• Book about The Philippines call centre industry now available for download

  Long time industry veteran Rob O’Malley has written a book entitled “Philippines: Call Centre Outsourcing” which is now available to download on Amazon.  The book documents the industry from its inception to the present day and highlights the many changes faced by the industry.   Full Story
  

• Mauritius seeks more investments from Indian firms

  Home to a host of Indian firms and a vast Indian-origin population, Mauritius wants a larger number of companies from India to come here — for setting up businesses in the island nation as well as in other African countries. Positioning itself as a ‘tax-free gateway to Africa’, Mauritius is also promising a host of other benefits to the Indian companies routing their investments to various African nations through its soil.

• South Africa selects Gemalto for its national electronic identity card program

  Gemalto, a leader in digital security, will supply the Government Printing Works (GPW) of South Africa with Sealys eID cards for their national identity program. GPW will harness Gemalto’s secure embedded software to protect the holder’s image and biometric data within the secure identity e-document, delivering outstanding levels of integrity and privacy.

• Heineken the world’s most international brewer, has chosen Orange Business Services to unify the majority of its global communications infrastructure connecting 60,000 employees across 1,100-plus sites in 53 countries, under a 5-year, multimillion euro contract.

According to the BPeSA Western Cape Key Indicator Report, the BPO/contact centre industry experienced impressive levels of growth in 2012, with an estimated 4,500 jobs created in the province. In total the industry grew from 33,500 to 38,000, contributing approximately R8 billion to the Western Cape annual GDP.

Out of the 4,500 jobs created in 2012/13, an estimated 3,100 are from offshore investment, showcasing a market shift driven by international outsourcers.

“This industry is a key growth area for the province creating significant job opportunities for the regions youth, with over 80% of all customer service associate positions being filled by staff aged 18 – 30,” said Western Cape Minister of Finance Economic Development and Tourism, Alan Winde.

Industry Overview

The UK continues to make up the majority of international outsourcing business in the Western Cape with 61% of the market, followed by Australia at 9%, a 5% increase from 2011/12. The largest non-English market for the second year in a row is Germany at 7%. Within the offshore market, English continues to be the service language of choice with 82% of the market share, showing no change from 2011/12.

“South Africa is known as an English voice based location with foreign languages such as German, Dutch and French typically being offered as additional support languages,” said Gareth Pritchard, CEO of BPeSA Western Cape.

According to Andrew McNair, Head of Benchmarking Customer Interactive Solutions (Global) Dimension Data, South Africa is rapidly establishing itself as an alternative BPO offshore location. This is being driven primarily by the people, a world-class infrastructure and an obvious cultural appetite for learning.

Operational Overview

The 2012/13 research highlights that ‘omni channel usage’ such as social media, web chat, speech self-service and smart phone applications will play an increasingly prominent role in customer service, with companies becoming more customer-centric. Results also point towards a shift in the job description of the contact centre customer service associate. It’s expected that these individuals will increasingly be required to cater for multiple service channels, which could impact the level and depth of training required by operators.

Human Resources

58.6% of customer service associates are between the ages of 26 – 30, this represents a 16.5% increase from 2011/12, while the number of employees aged 18 – 25 has decreased by 24.7%. This change could signify a development within the industry where experience is now seen as a prerequisite for employment and could result in more complex work being serviced from the region.

Overall attrition rates continue to be relatively low by global standards at 13.1%, a 3.5% increase from 2011/12. This could be due to a large captive market in the Western Cape, where progression is not limited to the contact centre environment. Attrition is highest among international outsourcers at 26%, a 4% improvement from 2011/12.

“The findings from this year’s report have helped showcase that the Western Cape is on par and in many instances ahead of other global customer service locations. This bodes well for the future of the industry and should result in growth among both local and international operators in 2013 and beyond,” said Pritchard.

To download the full report visit http://www.bpesawesterncape.co.za/key-indicator-industry-report/.

Telecommuting “Telework” refers to the usage of information technologies (such as telecommunications and computers) for work-related activities. It moves the workplace to the workers, instead of moving the workers to the workplace, which is the typical scenario for professionals. Although the concepts of “telecommuting” and “telework” are closely related, there is still a difference between the two. All types of technology-assisted work conducted outside of a centrally located workspace (including work undertaken in the home, outside sales calls, etc.) are regarded as telework. Telecommuting refers more specifically to work undertaken at a location that reduces commuting time. These locations can be inside the home or at some other remote workplace, which is facilitated through a broadband connection, computer or phone lines.

