Your employees interact with HR dozens of times throughout their journey at your company. From their first day onboarding to their last paycheck, every touchpoint either builds trust or creates frustration. 

If the HR department can attend to employees quickly, transparently, and in a manner that’s convenient for them, then employees will be more satisfied and more likely to remain in the organization for a longer period.

And that’s why we’re looking at HR service delivery today.

Read on to get a breakdown of what HR service delivery is, why it’s so important for your company, and which model can best fit your organization.

What is an HR Service Delivery Model?

An HR service delivery model is how your company structures its HR function so employees and leaders can get the help they need without confusion or delays.

We can liken it to your HR operating system. It defines three things:

The how: What process does an employee follow to request leave, report an issue, or update their information?

The who: Should they contact a generalist, a specialist, or their department’s dedicated HR person?

The where and when: Can they get help through a portal at any time, or do they need to visit an office during business hours?

Your HR service delivery model should cover the structure, processes, and tools your HR department uses to deliver services across the organization.

The Business Impact of HR Service Delivery Models

A company’s HR service delivery model will affect everyone in the organization. It will touch your onboarding, performance reviews, culture, and everything in between. That’s why it’s important to carefully consider the model you choose.

For starters, you’ll need to consider how large your organization is, how many departments you have, and the industry or sector you operate in.

The right HR service delivery model for your organization will:

1. Increase employee satisfaction because their queries are met promptly, easily, and in a way they can track.
2. Reduce friction in everyday operations by removing repetitive back-and-forth and standardizing how HR tasks get done.
3. Protect your organization from legal risks by ensuring policies and processes are applied consistently.
4. Streamline processes so HR can handle more with fewer resources.
5. Make it easier to scale teams, onboard employees quickly, and respond to changes.
6. Increase transparency and accountability because processes are explicit, centralized, and easy to audit.

Now, which model options does your company have?

HR Service Delivery Model Examples

There are multiple types of HR service delivery models, but these four are the main ones organizations use:

• Decentralized model
• Centralized model
• Ulrich model
• Outsourced model

As you can imagine, each of these models has its positive and negative sides. But before we get to the pros and cons, let’s look at how each model works. 

Decentralized model

In a decentralized model, each department, location, or business unit gets its own dedicated HR support.

For example, the Sales team has an HR person who understands sales cycles and commission structures. Finance has another team that handles compliance and audit requirements, while Operations has its own HR support team that handles shift scheduling and safety protocols.

Each HR representative handles issues specific to their department and may follow different practices based on the team’s needs. This is the most popular option for large organizations where a single department can have hundreds of employees.

Best for: 

• Companies with diverse product lines, regions, or subsidiaries that operate differently.
• Companies where local decision-making leads to faster execution.

Pros 

• Flexible since you can customize HR support for each department’s unique needs
• HR understands the specific challenges and culture of their assigned team
• Faster response times because HR is embedded within the department

Cons

• Hard to ensure consistency of policies and processes across the organization
• Risk of some departments getting better HR support than others
• It can be more expensive as you need multiple HR professionals instead of a centralized team

Centralized model

In a centralized model, all HR service delivery originates from a single central HR department that serves the entire organization.

Everyone contacts the same HR team for hiring, payroll, leave requests, complaints, or any HR-related queries. The same processes apply to all employees regardless of their department, location, or role.

For this model, there’s one team, one set of rules, and one way of doing things across the board.

Best for: 

• Medium to large companies with multiple departments that need standardized HR processes.
• Environments where compliance and risk control matter more than speed or creativity.

Pros 

• Consistent policies and processes across all departments, locations, and regions
• Easier to maintain compliance with labor laws and regulations
• Simpler to track metrics and measure HR performance company-wide

Cons

• Inflexible when departments have unique needs (e.g., manufacturing vs. corporate office)
• Can feel impersonal as HR may not understand specific team challenges
• Longer response times during peak periods when the central team is overwhelmed
• Difficult to customize for different regional labor laws or cultural expectations

Ulrich model

This model came about in the 1990s courtesy of Dave Ulrich. It’s often referred to as the ‘three-legged stool’ because it divides HR into three distinct functions: strategic, specialized, and operational.

