Eligible US employees buy discounted stock: Accenture's purchase plan sells shares at 15% below market price.
  • Client relationships run deep: Accenture has worked with 195 of its top 200 customers for more than ten years.

What critics are saying

  • Bookings are not guaranteed revenue: most Accenture contracts let clients cancel quickly with little or no penalty.
  • Promotions require AI adoption: Accenture's CEO said in March 2026 that employees must use its tools effectively.
  • Federal hiring practices proved costly: Accenture settled discrimination allegations for $25 million in September 2026, without a liability finding.

What makes Accenture unique

  • Its AI platform switches models: AI Refinery selects among prebuilt models according to cost, performance and other requirements.
  • Accenture owns specialist Microsoft expertise: it cofounded the Microsoft-focused Avanade consultancy with the software maker.
  • Consulting includes creative agencies: Accenture Song owns businesses spanning advertising, digital product design and customer engagement.

Help us improve and share your feedback! Did you find this helpful?

Benefits

  • Health Insurance
  • Professional Development Budget
  • 401(k) Retirement Plan
  • 401(k) Company Match

Company News

Business Wire
Oct 21st, 2026
TÜV SÜD and Accenture unveil physical AI safety suite to bring factories online up to 30% sooner

TÜV SÜD and Accenture are working with NVIDIA technologies to speed up safety certification of robots in factories and warehouses. They unveiled a joint "Physical AI Safety Suite" at NVIDIA GTC Berlin. The suite uses digital twins, AI agents, and simulations to partly replace manual assessments. TÜV SÜD estimates the digital process could bring production online up to 30% sooner. Certification against standards such as ISO 3691-4 is mandatory in many industrial countries before automated facilities can start. At a medium-sized plant, agreeing on safety concepts can take several weeks. The suite checks layouts, robot fleets, and individual robots before deployment. TÜV SÜD provides independent assessment and keeps responsibility for certification.

Yahoo Finance
Oct 16th, 2026
Accenture caps staff AI spending at $29 a month after $1,000 bills

Accenture has capped employee AI spending at $29 (£21.75) a month after some staff ran up bills of $1,000, according to a report by 404 Media. The consulting firm wants to curb runaway costs as employees use AI for more everyday tasks. Companies are typically billed by usage, like a utility. Last week, some staff were told their access to Anthropic's Claude had been pulled entirely. Others are also reining in costs. Uber capped engineers' Claude spending at $1,500 a month after using up its AI budget in four months, while Microsoft has reportedly cut its Claude spending by about a third. The curbs come as Anthropic prepares for a public listing, targeting a valuation as high as $2tn. Investors are reportedly considering about $1.5tn.

Yahoo Finance
Oct 16th, 2026
Accenture's AI push: analysts see earnings reaching $10.3B by 2029 on 5.2% yearly revenue growth

Accenture is shifting AI work from pilots to deeply embedded systems, according to recent deals with UMass Memorial Health, Dell, Microsoft and Workday. The UMass Memorial project is a multi-year AI data platform, while the Dell alliance pitches private AI infrastructure to regulated clients. Analysts expect revenue to grow 5.2% a year over the next three years, with profit margins rising from 11.3% to 11.9%. They forecast earnings of $10.3 billion by 2029, up from $8.4 billion today, on revenue of $86.3 billion. The stock trades at a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.2x, against 21.9x for US IT peers. Risks include slower decision cycles in federal and EMEA work, which could curb consulting demand and margins.

Yahoo Finance
Oct 14th, 2026
Accenture plans $9.5B shareholder returns and $5B acquisitions as it bets on AI reinvention

Accenture (NYSE: ACN) is betting on enterprise AI as its main growth engine. At its Investor and Analyst Day, the company targeted at least mid-single-digit constant-currency revenue growth in fiscal 2027 and 2028, rising to mid- to high-single-digit growth from fiscal 2029. Chief executive officer Julie Sweet said AI will create new demand that exceeds work lost to automation. The company has grown its AI and data workforce from 40,000 to nearly 110,000. Accenture plans to return $9.5 billion to shareholders in fiscal 2027 and spend about $5 billion on acquisitions. It expects annual operating-margin growth of 10 to 30 basis points. Its network of specialised businesses, now 6% of revenue, could double by fiscal 2029. Fiscal 2026 revenue was $74.2 billion, up 5% in local currency.

Yahoo Finance
Oct 14th, 2026
Accenture shares up 10.4% as dividend rises to $1.71 and AI alliances with Dell and Workday expand

Accenture shares rose 10.4% after the company reported higher sales and earnings for its fourth quarter and full year in early October 2026. It confirmed fiscal 2027 guidance, raised its quarterly dividend to $1.71 per share, and completed a long-running share repurchase program. The company also expanded its AI alliances with Dell and Workday and acquired Sagacity. It aims to embed agentic AI into client functions such as HR, finance, and customer engagement. Accenture's narrative projects $86.3 billion in revenue and $10.3 billion in earnings by 2029, up from $8.4 billion today. Pricing pressure and slower discretionary spending remain the main risks.