As a broader concept than telecommuting, telework has four dimensions in its definitional framework: work location, that can be anywhere outside of a centralized organizational work place; usage of ICTs(information and communication technologies) as technical support for telework; time distribution, referring to the amount of time replaced in the traditional workplace; and the diversity of employment relationships between employer and employee, ranging from contract work to traditional full-time employment.

A frequently repeated motto is that “work is something you do, not something you travel to.” Variations of this include: “Work is something we DO, not a place that we GO”and “Work is what we do, not where we are.”

Source: Wikipedia

Here is a visual perspective that you will find very interesting: http://www.howdoibecomea.net/telecommuting/

After earning a spot as the most sought after offshore destination in the voice-based outsourcing sector, the Philippines got another reason to rejoice. The country’s non-voice business process outsourcing (BPO) is seen as another gold mine for growth and opportunities.

In the past years, the Philippine outsourcing space recorded impressive growth figures. Just last year, the whole industry generated revenues totalling to $13-Billion. According to the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPAP), it expects the country’s non-voice outsourcing space to add up to the total outsourcing revenues in the forthcoming years.

An Everest Group report entitled, “Healthcare BPO Is a ‘Hidden Jewel’ For the Philippines’ Global Services Industry,” indicated the tremendous growth posted by the country’s health BPO.

The healthcare BPO segment increased fourfold over the past two years. From the US$102-Million revenues generated in 2010, revenues of the healthcare BPO sector jumped to US$430-Million by the end-2012, suggesting this non-voice sector is one of the fastest-growing among the country’s IT-BPO industry.

The report also indicates that the country now holds a large pool of US-licensed nurses. More than 6,000 nurses are being trained every year, which suggests that this figure makes the Philippines far ahead of the domestic demand.

Non-voice BPO works wonder for the Philippines, mainly due to its huge talent pool. It also boasts of a high level of cultural compatibility with that of the United States. Plus, the Philippine educational system follows the US standards.

Other than healthcare outsourcing, the Philippines command quite an impressive feat in the other areas of non-voice outsourcing. Tholons, one of the world-leading advisory firms today, sees the recent foray of outsourcing service providers in the country into non-voice areas like software development and IT outsourcing, animation and game development, and healthcare information management (HIM) outsourcing.

Tholons expects the country to also penetrate other markets outside the US. Local outsourcing firms are offering their services to Australian small and medium-sized enterprises as well. Tholons identified Cebu as an attractive destination for both voice- and non-voice BPO operations. In its ranking, Cebu got 8^th place in Tholons’ top 100 global outsourcing destinations.

Source: http://www.bigoutsource.com/blog/non-voice-business-process-outsourcing-is-this-the-hidden-jewel-for-philippines

By Ben Schneiders and Clay Lucas

The state government is dramatically lifting its spending on temporary workers and contractors in the public sector to nearly $1 billion – at the same time as it lays off more than 4000 staff.

The leap in spending on temporary workers is detailed in government contracts that reveal a big rise in the use of temporary administrative staff, information technology workers and consultants.

The $930 million expected to be spent from 2011 to 2014 compares with the government’s outsourcing contract for 2006-2008, which was worth about $200 million.

Among the firms to benefit from the current outsourcing contract are labour hire giants Hays, Hudson and Randstad.

Agreements with seven labour hire firms were signed in 2011, just months before then treasurer Kim Wells announced plans to cut 3600 public service jobs. This cut would save the government $998 million over three financial years, according to a budget update released in December 2011 when Mr Wells made the announcement.

In last year’s budget the government announced it would axe another 600 public service jobs, meaning 4200 public servants will go by the end of this year.

A spokeswoman for Assistant Treasurer Gordon Rich-Phillips did not directly answer questions on why the Coalition’s spending on outsourcing had jumped so much.

”The Victorian Coalition government will make no apologies for seeking efficiencies within government agencies. This is an important element in maintaining a stable economic environment with a AAA credit rating,” she said.

The spokeswoman blamed federal Labor’s ”inflexible” Fair Work Act for driving up the cost of labour.

Opposition industrial relations spokeswoman Natalie Hutchins said there were now doubts over whether the government was saving money through its redundancy program.

”This government prides itself that it is running sustainable budgets, [but] how sustainable is it to sack 4200 people and put out a $1 billion contract for casual labour?” she said.

Ms Hutchins said the move was ”about making the public sector more insecure, the delivery of services more questionable”.

A former senior public servant said labour hire staff and temporary workers were used by government departments to hide spending on wages and to disguise how many workers they used. Spending on labour hire could be reported in accounts as ”capital expenditure” rather than staff costs, he said. ”It is a tried and true method way of hiding the cost.”

