Philippines BPO earned $5B in ‘07
By Roberto Bacasong
THE revenue of the Philippines BPO (business process outsourcing) in 2007 posted at $5 billion, a news release coming from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) disclosed.
The annual report from DTI indicates that the revenue of the country’s outsourcing industry grew from $3.5 billion in 2006. Currently, the country’s global leading in the outsourcing employs a total of 320,000 workers, which is higher compared in 2006 with a total of 235,000 employees.
This growth is inline with the campaign of the Philippine Government to boost this industry not only locally but its target among the international key investors. The Philippines is one of the frontline choices in terms of BPO, especially the call center which is the voiced account scheme.
Other than call center, the Philippines is also promoting its competency in medical transcription, IT (information technology), animation, among others. Earlier, positive reports from international business leaders in Davos, Switzerland lauded the country’s huge growth in the outsourcing in the recent World Economic Forum.
Big and small companies are operating in the Philippines because of its cost-effective services and investor-friendly atmosphere. Philippine President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, in her previous statements posted at the Office of the Press Secretary (OPS), thanked the investors for lifting the country’s economic activity. She added that the employment opportunities in the outsourcing industry are a way of supporting her campaign to have a “Strong Republic†nation.
Competition
Because competition is very high in the BPO, several countries in the Southeast Asia, European, and the United States are also boosting this industry to remain on the top.
The country today is no doubt to gain success in maintaining the industry alive. The serious thing to consider is to stay above because other countries are seriously promoting their BPO industry not only to gain revenues but also to be a global leader.
Oscar Sanez, head of the Business Process Association of the Philippines disclosed during Thursday’s e-Services briefing that the country remains to be competitive.
Mr. Sanez said the voiced-based (call center) still growing in the country because of the English fluency of every Filipino. However, Mr. Sanez urged BPO firms to also strengthen the country’s weaknesses in the accounting, finance, engineering design and IT services.
Meanwhile, DTI reported that Filipino graduates with high knowledge on liberal arts, which is the studies focusing on general knowledge and intellectual skills, gives favorable advantage to the country as the preferred outsourcing destination rather than other offshore destinations like India.
DTI reported that higher fluency in English and with higher orientation in the customer services are among of the reasons why potential investors like the country.
According to Richard Mills, an expert on outsourcing in the Asia Pacific disclosed that India is known to be a top producer of technical knowledge while the Philippines is focusing more on liberal arts.
Mr. Mills disclosed that locators around the world is putting their companies in the country such as animation, medical services, insurance processes, legal services, publishing and content enhancement. Mr. Mills is one of speakers during the Business Venture Track of e-Services Philippines Outsourcing Conference and Exhibition attended by BPO executives, businessmen, local and national politicians.
Every year, the country’s graduates reached at 385,000 with strong background in the English language. The country is also producing more than 100,000 accountants and business-related college graduates every year.
To prove the best of the Filipino accountants, the US Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) acknowledged the Filipinos skills in accounting. This is because Filipino accountants who passed the yearly Certified Public Accounting (CPA) exam are familiar with GAAP and International Accounting Standards (IAS) in terms of financial reporting.
The Philippines outsourcing will continue to deliver finest services to its clients worldwide and expected to grow to 12.4 billion dollars with 303,000 job opportunities in the next two years.*
Web content writing in Offshore Business
By Roberto Bacasong
WEB content writing is now in demand in the outsourcing industry. Outsourcing is not only limited to serving back-office operations and other customer relationship management services. Outsourcing is a global industry with millions of people employed worldwide.
The power of writing is a gift. Not all human was born to have this craft. If writing is your passion, there are so many things you can do to help change the world effectively. Discovering your own talent will take time. If you start writing at early stage of your life then you have the skills to proud of. Learning starts from within – developing your hidden talent should start in yourself.
Writing 101 is learned in the classroom through a formal education. However, when you’re in the real world, what you’d learned in the classroom is just only a piece of pie. It means that what you’d learned in the classroom is only a preparation in the real setting of the outside world.
