Business Process Outsourcing HRM
Business Process Outsourcing HRM
Business Process Outsourcing HRM
business functions (or processes) to a thirdparty service provider. Originally, this was associated with manufacturing firms, such as Coca Cola that outsourced large segments of its supply chain.[1] BPO is typically categorized into back office outsourcing - which includes internal business functions such as human resources or finance and accounting, and front office outsourcing which includes customer-related services such as contact centre services. BPO that is contracted outside a company's country is called offshore outsourcing. BPO that is contracted to a company's neighboring (or nearby) country is called nearshore outsourcing. Often the business processes are information technology-based, and are referred to as ITESBPO, where ITES stands for Information Technology Enabled Service.[2] Knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) and legal process outsourcing (LPO) are some of the sub-segments of business process outsourcing industry. In 2010, the Philippines has surpassed India as the largest business process outsourcing industry in the world.[
retain their entrepreneurial speed and agility, which they would otherwise sacrifice in order to become efficient as they expanded. It avoids a premature internal transition from its informal entrepreneurial phase to a more bureaucratic mode of operation.[12] A company may be able to grow at a faster pace as it will be less constrained by large capital expenditures for people or equipment that may take years to amortize, may become outdated or turn out to be a poor match for the company over time. Although the above-mentioned arguments favor the view that BPO increases the flexibility of organizations, management needs to be careful with the implementation of it as there are issues, which work against these advantages. Among problems, which arise in practice are: A failure to meet service levels, unclear contractual issues,(since when BPO started it has happened that employees don't had the chance on making regular to their job), changing requirements and unforeseen charges, and a dependence on the BPO which reduces flexibility. Consequently, these challenges need to be considered before a company decides to engage in business process outsourcing[13] A further issue is that in many cases there is little that differentiates the BPO providers other than size. They often provide similar services, have similar geographic footprints, leverage similar technology stacks, and have similar Quality Improvement approaches.[14]
[edit] Threats
Risk is the major drawback with Business Process Outsourcing. Outsourcing of an Information System, for example, can cause security risks both from a communication and from a privacy perspective. For example, security of North American or European company data is more difficult to maintain when accessed or controlled in the Sub-Continent. From a knowledge perspective, a changing attitude in employees, underestimation of running costs and the major risk of losing independence, outsourcing leads to a different relationship between an organization and its contractor.[15][16] Risks and threats of outsourcing must therefore be managed, to achieve any benefits. In order to manage outsourcing in a structured way, maximizing positive outcome, minimizing risks and avoiding any threats, a Business continuity management (BCM) model is set up. BCM consists of a set of steps, to successfully identify, manage and control the business processes that are, or can be outsourced.[17] Another framework, more focused on the identification process of potential outsourceable Information Systems, identified as AHP, is explained.[18] L. Willcocks, M. Lacity and G. Fitzgerald identify several contracting problems companies face, ranging from unclear contract formatting, to a lack of understanding of technical ITprocesses.[19] BPO is a sector which is processed business from outsources.