He said some departments now had more than one-fifth of their staff employed from labour hire or as non-permanent workers.

Community and Public Sector Union state secretary Karen Batt said the government was moving to replace the permanent public service.

”The government is spending $300 million for the most recent round of redundancies while utilising sham contracting through labour hire for just under $1 billion,” she said.

Ms Batt said the government had ”perpetuated a political fraud” over its redundancy program.

Source: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/states-1b-outsourcing-bill-20130423-2id15.html#ixzz2VOVaVRF4

• The government of Mauritius announced that it is now the largest investor in Zimbabwe, with a commitment of over USD 3.4 billion. This will open up opportunities in BPO, data storage; call centres, media services, eBusiness and software development.

• Jabra Australia/New Zealand (ANZ) announced that it has appointed Ingram Micro, the world’s largest distributor of computer and technology products, to distribute the company’s complete range of Call Centre and Office (CC&O) products. The distribution agreement includes Jabra’s full range of products, including recently launched Jabra MOTION; designed to suit the rapidly growing group of mobile workers with an everyday need for audio conferencing or hands-free calls, in the car or at home using smart devices.
• Datacom, one of Australasia’s largest independent business technology solutions providers, announced that it has been awarded a contract to deliver a leading range of contact centre services to the Australian Taxation Office. The contract, estimated to be worth AU$32.5 million over the next 4 years, follows Datacom’s earlier September 2012 appointment

By Josh Taylor

Summary: Foreign IT workers were not the focus of a discussion paper that led to the Australian government criticising the 457-visa program.

The Australian government has recently been critical of what it calls overuse of the 457 visa program to recruit foreign workers into Australia, in particular IT workers, but the discussion paper that spawned the debate doesn’t mention IT workers at all.

In March, Prime Minster Julia Gillard said the use of the visa to temporarily employ overseas workers was growing much faster than employment in Australia, with over 100,000 workers in Australia now on 457 visas. She said the IT industry was one of the bigger offenders in hiring 457 visa workers.

“It is just not acceptable that information technology jobs, the quintessential jobs of the future, the very opportunities being created by the digital economy, precisely where the big picture is for our kids, should be such a big area of imported skills.”

As a result, the government is planning on introducing legislative changes to the program in the upcoming sitting of parliament ahead of the federal election in September.

The proposal spawned from a confidential discussion paper prepared in December 2012 by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship for the Ministerial Advisory Council on Skilled Migration on the integrity of the 457-visa program. The paper, which was released under Freedom of Information laws, states that it is time to evaluate the integrity of the program, and while it highlights 12 measures to improve the system, it does not implicate any one particular industry as abusing the system.

Immigration Minister Brendan O’Connor has said that it was not the only information the government was working from.

This paper is one of several important pieces of information that have been used to formulate the Gillard Government’s ongoing reforms to the 457 program. It is not, however, the sole determinant of the government’s decisions,” he said.

O’Connor was also today forced to defend comments he had made earlier in the week, stating that 10 per cent of people on 457 visas were rorting the system. He told ABC radio this morning that it was an estimate rather than a precise figure.

One of the measures that Gillard had highlighted as being an ongoing problem with the 457 visa program was employers discriminating in favour of 457 visa workers over local workers.

“Recent cases include examples of certain sponsors who have advised the department that they do not seek to recruit locally as it does not fit with their business model, or because it is too expensive to recruit domestically,” the discussion paper read.

The proposed change was expected to have nil impact, except in rare instances where an employer might be sanctioned for favouring overseas workers.

About Josh Taylor

Armed with a degree in Computer Science and a Masters in Journalism, Josh keeps a close eye on the telecommunications industry and all the goings on in government IT. Like most Gen Y, he spends a lot of his time with his eyes glued to his iPhone on various social media apps.

By Aditya Bhalla

For most of the big BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) firms the tenure of many client relationships is in excess of five years. This level of comfort has provided the service providers with unique insights into the challenges faced by their clients.

It is therefore natural for clients to expect the benefits of these insights to be passed on to them. Most client contracts quantify the specific benefits in the form of staff reduction or cost reduction or any other related efficiency gains with each passing year.

In the initial years BPO firms have been able to pass on the efficiency gains through automation and rigorous implementation of process improvement methodologies such as lean six sigma. Now that the low hanging fruit have been taken, the pressure to deliver additional benefits is telling on the gross margins. The double whammy on the financial numbers has been the pressures caused by stagnant or reducing topline growth of BPO firms.

