Increasing attrition rate in the industry attributed to night shifts, lower salaries and lack of outreach
After witnessing an explosive growth for almost five years, the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry suddenly seems to be losing its allure among employees and potential recruits. Most of the 20 major BPOs in the city complain not only of heavy attrition, but also of a dearth of qualified individuals.
Sources in the industry say the attrition level in BPOs was about 11 per cent a few years ago, and now it is around 18 per cent, and goes up to 25 per cent in smaller BPOs, where there are no standard income and human resource policies
A year ago, many arts and sciences colleges, especially women’s colleges, asked BPOs not to recruit from their campuses. “Many parents are wary of them. The night shift policy of BPOs is the main reason for this. Also, students prefer jobs in the IT industry, publishing and consultancies,” says Shyamala Kanakarajan, vice principal, Ethiraj College for Women.
Engineering students also see them as a last option considering the many options available — start-ups, SMEs and dotcoms among others. “It is not just the night shifts but the ‘call centre culture’ that we want to avoid,” says Prabha Ram, who works in a BPO in Velachery. She says easy transfers, more promotions and skill-development programmes are what the industry needs. “Getting a transfer within the organisation in smaller BPOs is so difficult that you can work only when you are fine with night shifts. Since, getting new recruits is easy, BPOs do not try to retain their employees.”
A. Gandhi, Training and Placement, Saveetha College of Engineering points out that fresh graduates hardly know how outsourcing works. “There is no interaction between the BPOs and the academia, and almost no BPO offers internships to students.” However many students, if rejected by top firms, take to joining the firms’ BPOs. “The brand matters a lot. And the work also demands technical skills which these engineers have,” says Prof. Gandhi.
A placement director of a reputed private engineering college says having BPOs in their list of placement companies does not go down well with students. “At the end of the placement season, we ask the students with not-very-good academic credentials to go to BPOs with vacancies. Only around 30 of the 300 in a batch of students do so, because they fear the tag will stay on, and they will be rejected by IT firms. The ones who join them try to shift within a year.”
BPO heads are also worried about absconding employees – those who leave without telling the management. “Employees abscond for as small an increment as Rs. 500 a month. There is a lot of loss incurred as we give them extensive training too,” says K.R. Muthy, HR head of a talent assessment firm. Companies such as Allsec, Sutherland and Genpact are combating this issue by recruiting candidates only through an employee referral mechanism. “Special incentives are given to employees who refer us to good recruits. Team-building exercises and family get-together are being organised too,” says an HR official.
The foremost thing one needs to know is not to equate a BPO to a call centre, says Arjun Anand, manager, client services, Merit Group. “There is IT work, database management, consultancy and much more that happens in a BPO, besides voice calling.” And not every BPO works on night shifts,” he adds, detailing the many who work at Indian and U.K. times.
While IT companies have an average annual salary of Rs. 3 – 3.7 lakh, their BPOs pay around Rs 2 – 2.6 Lakh, and the smaller ones pay even lesser, which also contributes to the attrition phenomenon. According to NASSCOM officials, however, the city is on par with Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi in terms of salaries, and behind only Mumbai and Gurgaon.
Keywords: BPO jobs, attrition in BPO's, internship in BPO's, BPO and call centre
To the point made by Amalesh,Philipines call centers have overtaken us in terms of acccent.From my vantage point. Accent doesn't matter a lot.As we being indians, we have a very good accent that is indian accent.
Most of the americans or british know when they call,they end up talking to an Indian. What matters the most is pronunciation, words are supposed to be pronounced correctly when they interact with the customer. In fact, most of the indian call centers emphasize on neutral accent.We don't put on fake accent, unlike some people do, Being fond of english, they are a few people who join this industry. Not as the last resort or last option.
Morever,this industry has taught me how to be a good human being when someone is in trouble, putting ourselves in their shoes. An industry teaches you to master at talking, technology, interpersonal skills. Having all these skills, irrespective of the volatile economic condition, the chances of getting a job is way too easy. India BPO rocks!
Mr walter read the article carefully and then comment,what is being
discussed here not against outsourcing but the kind of work that is
being carried out in these bpos especially the voice based call
centres,perhaps u have never worked with a bpo and u r just commenting
like a sterotype.
The Client Services Manager Mr.Arjun Anand of Merit Group says,
there are considerable works involved during the start-up as well
as during the functioning of the BPOs. This is absolutely true.
The liaisoning with various Govt.Departments like Customs,DGFT,
ROC, RBI ECD, STPI all involves constant coordination with various
executives and the Finance Dept., will have to cope-up closely with
Income generation for the company as well as keep an eye on overheads.
Considerable amount of patience and calm working attitude is essential. For this, elderly people who have put-in good amount of
work in Banking/Insurance/Central Govt.and other places with basic
knowledge of computing is enough. They will not leave the Company once
they are recruited. I was one such. After my Banking Service, I learnt Computing and then worked for a BPO which had its base in USA.