market[citation needed]. The South African call center industry has grown by approximately 8% per year since 2003 and it directly employs about 54 000 people, contributing 0.92% to South Africa's gross domestic product(GDP).[21] China is also trying to grow from a very small base in this industry. However, while the BPO industry is expected to continue to grow in India, its market share of the offshore piece is expected to decline. Important centers in India are Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, Patna, Trivandrum, Bhubaneswar and New Delhi. In fact, the Philippines has overtaken India as the largest call center industry in the world in 2010.[3] The Association of Southeast Asian Nation (ASEAN) countries, along with the People's Republic of China and Indiaknown collectively as ACI countriesare likely to see services like BPO figure strongly in their economies over the medium term. Services trade among ACI countries has been growing at a very rapid rate over recent years, despite starting from a relatively low baseline. Although data are scarce and must be interpreted with caution, an analysis of applied services sector policies in the region suggests there is much policymakers can do to intensify this process, and increase the pace at which the transformation to a service economy is taking place.[22
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What is business process outsourcing (BPO)? BPO is the process of hiring another company to handle business activities for you. BPO is distinct from information technology (IT) outsourcing, which focuses on hiring a third-party company or service provider to do IT-related activities, such as application management and application development, data center operations, or testing and quality assurance. In the early days, BPO usually consisted of outsourcing processes such as payroll. Then it grew to include employee benefits management. Now it encompasses a number of functions that are considered "non-core" to the primary business strategy. Now it is common for organizations to outsource financial and administration (F&A) processes, human resources (HR) functions, call center and customer service activities and accounting and payroll. These outsourcing deals frequently involve multi-year contracts that can run into hundreds of millions of dollars. Often, the people performing the work internally for the client firm are transferred and become employees for the service provider. Dominant outsourcing service
providers in the BPO fields (some of which also dominate the IT outsourcing business) include US companies IBM, Accenture, and Hewitt Associates, as well as European and Asian companies Capgemini, Genpact, TCS, Wipro and Infosys. Many of these BPO efforts involve offshoring -- hiring a company based in another country - to do the work. India is a popular location for BPO activities. Frequently, BPO is also referred to as ITES -- information technology-enabled services. Since most business processes include some form of automation, IT "enables" these services to be performed. An offshoot of BPO is KPO -- knowledge process outsourcing. Considered by some to be a subset of BPO, KPO includes those activities that require greater skill, knowledge, education and expertise to handle. For example, whereas an insurance company might outsource data entry of its claims forms as part of a BPO initiative, it may also choose to use a KPO service provider to evaluate new insurance applications based on a set of criteria or business rules; this work would require the efforts of a more knowledgeable set of workers than the data entry would. The current definition of KPO encompasses R&D, product development and legal e-discovery, as well as a number of other business functions. Also coming into use is the term BTO -- business transformation outsourcing. This refers to the idea of having service providers contribute to the effort of transforming a business into a leaner, more dynamic, agile and flexible operation.
CONCLUSION
The predominant business model of the '50s and '60s is that size was good. The creation of a huge, lumbering corporation with sprawling campuses was seen as a mark of success, and CEOs would boast that "our company's so big we have our own in-house printshop. We have a separate warehouse just to hold office supplies. We employ more mid-level bureaucrats than an agency of the United States government." But was all that necessary? Time has revealed the obvious answer to that question, and a company that would adhere to the above business model would not last long today. The rules have changed, and business process outsourcing (BPO) has become the cornerstone of the "lean and mean" way of doing business and staying competitive. There is, however, a right way and a wrong way to approach BPO, and Michael Montonen revealed in a recent interview, simply spinning off as many internal processes as possible is no guarantee of success. Montonen, a vice president with Gartner, is the BPO and offshore practice lead for the Gartner Consulting Sourcing team.
Tip #1. Get your outsourcing lifecycle strategy in place first.
Montonen described Gartner's outsourcing model, which includes four phases; a sourcing strategy, evaluation and selection, contract development, and sourcing management. In the strategic phase, a company goes beyond the obvious, and asks questions like, "Why am I doing this?" "What are the risks?" and "What kind of relationship do I want with a
provider?" Not all outsourcing relationships are the same, and even within the same company, there may be two completely different strategies with different relationships. Some may focus on enhancement, where the service provider supplies some type of superior process expertise; while other relationships are more transformative, where the company's goals are to transform the business itself and either drive cost savings or increase revenue. One of the biggest factors in a failed outsourcing project is when a company goes straight to the process of vendor evaluation, without taking time to consider strategy. Phase four of Gartner's model talks about "sourcing management," or what's done after the contracts are already in place. The foundation of this management is the service level agreement (SLA). But beyond that, a benchmarking clause would give you and the vendor the right to re-evaluate the contract and the relationship periodically. Montonen calls it a "relationship health check." He said, "It's a sourcing assessment. It's looking not only at the service level agreements and the metrics, but it's also looking at the contract. Is the service provider meeting their requirements? It goes back and forth. The client also has some requirements they have to meet. And you assess the relationship." Evaluation and selection builds on phase one. Simply putting out an RFP and taking the lowest bidder may work in some, but not all cases. A company may be looking for a very specific type of expertise, and that may be more important than the bottom-line price of service. This is also the time to consider whether it is advantageous to go offshore. Offshore outsourcing does offer an advantage, but it's not always the right solution. And Montonen added, "You can have cost savings, if that is the primary driver, with onshore companies" as well. According to Montonen, whether you choose a domestic or an offshore company may be irrelevant, because many BPO vendors have a global delivery model, where they can source services from a variety of domestic and foreign locations, depending on the economic and risk strategy of the client.
