If there is one significant challenge that the shared services would face, it would be that you're talking about 43 departments that are all operating differently, with different cultural tones. Merging them into one organization with similar values and cultures—that's where the challenge would be for the leadership.
That is a significant challenge, and I just cannot imagine it. In the private sector we don't have something this large and complex in terms of merging organizations on the cultural side. But that needs to be paid attention to. This is where you may need some outside help in order for the shared services to deal with these kinds of mergers.
You're talking very significant change here. It's not the technical side, it's not the execution side, it's the people side. The people side is very critical here, and that needs to be paid attention to.