The time is ripe for BPO firms to explore other engagement models that can provide the clients with the efficiency gains and the BPO firms with additional opportunities to retain their gross margins levels. As a bonus effect such models may also help recover the projected reduction in revenues.

Some of these engagement models such as project based pricing, transaction based pricing, pay per use models have been in existence for a long time. However, they have gained traction in the recent past.

Making these models work requires a good grasp of the end-to-end business dynamics that trigger the workload demand generated by end-customers. Supply side thinking will require a deeper understanding of the application of tools and techniques to leverage past data and predict future values of workload, unplanned shrinkages, unit processing time and service levels that can be committed to end customers.

While many BPOs have been very comfortable applying some of these techniques in a voice based environment, the bigger challenge seems to have come from non-voice environment where many of the higher order analytical jobs reside. Many of these jobs were outsourced with an inadequate understanding of the sources of variation such as types of workload and drivers of workload. Additionally the BPOs may be managing scattered parts of the end-to-end process limiting their visibility on the inefficiencies that exist.

Clients seem to be more than happy to collaborate with their service providers to develop the robust models related to managing demand and supply. Some of the BPOs have started investing in developing the internal competencies related to business forecasting and applying those skills to take over the client operations in this area. Still many challenges remain.

Clients may not pay

The new conflict facing BPOs at this stage is that clients may be willing to allow their service provider to take over the business forecasting function but they may not be willing to pay additional charges for that. The resolution for the BPOs lies in a multi-prong approach:

• Cost avoidance by cutting down the penalties on missed targets
• Cost reduction by optimal utilisation of skilled staff across multiple client engagements
• Revenue creation by leveraging insights on business drivers to offer newer products and services to clients. For example, additional services of value to healthcare clients that would help their end-users get their jobs done more effectively through self-service options.

Clients may not allow dynamic staffing

The new business model will require win-win thinking to resolve the contradictions with respect to staffing and scheduling.

Current non-compete clauses in contracts may have provisions that limit the dynamic movement of staff with similar competencies to other clients in the same industry.

Additionally, client processes on certifying staff or creating the license for any staff may be very laborious and time consuming reducing the flexibility of moving staff out and bringing them back based on seasonality.

There are no easy answers to the above challenges and BPO firms will have to work closely with their clients to find solutions that allow for multi-city, multi-client, multi-skill engagements.

Aditya Bhalla is Innovation Practice Head at QAI Global Services and consults clients on product and process design and improvement. He can be contacted at adityabhalla@yahoo.com

www.the-outsourcing.com

New survey finds Aussie workers believe noise disrupts efficiency.

Australian workers are avoiding phone calls in favour of emails due to noise levels in the office, a global survey by Jabra has found.

The research revealed nearly 40 per cent of Australian respondents reported sending out emails to avoid phone calls altogether.

When asked to identify the things that irritated employees in the workplace talking loudly across the office space was found to be the most annoying (44 per cent), followed by interruptions by colleagues (29 per cent) and personal phone calls (27 per cent).

The success of unified communications services provided by Cisco, Microsoft and others has led to over 45 per cent of Australian employees working in open or semi-open office environments. These work environments encourage them to communicate and collaborate with their colleagues. Unfortunately, this increased chatter has resulted in 40 per cent of employees having to raise their voices to be heard, 28 per cent missing details when on the phone and 21 per cent having longer phone calls.

Soren Schoennemann, managing director, Jabra ANZ said it was promising to see more Australian businesses embracing modern day working environments. However he warned that businesses must ensure they have the technology in place that supports this shift away from the traditional work model.

“Working in an open plan office is a great way to enhance team work, creativity and information sharing. However organisations need to make sure this increase in interaction does not impact employee productivity.

“It is important to equip workers with the tools they need to work more efficiently in a variety of work environments. Technology can now enable employees to continue working without being disturbed by a busy office environment, a noisy printer or coffee machine.

“Improvements in technology should enable businesses to be more agile and we are certain that the benefits of unified communication tools – such as greater collaboration, increased productivity, and more efficient business processes – will become readily apparent as companies move forward using them.

With technology such as wireless headsets and speakers workers are able to expand their work radius; they can get up and leave their office or desk to get papers at the copier or coffee and still be able to work efficiently from any place,” Schoennemann said.

Australian workers have a larger work radius than ever before with over 60 per cent having to move beyond 2.5 metres to perform basic tasks such as reaching documents,  collecting paper from the printer or simply going to get advice from a colleague whilst still on the phone.