Consider writing an article related to outsourcing industry. Think of how your article will provide a window of information and opportunity to the people who will able to read the write up. Nowadays, outsourcing introduced the web content writing which is different from journalism style. Web content writing is getting an edge now in this business. A lot of clients own a website. Maintaining it to be up and running depends on the way of promotional tools utilize.
Content writing is getting its big wave in the call center industry. If the account caters to website development and marketing tools, writing articles about your website is an effective way of promoting your website in the Internet. By hitting instantly the keywords of your site will be a great help for the website owner to be visible in the SEO (search engine optimization) tools.
In some call center in the Philippines, they usually hire content writers to do the writing strategy in getting more visitors in the website. Blog is the famous form now of writing simple materials in terms of promotion, and personal thoughts. Every one who wants to express their personal thoughts created a blog for them to tell the world about whom they are and what they do.
Considering the demand of the content writing services in the outsourcing continue to increase. Some customers are calling customer service either in telephony or chat support solutions to order content writing services. As mentioned above, not everybody possess with writing skills. Clients ordering this are those who have website in a way of earning sideline jobs or advertising needs.
In writing an article, the writer should base the article on the custom order from the clients. It should be relevant to the topic required to write. It is a great knowledge that content writing must be an original piece and not copied from the printed articles either published in the Internet or any publications. This is a clear committing of plagiarism which is an insult to the reputation of writers out there. A good website contains unique contents.
When writing for the web, it is effective to use brief sentences, paragraph forms and words. The content writer should also apply one idea per paragraph; applying a concise text - half the word count (or less) than writing for print. Remember that some online visitors viewing your website doesn’t recognized your site if the contents are too long. Don’t forget to follow the inverted pyramid style, use effective headline and stunning lead in your article.
There’s no harm in writing. It is better that from time to time; the site owner should know how to manage their own site. All you need is to write simple but impressive content about your site. You can learn how to write by reading any news articles, feature stories, or any forms of write ups. There are tips about effective writing available online for you to see and learn. And also, you can buy a book related to writing handbook which will be helpful for everybody who wishes to learn this craft.
There are so many reasons to learn writing content in the website. This can be fun and interesting job. Make use of your talents, and flaunt it. If you write effectively, you are helping the customers and make them happy. And most of all, you are supporting the outsourcing industry alive. Keep on writing!
Where is the call centers in the Philippines going?
By Rolen J. Espera
MUCH has been discussed about the advent of the call center industry in our seemingly English-speaking country. Most agree that it brings in more jobs especially that the unemployment rate has drastically increased during the last decade. Some say that it’s an opportunity for those who want to go for a part-time job. There are others, particularly the fresh Filipino graduates, who find call centers as a popular option to earn big without leaving the country.
When the Americans decided to save labor costs and increase efficiency, there was no doubt that it will pull out talents from countries with relatively cheap labor. According to Forbes, the Top Ten countries for off-shoring (in random order) are China, India, Brazil, Malaysia, Czech Republic, Singapore, Chile, Poland, Canada, and, of course, the Philippines.
The country has a population of more than 80 million and there is an estimated 15,000 technology students that graduate annually—more than any other country on the list except for the four largest which are Brazil, Russia, India, and China. Forbes was also able to state the strengths and weaknesses. It cited the English language skills, the low costs, and the country’s cultural affinity for the U.S. as its strengths; whereas, the overall business environment, infrastructure, and the political instability are considered as weaknesses.
Overall, the Philippines is definitely attractive for offshore location based on 39 different factors in 3 categories: people skills and availability, cost, and the business environment.
Although the business environment is a form of weakness, the Philippine government was able to support the setup of call centers in various locations within the country. In 2006, it saw an unprecedented growth in call centers which expanded and generated more jobs for the Filipinos. It was also in that year when the highest recorded number of jobs where in call centers. According to the Bureau of Investments, only 24,000 people were employed in 2000. That brought in only $24,000 in revenues; however, in succeeding years more and more business outsourcing firms were able to set up operations and in 2005 already 120,000 skilled Filipinos were hired and the call center industry earned more than $1 billion in revenues for the country. In four years’ time, the country aims to capture five percent of the global business process outsourcing in an amount that totals as much as $10 billion.