Tip #2. Address the question: Is it a marriage or one-night stand? Consider the duration of the contract.
An outsourcing contract often results in deep, long-lasting changes in strategy, and the processes being outsourced don't always move on a dime. It takes time to outsource, and if you want to bring it back in-house, it takes time to do that, too. Consequently, BPO contract duration must strike a balance. They must be long enough to make a difference, and short enough to afford a measure of flexibility to the relationship. Typically, BPO contracts last anywhere from three to five years. "The old 10-year deals are gone," said Montonen. "Some people still do them, but we recommend that you don't do that, because it simply ties you too long with a service provider." Instead of a long-term contract, a better approach is a contract with a shorter duration that allows for periodic renewal. The acceptance of the outsourcing model, the proliferation of service providers both here and abroad, and the availability of business-to-business (B2B) exchanges facilitate the outsourcing transaction and also enhance its competitiveness. The use of B2B exchanges in particular necessitates a shorter contract term. These exchanges make it much more possible for a company to stay on top of the service provider community, stay informed about newcomers and become familiar with price trends.
Online exchanges of any sort tend to result in price pressure, and the same is true with the B2B exchanges. Over time, prices for services will go down. A company that ties itself to too long of a contract will miss out on an opportunity to take advantage of this competitive atmosphere. Also, there may be circumstances where a company wants to bring a process back in-house, and here too, it's necessary to add an addendum to the contract that shows an exit plan. This clause would outline a transition plan, on how the service provider would help to transition the process back in-house.
Tip #3. Identify and assess the risks in your outsourcing plans.
Organizing any business process, whether internal or external, has a set of risks. BPO entails a particular set of risks, and these must be identified and evaluated. There are two things you can do to make sure the risk remains acceptable: Make sure that the vendor is able to service the process and retain a certain amount of oversight and control over the process. Business-critical functions like accounts payable or accounts receivable, for example, have a major impact on your overall business. It's not an isolated function. "Accounts receivable is critical for the revenue coming in, and accounts payable is important from a cost management standpoint," said Montonen. "So you want to manage those. You provide the business guidelines for the vendor to run those functions, but based on your policies. The whole idea there from a performance risk standpoint is that you're always in control." Towards that end, a company must understand what to keep in-house and what to outsource. While there are many processes that can be outsourced, policy creation must be kept in-house purely from a risk management point of view. "Accountability has to stay with the CFO or the sourcing manager running the relationship," added Montonen. "You can't delegate that."
Tip #4. As the client, you can't outsource compliance.
Legislation such as HIPAA and Sarbanes-Oxley has had a major impact on the enterprise, and many companies have had to spend millions to bring themselves into compliance with these and other rules. The end results of these laws are desirable, both to the public corporation and to society; HIPAA, for example, protects the rights of patient privacy through technological means, and Sarbanes-Oxley, among other things, imposes a set of internal controls that guarantees that the integrity of financial data hasn't been compromised. But regardless of the positive outcome, compliance can be costly. Non-compliance can be even costlier, in terms of fines or even prison sentences. Obviously, the need for compliance weighs heavily on outsourcing arrangements. In addition to making sure that all of your internal processes are compliant, a company is now obligated to also make sure that all of its outsourced processes are compliant as well. This poses special challenges, because a small service provider that's privately owned may not be required to comply with Sarbanes-Oxley, for example, while its clients do have that obligation. This requires all service providers large and small to become very familiar with, and compliant with these regulations.
Of course, compliance should be stipulated in the contract, and the service provider should provide documentation that it's able to, in essence, function as a virtual extension of its client's compliance-regulated process.
Tip #5. Keep lines of communication open.
