Globalization of Professional Services

In the past, services had a strong local and national focus. Professional services were very likely to be independently and autonomously organized from country to country in order to cater to local needs and local legal requirements. This has since changed radically, and highly integrated business and delivery models around the globe have become the status quo in clients' businesses and strategies. Serving clients on a global level requires professional services firms to adopt a structural change from local to distributed global sales and delivery.

This book brings together many years of experience, current perspectives and future ideas of international business practitioners, academics, and market researchers. Along those lines it is structured into four parts. Part I "Winning Strategies and Innovative Ideas" lays the book's foundation: it discusses core strategies behind the globalization movement and introduces the major paradigms and ideas. Part II "Successful Processes for Realization" provides solutions for how to establish successful processes for delivering global professional services. Part III "Inspired Talent Management" goes to the core of the professional services industry: attracting, developing, and keeping the right talent in the right locations. Finally, Part IV offers "Experiences and Case Studies" on all aspects related to successfully building a globalized professional services firm.

In short, this handbook provides professional services firms and their clients alike with a sound foundation for responding strategically to fundamental global changes and turning them into business advantages. It offers a comprehensive perspective of why and how to successfully globalize a professional services firm.

Ulrich Bäumer is a Partner with the international law firm Osborne Clarke, where he co-heads the India Group. He negotiates complex international IT outsourcing contracts and assists the firm's technology clients in M&A transactions. Together with BITKOM and NASSCOM, he initiated the international ICT conference series. He teaches at Frankfurt School of Finance, National Law School India, and University of Cologne.

Peter Kreutter is a Director at the WHU Foundation and the Managing Director of the WHU - Otto Beisheim School of Management's Strategy Research Network; he serves as a board member and trustee for several charitable foundations, e.g. the CIO Foundation. His academic research focuses on industry life cycles and strategic positioning in professional services industries.

Wolfgang Messner is an Associate Professor of International Management at MYRA School of Business, Director of GloBus Research, and Adjunct Faculty at WHU - Otto Beisheim School of Management; his professional experience includes working at an offshore captive centre and with a multinational service provider in India. His research, consulting, and executive education are aimed at achieving a positive outcome from services sourcing and intercultural collaborations.