Definitely, the call center industry is a sure economic booster. Not only has it widened job options for the people and generated revenues, it also introduced a venue for people who would like to work in a dynamic and creative environment. Usually, the general public perceives call centers as a form customer service; the latter however is a only a sub-sector of the business process outsourcing industry. Other BPO (business process outsourcing) services include engineering and architectural design, legal transcription, medical transcription, software development, and human resource management services among others.
Another problem that still exists though, as cited by the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), is that the English proficiency of the Filipinos is waning. It has been difficult in filling up call center seats since out of 100 applicants only 10 are expected to pass.
Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas said that this could be a cultural issue—that the Filipinos may do well in written English but when it comes to conversational English, there tends to be a problem. According to Sto. Tomas, Filipinos are not likely to correct the wrong usage of English in conversations as to not embarrass people.
In order to address the problem, DOLE together with its attached agency, Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA), met with the Department of Education (DepEd) and the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) to come up with an action plan that would sustain the competitiveness of the Philippines in the global call center industry.
With that, language proficient staffs and language centers will be put up to help the Filipinos improve their language skills. The language centers will not only aid people who want to work for call centers but also those who choose to work abroad as continuous demands for engineers, nurses, seafarers, waiters and other hotel and restaurant positions are made available through the years. Consequently, this move will increase the competitive level of Filipinos in terms of education.
It is then inevitable that for call centers to continue operating in the Philippines, it must have a working relationship with its people. That relationship involves a high salary offer, better health insurance, and the possibility of faster promotion. It also creates a new type of working environment fit for the young generation of Filipinos who continually seek a job that seems global.
Call centers in the Philippines are in every way helping out in providing more jobs and increasing the country’s annual revenue. And with its attractive job offers and employment compensations, it should continue to haul in more and more Filipinos into working with them. Wherever the call center industry is going, it surely is no way down.*
Call Centers: Paving the way of career advancement
By Virginia Anthony-Magallanes
IT WAS not too long ago that call centers became one of the fastest emerging industries in the Philippines. What started out as simple providers of e-mail responses and handling services as early as the year 2000, now became the largest business process outsourcing service providers paving way for more employment opportunities to thousands of Filipinos. By setting its trend in the services sector, it continues to be in demand by off-shore clients.
Since it is catering to a wide range of services which provides to all sorts of industries like travel services, insurance, telecommunications, credit card accounts, fund raising organizations, and a lot more; the need for call center agents increases and continues to grow.
Armed with our English speaking skills, it does not come as a surprise why Filipinos are the most sought after call center agents in the world, with Indians ranking second to us. In addition, we are hardworking, patient and do not mind being assigned to graveyard shifts.
The best opportunities for career advancement is with a call center.
Why do I say this? For starters, it does not matter what your civil status is or what your grade point average was in college. Gender or sexual orientation is never an issue. There is also no age limit or any height requirement. As long as you can speak good English, can handle the pressure and willing to work on graveyard and shifting schedules, you are the person suited for the job.
I will pose this straightforward declarative inquiry: Why work in a call center?
I can cite a good number of reasons.
First, the job is not monotonous, it requires a certain degree of excitement and certainly the job description possesses a satisfying job responsibility. Since you get to interact with different types of persons, your ability to adjust and to be flexible is greatly tested. The scope of the job entails one to hone their communication skills, negotiation capabilities and sales aptitude. It also improves one’s self-esteem and self confidence. Undeniably, being proficient in the English language is an edge which a call center agent aims to have. It can also be considered as an advantage and a symbol status of being a professional. For sure, there will never be a dull moment when you work in a call center.
Second, even if one works at an ungodly hour, a call center agent is assured of a very good salary. A customer service representative salary is estimated to range from PhP15,000 to Php25,000 a month as starting salary, depending on the package or what kind of account one is handling. If one shows good performance, he or she gets promoted to a higher position with a salary grade of PhP25,000 and above excluding all other benefits. The promotion in a call center industry is fast and the chances are greater. Come to think of it, it is not bad for one whose main asset is his voice and communication skills.
