FOR BPO SECTOR IN CEBU: Manpower woes continue
Despite the availability of affordable or even free call center training centers in Cebu manpower remains a huge problem hounding the Business Process Outsourching industry today.
Cebu Investments and Promotions Center (CIPC) managing director Joel Mari S. Yu said BPO companies, especially call centers that are planning to expand, are often faced with manpower shortage problems and if there are ample applicants, only a few are qualified for the job.
Yu added that even if Cebu will only be able to attract a few investors in the BPO sector, the revenue and employment generation can surge to a double-digit growth and that is if Cebu can meet the growing demand for BPO workforce.
“Everybody [BPO companies] is expanding. No one is downscaling,” Yu said.
Cebu produces at least an average of 25 thousand graduates per year, if the BPO sector can get even five percent of this number it can easily give about 1,150 new employees to the sector.
However, the problem of ready people to do voice jobs that only requires short-term training is still haunting the industry, Yu said.
The worldwide BPO market is a US$50 billion dollar industry, the penetration rate is only at 15 percent.
Cebu has the huge potential to rake in a bigger chunk of this market, however, if manpower availability will not be solved, the industry will remain cripple because of this problem.
Significantly, Cebu’s aim to become a number one emerged destination in the world is at stake, because of the profound manpower problem, Yu said.
At present, Cebu only employs a total estimate of over 30 thousand people working for the BPO related companies. In Metro Manila on the other hand, the industry employs over 500 thousand people.
“The problem is still human resource. We don’t have enough people. One of the requirements in achieving an emerged destination is the availability of manpower,” Yu said.
Business Process Association of the Philippines (BPAP) chairman Bong Borja said while Cebu’s infrastructure and environment is already attractive for BPO companies to expand or to lure fresh investments in this sector, the challenge for Cebu is to provide the people.
According to Borja, if Cebu can provide 120,000 people for the industry, it can easily capture a huge chunk of the US$50 billion BPO market in the world.
He said if Cebu can get at least US$2.4 billion revenue out of BPO sector, “it can change the landscape of Cebu.”
Because of this problem, Borja suggested that Cebu should also aggressively attract Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO) investors. These higher scale investments will give three-times revenue versus the traditional voice BPO.
Borja reiterated that aside from voice-related BPO, Cebu should also capitalize on the KPO market, and the BTO (Business Technology Outsourcing), while manpower requirement is not in volume and revenue generation for the province’s economy can triple.
