Business process outsourcing is no longer regarded as a new concept. The companies have been, for many years, outsourcing their non-core business functions, such as customer support, billing, and other IT-related processes, to third-party service providers placed in the offshore locations. In recent years, many companies have started contracting out their legal and knowledge-based functions to the call centers.
As BPO units have mushroomed around everywhere and companies across the world have become highly reliant on them, various myths surrounding contact centers have gained momentum. To correctly appreciate the utilization and operation of these call centers, it is necessary to dispel such myths.
Myth #1: Business Process Outsourcing is Not Good for an Economy
Many companies believe that outsourcing can harm or misguide a country's economy. This is because; it curbs the employment opportunity of the outsourcing country, and hence reduces the job ratio. The other reason is that subcontracting does not offer quality services due to the lower prices. However, in reality, outsourcing not only creates new job opportunities for the service providers based in offshore locations, but it also offers economic benefits to the countries outsourcing these processes.
Myth #2: Risks of Losing Confidential Data
It has been widely debated that there are high risks associated with the loss of confidential data and information when outsourced to a call center. Moreover, some companies fear that their private information will be shared with the competitors when subcontracted to a third-party service provider. In reality, most of the call centers are self-regulated in order to overcome the misuse of this proprietary information. Some BPO companies implement the following procedures to safeguard this:
1. Restricted entry
2. Picture capturing devices are strictly prohibited
3. Armed guards outside their offices
4. E-mail and personal Internet access is prohibited
5. Removable storage devices such as USBs are not allowed
In addition, employees are often required to sign on the confidentiality contract in order to pass private data/information over secured networks. Many call centers use firewalls and VPN networks to connect across the servers and follow encrypted passwords to prevent hacking.
Myth #3: Outsourcing Is a Complicated Process
Many companies shy away from sub-contracting their workflows to the contact centers with a belief that outsourcing is a cumbersome process. Though, the fact is, it just requires proper planning, training and management to employ and partner with a call center. The following approach can be followed by the companies while partnering with a call center:
1. Identifying processes that need to be outsourced
2. Ascertain the outsourcing firm's speciality
3. Entitle a responsible resource to review and delegate responsibilities
4. Conduct periodic reviews of the quality and performance
5. Availability of round-the-clock customer assistance
6. Confirm that the employees are well-educated and skills to professionally manage the work
From the above points, it is quite clear that outsourcing can significantly reduce costs to the existing clients by enabling them to avoid investments in infrastructure, trained workforce, and the latest tools and technology. It also saves their valuable time, without compromising on the quality of services provided. All the above reasons compel an organization to strategically partner with a third-party service provider so they can focus on formulating and implementing strategies for their mission-critical business functions.