I was looked-after very well during my 4 year stint.
In response to james
Posted on: Jul 9, 2012 at 11:29 IST:
Indian Economy has gone up due to Bpo's n call centres. Every Indian today can afford to buy a pizza, a burger n also travel by an AC bus because its affordable. Today, if 1 out of 5 Indians are able to put their children in big schools, its because of the money flowing into India from other countries who outsource their projects to India. If it was not for Bpo's 1 out of 3 Indians wil be working in a Hotel n undergraduates & post graduates will be Unemployed. Whether its their priority or last resort is Not the question but most of us Indians end up in a Bpo or a call centre because THEY HV THE MONEY TO PAY. I ve seen Doctors, engineers, business men and every other person who wants a better lifestyle-join a Bpo. Money is Everything- from the moment a person is born n until the person is Dead = Everything is Money.
The Hindu should go to West Bengal sometime and report on the state of BPO and IT offers there. For most engineering grads in WB, a salary of more than 2 lakhs a year is too good to be true and 3 lakhs is a dream. Some companies even have the audacity to offer 1.2, 1 lakhs pa for jobs in Bangalore/Hyderabad, which are jokes rather than job offers.
Main thing wrong with Indian is that all of them want to be rich quickly or keep earning more and more money which ever way. I live in U.S. and I see many of them coming over these days do not have the technical knowledge nor the ethics the previous generation had. All of them want huge money, buy huge homes and drive nice cars but they are just the lowest level of code monkeys who not even know how to talk in english nor have any creativity.
Indian have become very materialistic. Repect is given only if you have money
It is a sad story hopefully will have a good ending!
The change is in fact a good news for the country.I say this because first of all rash and rampant driving by these call center cabs will be curtailed. Another more important change that I see is the inflation will come down as these are the people who do not understand how to spend money as all of a sudden they now have too much money in their pocket than they need.Further, Now is a time to realize and we the people should push the Govt of India to give more subsidiary for Agriculture and Manufacturing. If you look at our economy we are too much depend on external sources for all our needs. We should be investing on R&D in Manufacturing and other tangible economy rather than a pure services economy. We claim that we are producing high end engineers but till date we haven't produced any IP out of our country. If we dive little deep we can see that these IT companies recruit freshers every year to maintain their bottom line and this the reason for high attrition. Let us unite and fight.
I strongly believe that there is a huge communication gap between the students and the BPO Firms.
1st of all, ITs just are responsible for tailor made projects. Mass producing firms run mainly at the mercy of BPOs, because there is actually no contact between those firms and the end user, who is actually using their product and facing loads of difficulty. It is these BPOs that assist the user, bearing all the frustration and the words of the customer.
And more over, the Growth,promotions, perks, recognition for good work is high in BPOs compared with an IT.
Just because of the Night shifts,one can't neglect and complain over BPOs like this. People get a huge opportunity to learn in BPOs.
Well, let's not forget that BPO industry has made life of thousands
people in our country. But everything comes with it's own cost. BPO
industry has different culture than usual industries. One of my friend
has worked in a well known BPO at Delhi. He had earned a lot as he was
quite good in communication. He got many perks like Movie tickets,
vouchers of malls, night club passes apart from salary. He and their colleges were forced to watch English movies which may contain adult
content as well. After 6 months, due to frustration, he had left the
job. The reason was late night hours, performance pressure and no time
for day time/ night time activities. Biological cycle was screwed like
anything. I just specified for other people aspiring for this field.
Even IT majors like TCS have BPO wings - but there is no clear transition path - The people aspect is not considered - Night shifts in long term will lead to health issues & Marriage proposals become a problem for a person who is working in night shifts. With these issues in mind, i think it is better if youngsters dont take up BPO jobs.
its about time that the shitty bpo voice based call centers should be
eradicated from the country itself,a states can only progress only if it
has really good jobs . with dozens of stinking of call centers piling up
how can one expect any kind of growth and there also teaching you to
put up a stupid accent.
The accent in english call centres in Phillipines ( which allready over took India in call centre strength.)and apathy of quick money is main reason please highlight our loses as call centre nation immidiately to save thousands of jobs.
For an economy to flourish, production of goods and agriculture is a must.US realised this and is back to promoting production.Jobs in production sector is more stable and chances of loosing job is less. Salary in IT sector may be good but they get pink slip and return back.Higher productivity leads to Economic growth in the present day world.Food grain produced perishes when exposed to rain and sun proper control needed in movement of food grain. Manpower needed to plan and execute preventive steps.Unemployed graduates and engineers will be available for production and services if artificial attraction to BPO diminishes.I call it artificial as it attracts graduates, but self development of skill is less. In case of engineering the graduate learns technology and this experience adds to market value of the person.
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