BPO Philippines: Training Filipinos to Serve, Not Lead?
Recently, an executive from an IT outsourcing company in the Philippines published a commentary about the current state of the BPO industry of the country.
According to Kevin Leversee, general manager of an Australian start-up IT company based in Pampanga, Philippines, he has observed a dramatic shift in the focus of inculcating the value of education and profession among the Filipino youth.
He saw that with the growth of the outsourcing industry of the Philippines, the amount of support the government is giving enables the universities to focus on courses that will provide the needed skills to make it in the industry. The universities and the government have been focusing on coming up with a better and bigger workforce that can deliver outsourcing services.
Unknowingly, the Filipinos are actually working for the services needed for foreign people and companies to be innovative. But are the Filipinos changing and innovating as well in the process? According to Leversee, no.
Leversee saw that the government and the big players of the industry are so focused on growing the industry now, yet fail to adapt with the new developments that will be beneficial for the future of BPO in the Philippines.
The education given by the universities is not enough to let the Filipino youth go out off the box and innovate, rather, they are educated to work on the services that conform to the industry.
Leversee compared the Filipinos to the students of California’s Silicon Valley where the IT students are trained to come up with their own ideas, apply it, and make a business out of it. The Filipinos, on the other hand, are trained to support the innovations of the inventors (e.g., Silicon Valley).
He does not hate the industry, but he just wanted to make a point that Filipinos should be trained to do more and not just simply be contented by working in one call center company to another.
For him, the BPO industry would have not grown so immense like it is today if not for the cheap labor it is offering to its foreign clients.
“Why is the Philippines big? Because you’re cheap,” said Leversee. There are many other competitive countries who can do the same work or much more that the Philippines does, but still, the clients go for the latter because of the cheap labor.
On the other hand, the umbrella association of the BPO industry, the Business Processing Association of Philippines (BPAP), said that the country is an IT-BPO hub, growing at a much faster rate than other developing economies.
BPAP president Benedict Hernandez said that the BPO industry accounts for 9 percent of the country’s GDP and 10 percent of the global IT-BPO market share. It is number one in voice-based BPO services and number two in non-voice-based services.
Hernandez still has not given any comment regarding Leversee’s “sensitive” commentary, but assured everyone that the country will not only defend its current status, but will also lead the rest of the world in the IT-BPO industry.
About the Author
Publish on 03/11/2013
is a freelance copywriter, with majority of her work focusing on the outsourcing industry.
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Most businesses NOW take advantage of the services offered by outsourcing companies in the Philippines. Aside from the cheaper cost, clients looks the quality of work which Filipinos can give.
ReplyDeleteI agree
ReplyDeleteBecause this is a third world country we can't help but to really adapt of what is in demand jobs in the country. Some of the call center agents are a graduate of a four year course they decided to take up a career in BPO because the courses that they finished can't give them jobs or the salary is too low for them. Wherein the BPO they offer higher salary. brake repair
ReplyDeleteWell for me, I think he is partly right because, it really is important to think outside of the box, since we can't avoid changes in the future, it will be also crucial for Filipino's to evolve to adapt to the changes that may occur in the future. But regarding with the universities, their offered learning's may vary from each other, because, there are still universities that offer learning's that does not focus on "delivering bpo services" for example in I.T. programs, there schools that have subjects that aims to train future, system analyst, network administrators, etc, and some of them even have "Technopreneurship" which is kind of similar to what students of California's Silicon Valley were trying to do. Another thing is that, BPO industry became a success is not only because of"cheap" labor but also because, Philippines, is the one of the most fluent English speaking countries in the world, which makes it an ideal place for outsourcing, second thing is that, Filipino's are known to be diligent, another characteristic that adds up to why foreign countries chose Philippines for outsourcing.
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I am Filipino and don't think I am being told to serve. I get jobs and make money freelance on websites including www.workersoncall.com and am happy to have opportunity to make money.
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every employee is being paid to serve, no matter which industry you're in. even doctors and lawyers are. the whole point of course of out sourcing is cheaper operational costs. but Filipinos are not he cheapest. labor in India and China are cheaper. Companies are here because Filipinos are sensitive. We're nice and dependable. That's exactly the main reason that they stay and even grows.
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I can't say say much about that. May be you are right.I don't think there is anyone who should stay in the call center world for more than a couple of years.call center outsourcing
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I think Filipino's fluency, flexibility and good attitude towards work plus Technopreneurship will help Philippines lead in the BPO Industry. Im just hoping our government realizes this soon. Nice Blog.
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