BPO Career Tips

Education and Careers over the past two decades has undergone a sea change. Until 20 years ago there were limited careers and standard routes to those careers. Today a student on the threshold of College Education or opting a Career is baffled by the myriad options before him. With the advent of liberalization and the opening of the economy to the international world, innumerable career opportunities are being created all the times.

India has seen the limelight in the past few years shifting rapidly, first it was computer education and training in the early 90's, Y2K was the star during the closing years of the last century. Then as the dot com boom soared high, it was followed by B2B and B2C, followed by the SCM and CRM mantra. Today star goes by the name of BPO or Business Process
Outsourcing. India is today at the core of the Outsourcing Revolution. However as outsourcing moves beyond just call centers and cost cuts, clients are looking for companies that can provide them with that competitive advantage and go with them where they can go alone.
Companies across the globe are favoring India - due its talented and educated work force. Read more about what BPO careers can do for you. As the BPO sector booms in the job market today, you could also get a sizable piece of the pie.

What's a BPO Career all about? A BPO career revolves around the core activity of delivering business process outsourcing services. This involves voice (telephone) and non-voice (email, chat) based customer interaction services, transaction processing, telemarketing, technical support or analyzing of customer specific data. It also involves back-end jobs such as claims processing and processing of Finance & Accounting transactions.

In a growing BPO organization, career opportunities exist across various facets of the business - extending from the core contact center to support functions like HR, legal, marketing, quality, administration etc. Opportunities in the contact center include customer support, telemarketing, technical support and multilingual support (which require people having knowledge of foreign languages like French, Spanish etc.). Opportunities also exist for experienced people from various backgrounds and industries. - like hospitality, services and the retail industry.

The booming BPO industry seems to very complacent with its success, for the pavilion at the Bangalore IT.com had just about a few big BPO/call center players. Business process outsourcing jobs are increasingly being sent by American firms to the low pay nations, nation to register the highest growth in BPO jobs is India . Most of the Call Center jobs are now moving to the countries like India, Philippines, Russia, Mexico, and Canada where cost is low which is huge savings for the companies outsourcing.

In a growing BPO firm the career opportunities exists across various parts of business, from core contact center to the supporting functions like legal, HR, quality, marketing, administration etc. Opportunities in contact center involve telemarketing, customer support, telemarketing, technical support and multilingual support. Because of its vast English speaking population, India has become an ideal candidate for outsourcing US workload through business process outsourcing. English is a popular and well spoken language here. Indians learn English as their second language and are familiar with it. But speaking the global language is not the sole reason for this choice.

The fact that Indian labor is relatively cheaper than American, was also a valid argument for those in favor of outsourcing. Indian labor cost is almost one tenth as compared to American when it comes to the call center industry in particular. That stems from the facts that Indian standards of living are lower than Americans and that Indian pay structures vary greatly from their American counterparts. So America saves costs and benefits from the same by outsourcing its work to India. Call center units are not very demanding as far as qualifications and prerequisites are concerned. Most call center jobs require a basic understanding of computers and a good grasp over English. And the urban youth of India are computer literate graduates with a command over English language. This is the ideal unskilled labor that the call center industry is looking for.

Call Centers in India
Call centers are a phenomenon that has taken over the young crowd of metros in India by a storm. Its implications are social, cultural and economic. It is a new society of the young, rich and free, selling the new dream of an independent life to the regular desi.

With a bang in telecommunications and the boundaries of countries fast disappearing because of the Internet, the world is shrinking into smaller and smaller dimensions. It is getting slighter by the day and faster by the hour. Whether it is culture, arts or economy, you are no more in your own national space. The world has telescoped into one big melting pot of ideas. In this shrinking economy, India has made its presence felt in many fields. And the Call Center industry is one of them.
India shining!

What started as a niche service provision has evolved into a whole new industry in itself. Call centers are organizations in countries where an offshore company services American customers for American clients. Although the business did start off with America, it is no more restricted to the United States only. Countries like Australia, Canada and The United kingdom have also started outsourcing their work to India. The work that is outsourced is from various industries like credit cards, healthcare products, personal care products and education.

Because of its vast English speaking population, India has become an ideal candidate for outsourcing US workload through business process outsourcing. English is a popular and well spoken language here. Indians learn English as their second language and are familiar with it. But speaking the global language is not the sole reason for this choice.

The fact that Indian labor is relatively cheaper than American, was also a valid argument for those in favor of outsourcing. Indian labor cost is almost one tenth as compared to American when it comes to the call center industry in particular. That stems from the facts that Indian standards of living are lower than Americans and that Indian pay structures vary greatly from their American counterparts. So America saves costs and benefits from the same by outsourcing its work to India.

BPO and Outsourcing Jobs - A win-win situation
Reiterating the economists and the sociologists, the cheap labor in India owes its origin to the high rate of unemployment here. Hundreds of thousands of graduates are jobless and desperate for work in India. With higher studies only an option for the affluent, professionals too are facing increasing difficulties in recruitment. And as far as skilled labor is concerned, it is limited to few technical branches of work. Here is where the call center industry fills the gaps.

Call center units are not very demanding as far as qualifications and prerequisites are concerned. Most call center jobs require a basic understanding of computers and a good grasp over English. And the urban youth of India are computer literate graduates with a command over English language. This is the ideal unskilled labor that the call center industry is looking for.

Call center executives only need to be trained in soft skills that include voice neutralization and accent training. This helps to give them an accent more familiar with the people they are going to be talking to. For Indians, this is a smooth transition. Ours is not a country that has evaded the influence of the West and Americanism has seeped into our daily lives like ink on blotting paper.