An AT Kearney 2007 study on shared services in government. The image of the public sector as slow to innovate is rapidly becoming a thing of the past as governments are using advanced technology to consolidate back-office functions, concludes this new report. This study, conducted independently by A.T. Kearney with sponsorship from Cisco®, has uncovered major service improvements and cost reductions as a result of "shared services".

When shared services are employed, agencies across government organizations create shared access to functions such as finance or IT, instead of having to gather information from and work with separate departments.