Source: AIHR

Unlike the centralized or decentralized models, the Ulrich model doesn’t put all HR responsibilities in one place or spread them across departments. It creates three specialized teams, each focused on its area of expertise.

Best for: Large organizations spread across multiple locations or geographies. Since this model relies heavily on technology, you’ll need mature cloud-based HR systems or the budget to invest in one.

Here’s how each ‘leg’ works:

1. Shared Services Center (The Operational Leg)

This is your centralized HR help desk that handles all administrative and transactional tasks. According to Deloitte, over 80% of large organizations have adopted some form of shared services, and for good reason.

In this setup, HR relies heavily on technology to manage routine administrative tasks. 

Employees typically submit tickets or use a hotline/portal to receive prompt assistance with tasks such as leave requests, benefits inquiries, or employment letters. The process works the same way for all departments.

The primary goal of the shared services function is to standardize and automate all transactional and repetitive HR tasks. 

2. HR Business Partners (The Strategic Leg)

For this function, an organization typically assigns HR professionals to specific departments or business units to work closely with managers on people-related issues that directly impact the business’s bottom line.

An HRBP isn’t responsible for handling payroll or processing leave requests; that’s the role of Shared Services. 

Instead, they’re sitting in leadership meetings helping department heads with workforce planning, team restructuring, conflict resolution, and performance challenges. 

They’re there to ensure HR strategies align with the department’s business objectives.

HRBPs are usually the bridge between HR expertise and business needs. They understand both the company’s HR policies and the specific pressures facing their assigned department. 

3. Centers of Expertise (The Specialized Leg)

This function brings together specialized HR experts who handle advanced or strategic areas that require technical expertise.

You can have subject matter experts, such as a talent acquisition specialist who designs your hiring strategy, a learning and development expert who builds training programs, or a compensation specialist who structures your pay scales and benefits packages.

The Centers of Expertise(CoE) team supports both the HRBPs and Shared Services teams. 

When an HRBP needs expert guidance on a complex compensation issue, they consult the CoE. When Shared Services needs to update benefits enrollment processes, the COE provides the technical expertise.

Pros 

• Reduces the need for multiple HR generalists doing repetitive admin work
• Every employee gets the same answer and follows the same process, which is great for compliance
• Employees get faster, dedicated support for routine queries through the Shared Services Center
• Frees up senior HR professionals to focus on strategic business goals like talent management and culture building, rather than paperwork
• Provides specialized expertise exactly where it’s needed through the COEs
• Aligns HR work directly with business outcomes through the HRBP function

Cons

• Expensive to implement as it requires significant investment in HR technology and systems
• Requires a mature organization with explicit processes, since it doesn’t work well if your HR basics aren’t already solid
• Heavy reliance on technology means system downtime directly impacts employee support
• May create silos if the three legs don’t communicate well with each other

Outsourced model

In this model, a company brings in an external partner to handle some or all of its HR functions. 

The most commonly outsourced functions are recruitment, payroll, and training, but depending on your needs, you can outsource everything from compliance to performance management.

This partner will usually act as an extension of your team.

For instance, they might manage your entire payroll process, source candidates for open roles, and ensure you’re compliant with Kenyan labor laws without you needing an internal HR department.

In fact, here at Bridge Talent Management, we offer comprehensive HR management services that cover everything from recruitment to retirement. However, you’re also free to request more strategic HR consultancy and operational support.

Best for: SMEs and startups without internal HR capacity, companies expanding into new markets, or organizations that need expert support without the cost of full-time HR staff.

Pros

• Access to HR expertise without hiring full-time staff
• Significant cost savings compared to building an internal HR department
• Flexibility to scale services up or down based on your needs
• Reduced risk of compliance violations with expert guidance
• Access to advanced HR technology and systems you might not afford independently

Cons 

• Less direct control over HR processes and decisions
• Potential disconnect if the external partner doesn’t understand your company culture
• Dependence on the external provider’s availability and responsiveness
• Requires careful vetting to ensure you’re working with a qualified, trustworthy partner

Check out our guide on choosing the right HR consultancy to ensure you work with a reliable and trustworthy partner. 

How to Create Your HR Service Delivery Strategy

After you understand the different HR service delivery models, the next step is building a strategy that works for your organization. Let’s check out a few tips that can help you create an HR service delivery strategy that sets you up for long-term success.