Third, all call center agents work in an air conditioned area, provided with the state-of-the-art computers and other equipment to better facilitate one’s job. There is always a sufficient supply of caffeine to fight off sleepiness if assigned on a graveyard shift. Air and ventilation are always well maintained not only for the convenience of the call center agents, but also to keep the computers and other facilities in good running condition.
Fourth, you don’t need work experience to start working in a call center (except for positions requiring technical expertise). Call centers are willing to train you from scratch, with the qualification that you possess the minimum skills and capabilities.
Fifth, there are a lot of call centers to choose from. Just take your pick and decide which location is most convenient for you. From the busy districts of Metro Manila, Ortigas Center in Pasig City, Makati, Quezon City and Fort Bonifacio in Taguig down – all from the National Capital Region (NCR); and the cities of Baguio, Angeles in Pampanga, Lipa in Batangas, Bacoor in Cavite, Santa Rosa in Laguna – all in Luzon; Bacolod, Cebu, Iloilo – in the Visayas; Davao, Zamboanga, and Cagayan de Oro, in Mindanao.
Definitely, this only shows that there is an abundance of call center opportunities all around the Philippines.
Now, where can you find a job that allows you to interact with all kinds of people around the world? The answer would be at a call center. Does working in a call center allow for career advancement? The answer would be in the affirmative given the reasons already discussed.
Looking for a job that offers you a wide range of opportunities, allows you to grow professionally, and be well compensated at the same time? Then work for a call center. Its the way of career advancement in the 21st century.*
Call Center and Beyond
By Roberto L. Bacasong
TAKING advantage of what the call center industry is not just ordinary. This industry is something that dominating the world of the business process outsourcing (BPO), to which the Philippines is considered as the home for largest contact centers in the world.
Beyond this booming industry is a promising future for the Filipinos being classified in the Third World country. The gift of call center is a blessing for the Philippine Government, because the country is being look up as leader in the outsourcing. This is true, several surveys have been done before why the Philippines is considered as location for outsourcing. The surveys done by the private sectors revealed that the country can significantly compete in off-shoring industry. It is a window of hope to young Filipino workers, who directly employed in this industry even they are undergraduate.
Beyond call center promotes huge revenue advantage. In the Philippines, for instance, it was reported by the country’s Chief Executive that earnings in the outsourcing dramatically increase this year. In return, the national government continue to strengthen their partnership among the contact center executives. Proving their support of being friendly to the investors are proof why these giant contact centers want to stay up and running in the Philippines.
Beyond call center promotes a realistic preparation in the future of the Philippines. It is now known in the business world that can never be ignored. The presence of call center lessen the unemployment rate of the country. Since there’s no problem in getting job in outsourcing, Filipino workers can easily grasp the lifestyle in call centers. Filipinos are competent and can talk with passion and accent with their American clients. Their trainings are wonderful and considered as extensive.
Beyond call center is a reflection of having a stable industry, which will continue in the next following years. The target of the government will soon achieve because many call center companies are now entering in the country’s business circle. Large and small contact centers enjoy the privilege given to them by the government. No need to worry about security because they are safe and being prioritized all the time. The country’s finest policemen continue to conduct surveillance in any of the financial districts in metro Manila. Call center companies are considered as vital installation, since many of them occupying the skyscrapers, the government always monitor them in a case to case basis.
Beyond call center is a strong nation. If the government is considered as investment hub, no wonder that this is a country with great leaders. The Philippines is among of them. Though political bickering is almost happening everywhere. However, when it comes to the public interest, the politicians from the local and national arena unite each other to promote peace and nationwide camaraderie. No call center companies will stay in the country if political noise is unresolved. With the present situation right now, it is with great respect and desire that contact center locators will remain operational in the Philippines.
