To me, it’s always good business to do well by doing good. That’s the spirit in which Wipro established its rural BPO program in Manjakuddi, a village with a population of 2500. A large percentage of the 54 employees live in a house with a thatched roof. The village is six hours by car from Chennai.
The mover and shaker behind this project is Puneet Chandra, global head and vice president, Corporate Business Services, who was moved by the work of two institutions:
- The Azim Premji Foundation, whose goal is to educate the girl child in rural India
- Swami
If I hear one more person complain that outsourcing is the major reason for the seemingly intractable U.S. unemployment rate, I will scream. I live in Las Vegas, which has one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation. Here is a quote from a letter to the editor of the local paper dated July 13:
Headline: “Nation’s jobs have gone overseas to the detriment of the U.S.”
Letter: “All I hear is, “Where are the jobs? The answer is they are overseas. … I don’t see other countries sending their jobs to the USA. How come?”
The jingoistic… Read the rest
Congratulations to Francisco d’Souza, president and CEO of Cognizant! The South Asian MBA Association recently named him “CEO of the Year.”
Cognizant is enjoying double-digit growth, ranking among the top outsourcing companies in India, and was added to the Fortune 500 this month.
D’Souza took the helm at Cognizant in 2007 as one of the youngest CEOs in South Asia. He’s no stranger to awards and accolades. Business Week ranks him as one of the world’s most successful immigrants; he also received the Economic Times Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2005.
Don’t you just hate having to say “I should have paid more attention to that”? Here are four news items that caught my eye, as they bode strongly of trends that will change the outsourcing pulse.
Pay attention to these trends now and start planning for them in your future outsourcing strategies — or you’ll wnat to kick yourself later for not having done it sooner.
Trend #1. U.S. and UK banks are currently reducing the number of service providers they use, narrowing them down to two or three providers with whom they have a high level of… Read the rest
The BPO world has come a very long way over the past decade! We have seen significant change in the market, both from buyer and supplier perspectives.
Buyer requirements have evolved across the board to enhance the range of processes that they outsource and the way they structure the engagements and what they demand from a BPO partner.
Providers have evolved to keep pace with buyer interests, and in many ways have also influenced the same by creating and demonstrating capabilities that have strongly contributed to the evolution of the buyers’ thoughts.
Overall, from my perspective here is what that… Read the rest
Over the past few months, the media has brought attention to the growth of outsourced call center services in the Philippines instead of India. I spoke with Steve Barker, General Manager – AsiaPac at Sitel – which provides call center services from India and the Philippines as well as 10 other geographies – to get his take on issues associated with the growth as well as other trends in call center outsourcing.
Q: A USA Today article on January 10, 2011, says the Philippines now employs 350,000 people in outsourced call center jobs compared with 330,000 in India. And according… Read the rest
Rebounding from the recession and economic crisis, and despite increasing competition from other offshore outsourcing destinations, India outsourcing firms will still occupy the headlines as the world leader in 2011. As evidence:
- Kotak Institutional Equities predicts “blockbuster growth” for TCS, Infosys, and Cognizant
- TCS upped its plans to hire, now announcing they’re looking for 50,000 new employees; Infosys wants to add another 20,000 in headcount
However, in a PC World article on 11 trends in 2011, advisory firms EquaTerra and Everest Group predict an increasing interest in outsourcing to providers in China,… Read the rest
Three statistics caught my eye as important outsourcing news today: #1, 3/4, and 24.
#1 - Congratulations to Océ Business Services!
The Black Book of Outsourcing’s 2010 “State of the Industry” survey ranked Océ as the leading document process outsourcing provider among the Global Top 50 Outsourcing Providers. Océ Business Services received the highest scores of any DPO provider in the three criteria that 6,500 respondents considered to be the most important. These include awareness of requirements, closely followed by the ability to resolve problems as and when they arise, and the skills and resources that providers can bring to the work they… Read the rest
WNS was featured on the show titled Making it Big – 2010 on CNBC last week. The program chronicled WNS’s growth story from its origins as a captive back-office unit of British Airways through its transformation into a leading third-party provider of BPO services across many industries.
The program covered WNS’s history, its pioneer status in the BPO industry, and its leadership position as the first India-based BPO company to list on the NYSE. Most importantly, the show highlights WNS’s focus and strategic programs for the future as it evolves for its next phase of growth.
If you’re interested in viewing the show,… Read the rest
In Rome, do as the Romans do! This popular proverb has a strong application as corporations expand across international locations. Most of us are aware of the initial failures that some of the top brands in the world have encountered when they have rushed to penetrate a new geography/country without understanding the local nuances fully.
As an example, the Coca-Cola name in China was first read as “Kekoukela,” meaning “Bite the Wax Tadpole” or “Female Horse Stuffed with Wax,” depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a phonetic equivalent to “kokoukole” translating into “Happiness in the… Read the rest
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