1. Analyze all HR services

Map out every HR service your organization currently provides or needs to provide. Ask four critical questions for each service: 

• What is the service? 
• Who needs it? 
• Who fulfills it? 
• How is it fulfilled?

For example, payroll processing might be needed by all employees, fulfilled by your finance team or an external provider, and delivered through a monthly automated system. 

On the other hand, leave requests might be needed by all staff, fulfilled by line managers with HR oversight, and processed through an online portal or email.

This exercise ensures no service falls through the cracks. You’ll identify gaps where employees need support but aren’t getting it, redundancies where multiple teams are doing the same work, and opportunities to streamline processes. 

Document everything so you have a good picture of your current state before making changes.

2. Determine the systems you need

When you know what services you’re delivering, it’s now time to figure out what technology will support them. 

If you decide to implement employee self-service, you’ll need help centers, ticketing systems, or chatbots where staff can get quick answers to routine questions.

These technologies should be simple enough that anyone in your organization can easily use them. Your field teams shouldn’t need IT support just to submit a leave request, and your managers shouldn’t struggle to approve timesheets. 

At the same time, implement permission controls and audit trails to protect sensitive information, such as salary data or performance reviews.

3. Establish service-level standards

Set service delivery norms so performance is predictable and employees know what to expect. 

We also recommend creating escalation policies for issues that can not be solved via a self-help portal or a single email. 

If an employee has a serious complaint or a manager faces a tricky performance situation, they should know exactly who to contact and how quickly they’ll get support. 

Also, if you’re using HRBPs, set metrics for their support to business units, such as monthly check-ins with department heads or quarterly talent reviews.

These standards keep everyone accountable and prevent situations where some departments get excellent HR support while others are left waiting.

4. Create feedback loops and governance

Even with all the above checks, every model is bound to have problems from time to time. You’ll need to establish systems to maintain its health and responsiveness to changing needs.

You should schedule quarterly reviews with business leaders to discuss whether the model is still effective. 

Running employee experience surveys to get direct feedback on HR service quality is also a great way to understand if your model is effective.

You should also build performance dashboards that track key metrics, such as ticket resolution times, employee satisfaction scores, and compliance rates. 

At the end of each quarter, you’ll then use this data to identify trends and address problems before they escalate into crises.

Your HR service delivery strategy should function like a living system that evolves in tandem with your business, rather than a document that sits in a drawer gathering dust.

Wrapping Up

No matter which model you choose, your employees must always have a way to speak with an actual HR person when they need help. 

The best model is one that’s comprehensive yet customized to your needs, easy for everyone to use, and fair across all departments and levels.

If you’re still at the foundational level of building your HR service delivery model, or if you’re not sure which approach fits your organization best, you don’t have to figure it out alone.

Bridge Talent Management has spent over 15 years helping businesses across Kenya build effective HR systems. 

We’ve guided companies through every stage, from startups with no HR function to established organizations restructuring for scale. 

We know what works, what doesn’t, and how to tailor a model that fits your industry, size, and growth trajectory.

Contact our HR experts today to discover which HR service delivery model will set your organization up for sustainable growth.

FAQs

What is an HR service delivery model?

An HR service delivery model is the framework that defines how your organization structures its HR function to deliver services to employees and leaders. It covers who employees contact for help, the processes they follow, and the tools or systems that support those interactions.

What are the different types of HR service delivery models?

The four main types are decentralized (dedicated HR for each department), centralized (one HR team serving the entire organization), Ulrich (a three-legged stool with shared services, HR business partners, and centers of expertise), and outsourced (an external partner handling some or all HR functions). 

Which HR service delivery model is best for small businesses?

Small businesses typically benefit most from either a centralized model or an outsourced model. The centralized model is effective when you have a small internal HR team that can consistently serve everyone. Outsourcing, on the other hand, is better if you lack HR expertise internally or need access to specialized knowledge without the cost of full-time staff.

How do you implement an HR service delivery model?

Analyze all your current HR services and identify service gaps, then determine what systems and technology you need to support service delivery. Next, establish clear service-level standards so employees know what to expect, and create feedback loops to improve your approach based on performance data.

Schedule a free consultation with our HR experts to determine which model best suits your company’s needs.