Call center and beyond is now the pride of every Filipino. Working closely with the government will provide a better chain of command between the business partners, the lawmakers and the workers. The Philippines will continue to raise up the flag that call center is a dominant industry in the country today.*
More Yuppies Eyeing Call Center Jobs
By Fernan J. Angeles
AS timely as today revolutionary ideas, even dreams of children aged below 12 have shown tremendous, radical changes on the mindset of their siblings shift from their aspiring to become either a doctor, a teacher, a lawyer, a professional nurse, a an athlete, a senator, a priest or a cop, at that.
While there are still a handful of children who’d opt for a degree from a reputable university. Most of us would have been satisfied and half fulfilled given a computer station inside an office located perhaps in a financial district — not as CEO of a publicly listed firm but as a call center agent of a relatively new, but attractively earning company.
Why not? Imagine an office job — it may not sound even half of what one would have dream of,, but has seen so many other young urban professionals grow literally and financially big at that. “Big†as in these call center firms are offering twice as much as the minimum pay for a start. It may even go beyond another fold or twice as much the starting salary if one gets to be blessed with more markers, connoting an added pay on top of their salary as this type of job at times require being verbally convincing to make a sign for â€an expensive package that you just bragged aboutâ€, or make him buy of something which he hasn’t even seen or hold on to.
Interestingly, the sprawling number of call centers in the country and elsewhere has shown what could best be described as a phenomenal hit at a time when most of the world is suffering from recession. But while these call centers are surprisingly doing good business and in return helps in trimming down local unemployment rate and at the same time help the government through the taxes that is directly or indirectly earned from its operations, the government has every reason to be alarmed with another social abnormality which may adversely affect all other socio- economic and political set up.
Imagine a strategically situated city that is described as a top local revenue earner because of the sprawling call center business that occupies most of the leased office spaces of tall buildings and skyscrapers. Everything seems normal as the financial district has remained busy as people in batches of thousands come to work and go home in three shifts. The volume of people at the city’s center of growth has practically involved almost everybody, unmindful of the balance that we have to keep.
Unmindful to an extent that even an English teacher would be willing to skip classes if only to guarantee her a slot in an office as a call center agent. What about the nurses who finds it hard to pass their licensure tests — they too would have been more favorable to the idea of working as a call center agent receiving a salary that is decently higher than that of jobs related to what their college degree courses could offer.
And soon enough, even the cops, non-Bar passers, the journalists, health professionals, social workers and other allied fields of expertise, would go similar way.
And even before we come to realize it, their kids could be skipping classes because their English teacher just joined the elite team of handsomely-paid cal center agents. And nobody seemed interested to fill the slot. An almost similar scenario could take place in a hospital where inside an operating room you’d find two people — the doctor who’ll do operations and the patient. No more nurses to assist doc. They’re all out there on the graveyard shift of a call center firm relating to clients from elsewhere.
Some sort of gap has also to be filled up in other allied professions, where a significant number from among them opted to hop in to the hottest job of the modern times.
Unless steps are taken to address concerns which may rationalize the salary-aspect that separates the call center agents from other allied services and professions, chances are we’d run out of teachers, doctors, nurses, lawyers, among the others whose role in the daily city life prove too significant to let go of.
In what appears to be an imbalance, it is imperative that a study be made on how to rationalize the gains of the call center industry if only to allow the other alleviated labors to move up.*
Outsourcing its Role in the 20th Century
By Roberto L. Bacasong
IN THE REALM of modern technology wherein everything is interconnected through online, outsourcing business is considered as one of the gifts brought about by the globalization in the 20th century. It is fast and vibrant today in the Philippines because of its presence over a decade.
When computer was invented which immediately was a huge advantage against typewriter, it help mankind made their output easier. When telephone as well as mobile phones were invented, it also brought rapid changed in the communication aspect. Science geeks develop the wonder of the email services through the Internet services wherein people can play around and do immediate research of any topics they’re interested with. Aside from these features, there are so many useful gadgets were discovered which contributed to the lives of the people. We are not only limited of using these equipment because there are so many benefits to be offered by these materials.