Any time a third party outsourcing representative comes near a corporate office, the rumor mill starts churning. The fact is, outsourcing has become a necessary corporate strategy, but in the end it doesn't even always result in staff reductions. It will, however, almost universally result in changes to internal processes. Employees don't like either. "Change management and communication with employees is absolutely a critical success factor," said Montonen. "Employees want to be told why it's being done -- what are the business reasons." As soon as a decision has been made to pursue an outsourcing strategy, that's when the communication process should start. Don't keep employees in the dark. The result could be damaging to morale and to production. "What typically happens is once you have an RFP out, or some service providers are providing proposals, the word gets out. Somebody knows somebody who knows somebody, so the word will either come out informally from the outside, or formally, from the inside."
Intellenet global Address: Hall No 4, Gate No 3, Nesco Compound, Western Express Highway, Next To The HUB Mall, Goregaon East, Mumbai, - 400063
Intelenet Global Services is a third-party Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) & contact center provider headquartered in Mumbai, India,[2] backed by Blackstone Group. The company offers 24/7 services for contact center, transaction processing, finance & accounting and human resource outsourcing services to Fortune 500 companies in the UK, USA, Australia and India. Intelenet has 31000[1] employees across 30 delivery centers globally in India, Philippines, Mauritius and USA. Susir Kumar is the Managing Director and CEO. Intelenets management team has been with the organization since inception. The company's headquarters is in Mumbai, and operates from 30 delivery centers in Mumbai, Chennai, New Delhi, Gurgaon, Mauritius, Philippines, USA (Fargo, Campbellsville, Chesapeake) United Kingdom (Fort William, Plymouth) and Krakow. Domestic Operations operate in Mumbai, Gurgaon, Chennai, Bangalore, Pune, Kolkata, Mohali, Pondicherry, Dehra Dun, Lucknow and Patna. Intelenet has won the contract of UIDAI for providing outsourced call centre services.[3]
Contents
[hide]
1 History
2 Certifications 3 Key services and industry verticals 4 Focus verticals 5 Awards and recognition 6 References 7 External links
[edit] History
Intelenet Global Services was formed in October 2000[4] as a 50:50 Joint Venture (JV) between Tata Consultancy Services and Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd. (HDFC) and started operations in November 2001. In July 2004, TCS divested its 50% stake, which was purchased by Barclays Bank Plc one of Intelenets biggest clients. By 2006, Intelenet had grown to over 5000 people with over 20 client relationships. In 2006, Intelenet ventured into the India domestic BPO industry with its acquisition of Sparsh BPO Services from Spanco Telesystems.[5] Intelenet is today the largest player in the domestic BPO market with over 18000 employees in 10 locations across India, providing customer management, outbound sales and analytics in the Banking and Financial Services, Telecom, Travel, Insurance, Retail and Government sectors. In 2007, Intelenets management team initiated a management buyout backed by Blackstone Group, a global private equity player.[6] Blackstone group owns 75.98% of the stake at Intelenet; 19% is held by SKM (Employee) Trust and 5.02% by Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd (HDFC). In 2007, Intelenet acquired two companies in Travel and IT verticals - Upstream, a US based BPO company with centres in Fargo, North Dakota, Chesapeake, Virginia and Campbellsville, Kentucky and Travelport ISO, the India based captive perations of the Travelport group. In January 2010 Intelenet set up a delivery centre in Krakow, Poland.[7] 2012 - Intelenet Global Services was acquired by Serco Group PLC.
[edit] Certifications
Intelenet's operations teams are certified to the standards of Customer Operations Performance Centre (COPC) version 4.1 awarded by COPC Inc.. Intelenet is also certified to ISO/IEC 27001 for information security.[8] Intelenet is certified to People Capabilities Maturity Model (PCMM) - Level 3. Intelenet's HR practices spanning recruitment, career enhancement, continuous learning, performance management, communication and employee recognition have been standardized as part of the certification process.
Inbound and Outbound Contact Centre operations - Customer Service, Sales, Collections via multiple delivery channels including, telephone, email, web chat and fax Back office operations - Application data entry, transaction Processing for insurance and hospitality verticals Finance & Accounting (F&A) services - General ledger, accounts payable, accounts receivable, bank reconciliation, revenue accounting, travel and entertainment expenses, management reporting and analysis, payroll processing etc. IT and Process Consulting Intelenets process consulting capabilities include consulting on Business Process Management Systems, process re-engineering and business analytics using COPC and Six Sigma.
