Free White Papers

Service Performance Insight offers free, downloadable research in the form of whitepapers.  In order to access these documents you must provide your demographic information, which will only be used for SPI’s marketing.  We do not sell or provide our contact list to other organizations. You will generally receive 1 to 2 emails a month from SPI Research, highlighting new research or upcoming events that could be of interest to you.

Close up on Europe:  PS Maturity Benchmark

Close up on Europe: PS Maturity Benchmark

This white paper highlights the state of Professional Services in the European region.

 The Drive to Achieve Excellence in the IT Services Industry

The Drive to Achieve Excellence in the IT Services Industry

This white paper explores how the world of IT Services consulting continues to advance. This rapid evolution is the result of the importance and need for greater and more timely information across every industry.

Accelerate Professional Services Growth & Profit

Growing revenue and increasing profitability is a primary goal for almost any business.  For professional service (PS) firms, revenue growth and profit improvement are inextricably intertwined. This executive white paper reveal industry trends and the best practices of top performing firms, and how with real-time insight into their business utilizing a Professional Services Automation (PSA) solution they are able to spot emerging trends and opportunities to quickly capitalize on them to drive growth.

Intelligent Growth

A look at how organizations should evaluate their information infrastructure to ensure they select the right solutions to help them grow profitably.

Looking Forward - Catalysts for Growth in PS

Looking Forward - Catalysts for Growth in PS

This white paper identifies some of the challenges executives face in terms of delivering high-growth professional services, and how leaders focus on performance improvement as a way to rapidly grow revenue and profit. The data utilized in this white paper comes from 358 independent professional services providers in the management and IT consulting arenas. They have been analyzed through Service Performance Insight’s Professional Services Maturity™ Benchmark to determine the best practices of the most mature firms, which excel at driving high revenue, growth and profit.

Best-of-the-Best in PS

The 2015 PS Best-of-the-Best

This white paper highlights how the 2015 Professional Services Maturity Benchmark participants elevated performance.

2015 State of PS in APAC

2015 State of PS in APac

This white paper highlights the state of Professional Services in the Asia-Pacific region.

Best-of-Breed PSA vs. Suites

Comparing Best-of-Breed PSA vs. Suites

This white paper explores the advantages and disadvantages of the best-of-breed versus the integrated suite approach of Professional Services Automation (PSA) solutions.

Evaluating PSA

Evaluating Professional Services Automation (PSA)

An overview into how to conduct an evaluation and selection of Professional Services Automation (PSA) solutions.

Service Performance Acceleration

Service Performance Acceleration

An overview into how to conduct a comprehensive assessment of your company’s service business, using the objective PS Maturity Model™ and benchmark to diagnose areas of strength and weakness.

Professional Services Maturity Model

Introducing the PS Maturity Model

An introduction and overview of the ground-breaking PS Maturity Model™ including the five service performance pillars, maturity definitions, the PS excellence roadmap and the impact of maturity on financial results.

Take a Big Step Forward to PS Excellence

Take a Big Step Forward to PS Excellence

2013 turned out to be the year where PS executives were most concerned with their ability to deliver the necessary profits, and it showed up in a big way in the 2014 Professional Services Maturity™ Benchmark. As PS executives enter 2014 their focus must be on profitability, but it is just the end result of doing many things much more efficiently and effectively. In this white paper, SPI Research will examine how this situation came about, and will prescribe several areas where PS executives should focus their effort to improve performance and ultimately profitability in 2014.

Enterprise-level Professional Services Automation

Enterprise-level Professional Services Automation

As the professional services market moves back into a “hyper-growth” phase, its leaders must prepare for the impending issues associated with rapid expansion. Globalization, a more demanding client base, and regulatory scrutiny are only part of the problem. Many of the largest PSOs have developed a mosaic of homegrown solutions to manage the business while organizations with between 100 and 10,000 employees tend to adopt commercial, best-of-breed Professional Services Automation (PSA) solutions. This white paper analyzes the unique difficulties larger professional services organizations face and highlights the benefits information-based solutions provide to overcome these obstacles.

Professional Services Resource Renaissance

Resource Renaissance

In a people-based business like Professional Services the two primary profitability levers are bill rates and consultant productivity also known as billable utilization. In most markets it isn’t that easy to raise rates. For PS organizations seeking to improve profitability the best place to look is staff productivity and effectiveness. Based on six years of benchmarking over 1,500 Professional Service organizations, SPI Research has discovered one of the most important improvement areas is resource management – reducing the number of wasted administration hours and non-billable time.

PS Business Planning

Five Steps to Build a Successful Services Business Plan

For many professional service organizations annual planning has become an empty ritual. Firms often waste too much time and energy reliving past failures instead of exploring new avenues for growth. Done right, instead of a necessary evil, business planning can open up fresh new ideas and facilitate playing to strengths rather than shoring up weaknesses. This White Paper identifies five critical steps PSOs should take on an annual basis to prepare for what lies ahead.

Killer Service Marketing

Five easy steps to “Go-To-Market”.  The rules and impact of business development; what PS buyers are looking for; positioning made easy and an overview of sales tools to make your marketing programs stick.

Billable Copsulting Culture

How to Create a 'Billable Consulting Culture'

Why change?; defining the transformation vision; driving behavioral change and how to foster a billable consulting culture.

The New Revenue Growth Engine

Bridge the sales/service divide through the alignment of core business processes.

Killer Service Transformation

Differentiating transformation, reengineering and change management; a transformation solution that works including successful transformation case studies and compelling financial results.

Killer Human Capital Alignment

Develop a workforce to meet the dynamic and changing professional services economy.

Killer Service Pricing

A look at pricing strategies and how bill rates drive profit margins and employee investment plus an overview of why discounting does not work.