There’s a so many changes happened in the history of mankind because of the massive development occurred. Today, outsourcing is one of those potential industries which continue to grow in the prime of business world. Doing outsourcing is a wise thing because it gives the opportunity to achieve the goal of the national government. In the Philippines, for instance, contact centers are found everywhere especially in metro Manila and other regions in the country. Though the Philippines is belong to the third world countries, it was not a hindrance of placing the country on the map where it is now receiving recognition in the outsourcing world.
A call center in the Philippines continue to be the number one in Asia and against those first world countries like the US, United Kingdom and among others. Contact centers are considered as the sunshine industry which aim to save the country from poverty and give the Filipino people suitable job.
It is proven and tested that outsourcing in the Philippines is not a problem because Filipino customer service are still on demand in the market. The country is the number one choice by the largest call center key players in the world. It is part of the culture and tradition that Filipinos have been the best in terms of doing simple customer service.
The role of outsourcing in the Philippines will continue to keep the business sector up and running. The advantage of having outsourcing in the country is something that we need to be proud of. Now, this is the important role that outsourcing has gave to the Philippines.*
Philippine Outsourcing the Ideal in the World
By Roberto L. Bacasong
HOW can we say that the Philippine outsourcing is ideal in the world? There are so many reasons why the Philippines is considered. This industry is truly amazing because the way it help the Filipino workers in terms of contribution to the large scale of development for the country. Working in a call center in the Philippines is worthy enough in helping the Filipino families boost up their morale and the level of their competent in terms of adopting English language.
Beyond expectation, contact center is widely known today in the Philippines. It is a word of mouth which now became a common trend setting for yuppie Filipinos strongly agreeing that there’s better future on working in call center. For instance, once they have graduated from their respective bachelor’s degree thousands of them employed easily to different world class contact centers in the country. It is with great knowledge that call center companies offer great package such as salary scheme and benefits which attract Filipinos workers grabbing the opportunity with no doubt. Despite the high attrition rate in this industry, looking for staffing and manpower services have never been a problem to the call center locators in the Philippines. Most of them, received volumes of applicants everyday in which the shortlisted applicants were thoroughly screened upon reaching the job offer. The ratio goes this way, only three out of ten successful applicants qualified were mployed in the call center arena. But this does not mean that the level of competency is affected, this only reflect how the human resources team of hundreds of call center companies in the Philippines doing stiff hiring process to fill in their vacant position.
Outsourcing in the Philippines is very ideal in the world, as what most commented by some international call center owners published nationally and internationally in different medium especially in the newspapers. In Asia, along with the Philippines that is known for outsourcing are India, China, Thailand, among others. With strong command in English is a great advantage among other competitors. The country has huge number of graduates from reputable colleges and universities which is also a factor to consider.
In a research entitled: “Outsourcing to the Philippines: Metro Manila and Beyond†by neoIT highlighted some economic activity which contributed by this industry. The report noted that Metro Manila is considered as the most popular destination for outsourcing. This is because that Manila has a large skilled resource based that assures smooth operation scale-ups. The city houses 81 institutions of higher education and 1,600 other schools, boast a literacy rate of 92.4, and is home to institutions such as the Asian Institute of Management (AIM), Ateneo de Manila, De La Salle University, the University of the Philippines and the University of Santo Tomas. But not only this, the research further showed that not only Manila is the focus of call centers, it is also incubating other provinces such as Pampanga, Bacolod, Iloilo, Dumaguete, Cebu, Davao and Cagayan de Oro. It further revealed that as an offshore outsourcing enters its next phase of evolution, the competitiveness of offshore nations will rest on their ability to develop multiple centers of excellence within their boarders – centers that satisfy the skill requirements, delivery capabilities,and risk appetite of outsourcing organizations.
Outsourcing continue to gather crowd of interest in the country. It opened opportunities to the Filipinos and combat the war against unemployment which is one of the major problems of the Philippine Government. The increasing demand in this industry has been given attention by the national government in order to attract other investors to stay in the country. It is no doubt that truly the Philippines is not only the land for its bountiful rich in tourism but also the home for the growing outsourcing industry.*