Banking and Financial Services & Insurance: The Banking and Financial Services (BFS) industry is a core focus area for Intelenet spanning retail banking, business banking and shared services. Travel & Hospitality - Intelenet delivers customer support services and handle customer queries relating to Baggage Check, General Reservation, Fares & Pre-paid Ticket Advices (PTAs) Healthcare - Intelenet provides helpdesk services and product / technical support to end-users. Telecom - Intelenet manages the entire customer life cycle (customer acquisition, maintenance and retention) for leading telecom service providers, which includes back office processing and voice-based processes. Retail - Intelenet offers customer interaction services along with end-to-end Rebate Processing and tracking services for its clients in the retail segment.
In 2010, Its ranked 9th in Top-20 IT/BPO employer in India by NASSCOM.[9] Ranked 12th in the NASSCOM Top 15 BPO Ranking for FY09-10[10] and ranked 15th in the Dataquest Top 20 BPO Ranking 2009 by Dataquest magazine.[11] Featured in the Fourth Deloitte Technology "Fast 50 India" 2008 program, which ranks the 50 fastest growing technology companies, public or private, based on percentage revenue growth over three years[citation needed].
Best Employer in India and Asia for 2009 by Hewitt Associates.[12] Intelenet has been ranked amongst the Top 25 Employers in India as part of the Best Employers in India Study for 2009 conducted by Hewitt Associates in partnership with Outlook Business, a leading business magazine in India. Intelenet was also recognised as the Hewitt Best Employer in Asia 2009[citation needed]. Ranked 2nd among Large Organisations at The Economic Times Best Workplaces in India for 2008 and 2009.[13] The survey was conducted based on best practices and employee feedback. The Indias Best Companies to Work For - 2009 list was produced by Great Place to Work Institute, India in association with The Economic Times Ranked 23rd in IAOP's "Global Outsourcing 100 for 2009"[14] and also featured in the Leaders Category of Global Outsourcing 100 for 2010[citation needed] Best Performers category in Global Services 100 List for 2009[15] BPO Project of the Year 2007 at the NOA Awards 2007, an annual award by National Outsourcing Association, the UKs only outsourcing trade association[citation needed] TMC CRM Excellence Award 2009[16] MVP Quality Award Bronze for 2006, 2007 and 2008.[17] Silver Position in the Best Contact Centre Large Size category at Contact Center World Awards 2008 Asia Pacific organised by Contactcentreworld.com
2. High attrition rate in this sector reason being unsatisfied employee, monotonous work, neglected talent, inadequate know-how, etc 3. Coming up of high profile BPOs
Training has become a major tool to retain employees. People working in BPO sector face the problem of night shift, job stress that results in de motivation. Well designed training program with clear career path increases the job satisfaction among the young professionals and help them in becoming efficient and effective at the work place. Therefore, organizations have to handle such challenges of meeting training needs, although, the sector is taking a lot of initiatives in conducting training for new joinees. Companies are now aligning business goals with training costs. But what more important is, is the development of the skills of middle management. Various BPOs have an elaborate training infrastructure that includes ComputerBased Training rooms, and specially trained and qualified in-house trainers. The companies are now busy designing training programs for their employees. These companies try identifying the strengths and weaknesses and are emphasizing more on their personalities, problem-solving skills, and leadership skills.
With constant change in processes, technologies, techniques, methods, etc, there is a constant need of updation, training and development the BPO employees to consistently deliver customer goals.
Areas Covered in Training Programs The specific areas where training is given in BPO sector are: Customer Care Technical Support Payroll Maintenance Publishing Sales and Telemarketing
Finance and Accounting Human Resources Intellectual Property Research and Documentation
Administrative Support Security Supply Chain Management (SCM) Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Legal Services Medical Transcription Research and Analysis
Business Communication
Accent neutralization
E-mail Etiquette
Telephone Etiquette
Cross-cultural Training
Preferred Training Methods Some of the preferred training and development methods in BPO Industry are:
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