Academe urged to partner with private BPO companies

CEBU, Philippines - While providing generic courses to complement the growing Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) and Information Technology (IT) sectors is still important, the academe sector however is urged to directly partner with individual companies.

This is the suggestion made by BPO consultant and analyst Jonathan De Luzuriaga to the academic sector in Cebu, to address the problem of human resource scarcity.

He said the BPO industry in Cebu has grown tremendously, and that good English speaking manpower is not anymore a problem, but providing highly skilled people should be the focus to maximize the huge opportunity for KPO (Knowledge Process Outsourcing) investments here.

He said schools and universities need to identify their partner companies in the BPO, in order to get the exact skills requirement they will need, and mismatch problem can be eradicated.

Although, the challenge lies on getting the approval of the Commission on Higher Education (Ched) and the Department of Education (DepEd). There should be a strong unity and lobbying body that should work on getting the nod from these agencies.

According to De Luzuriaga, the BPO industry is so vast and diverse, generic courses, and graduates with knowledge only limited to theories and general information on the courses, usually need extensive training from their future employers.

“In order to bridge the gap between industry and the academe, there should be one-on-one partnership,” he said adding that generic courses alone cannot fill in the vacuum.

In the past, the academic sector had been trying to address the gap through providing “across the board” training and crash courses. But, today, this approach is no longer application, specifically with the strong entry of higher-value KPO investments.

Individual efforts from school to partner with BPO/IT companies are now considered as the best way to connect the gap of industry and the academe, de Luzuriaga said.

In fact, there are already a number of BPO companies that are now starting to partner with universities and colleges, but if the academe will intensively practice this strategy, Cebu will no longer suffer from manpower shortage.

In the KPO sector, Cebu is seen to take the center-stage in healthcare and information management services. This early, university and college administrators should look at the potential skills needed in these two particular edges of Cebu in the KPO business.

De Luzuriaga is confident that given the right reasons, both Ched and DepEd will support this unique approach, while the broad BPO industry is now requiring another set of manpower skills, not only those who can fluently speak English. (FREEMAN)