Furthermore, workers are increasingly working from other locations in and outside the office with 45 per cent of respondents working from meeting rooms or quiet rooms, 43 per cent working from home, 29 per cent working on transport (car, bus, train) and 22 per cent working out of their customers’ office.

Australian companies are replacing older technology with new unified communications (UC) solutions and the research also found that 46 per cent expect significant increases in employee productivity by implementing UC and found it to be a great return on investment.

The research also found using a headset at work enabled employees to be more productive with 47 per cent reporting fewer missed calls and 55 per cent of respondents being able to perform their tasks better with a headset.

By Daniel Burrus

Today’s smart phones are much more than phones—they are powerful, networked multimedia computers, and over the next 10 years they’ll get far more advanced. As a result, mobility is transforming every business process, including how we sell, communicate, collaborate, train, and educate. Following are some key developments that will revolutionize the smart phone and every company’s mobile strategy over the next decade.

1.  Your smart phone will have a 3D display and a 3D web browser, and you won’t need special glasses to view it. So instead of just viewing web pages on your smart phone, you’ll be able to go into environments (or stores or showrooms) and manoeuvre around in them, just as you do on devices like the Xbox. Alternatively, you’ll be able to see things sticking out from the screen, again without the special glasses. The 3D web on your smart phone will be a game-changer for business.

2. Rather than have to remember numerous passwords, you will be able to access data and sites on your smart phone using multiple biometric authentications. Advanced screen resolution and sensors on the phone will make this possible. For example, when you touch the screen, it will recognize you based on your fingerprint. In addition, your phone’s front-facing camera will use facial recognition to identify you. Everyone’s voice is unique, so voice recognition will also be part of the identification/security process. How you handle the phone—your keystrokes and touch/manoeuvre patterns—are also unique. The number of biometrics used will depend on the level of security you want based on what you are doing. For example, if you’re accessing your Facebook account, you may only want one biometric for authentication. However, if you’re doing a high-level security activity (such as banking via your smart phone), you’ll likely want to use multiple biometrics.

3. Your smart phone will become your wallet. Credit cards are easy, but e-wallets are easier. Currently, Google has a mobile wallet that works with Citi MasterCard, and in the future it will work with other credit cards. It is secure and enables you to make payments with your smart phone. In the near future, as every financial service firm gets into mobile payments, you will move very quickly from a leather wallet to a smart phone wallet. One example of an enabling technology is NFC, near-field communications chips, which are being built into smart phones as you read this article. They allow for secure and easy payment, so be ready for it. Not ready for e-wallets? How about payments using smart phones by adding a Square or similar system? Starbucks and others are using this already with great success.

4. Your ultra intelligent agent will get smarter. The first ultra intelligent agent was Apple’s Siri. As Siri-like agents advance, they will turn into personal assistants and will be able to search the web for you and bring back focused, highly relevant information based on how long you have used your e-agent and how well it knows you. In other words, your ultra intelligent agent will know your preferences, your likes, and your needs and will automatically compile, present, and share what’s pertinent to you. Additionally, your ultra intelligent agent will have a face when you are looking at the screen and a personality that you choose. You’ll even see celebrities licensing the rights to their digital likeness and personality to be used as ultra intelligent agents.

5. Some of your smart phones will be screen-less. The traditional smart phone with a screen will not go away, but you will have an option for a screen-less smart phone. This will be a very popular and highly adopted smart phone because without the screen, you get rid of much of the need for a big battery. Think of the screen-less smart phone like the little piece of jewellery people wore on the old Star Trek TV show. The screen-less smart phone will be touch and voice activated. When you tap it, you’ll be connected to your ultra-intelligent agent, which is part of a super computer in the cloud. Whatever you need, your ultra intelligent agent will be able to verbally give you the information, such as turn by turn directions, reading your email to you, etc.

6. Your smart phone will interface with smart surfaces. We are already seeing the beginning of using touch and voice-operated intelligent screens as tabletop computers that can access the Internet. Simply by placing your smart phone on these surfaces, the two will link together.  Additionally, your ultra intelligent agent will flow from your smart phone to the screen.

This is just a small sampling of what we’ll see for future smart phone technology. All of these advancements are in their early stages today. So keep in mind that if it can be done, it will be done. The question is, who will be first?

DANIEL BURRUS is considered one of the world’s leading technology forecasters and business strategists, and is the founder and CEO of Burrus Research, a research and consulting firm that monitors global advancements in technology driven trends to help clients understand how technological, social and business forces are converging to create enormous untapped opportunities. He is the author of Flash Foresight.