Growing demand for online jobs promotes “brain gain”

CEBU, Philippines - The Philippines will be able to take strides with its long-time bid for “brain gain” if it were to implement programs that encourage Filipinos to stay home while earning dollars and maximizing the growing virtual job demand, a chamber official said.

European Chamber of Commerce in the Philippines (ECCP) Executive Vice President Henry J. Schumacher believes that Filipinos don’t need to leave the country and offer their talents abroad when outsourcing jobs over the Internet is increasing.

Schumacher said that the Philippines has been losing good talents to other countries. He thinks now is the best time to lure them back and promote “brain gain.”

The ECCP executive particularly mentioned the creative Filipinos who are now employed around the world, rendering the best talents to other countries, while the Philippines is struggling to make the creative industry as one of its economic drivers.

“The only thing that makes Singapore creative is the Filipinos. The Philippines should bring them back. Filipinos created Disneyland,” Schumacher said.

He said that the President’s recent move to establish a “Design Council” to drive the creative industry side in the Philippines is laudable. However, Filipinos should realize that they don’t need to leave their homes and earn dollars as job opportunities online, not only limited to creative skills but across varied professions, is significantly increasing.

Schumacher mentioned thousands of job opportunities offered by one of the world’s largest online job contractors—oDesk—that could be maximized by Filipinos, whether as a part time job or mainline work.

According to Schumacher, there are at least 60,000 Filipinos working for oDesk. This number is seen to double in the short term as soon as more Filipinos will be able to appreciate virtual employment and work from the comfort of the homes, also called mobile working.

Filipinos, known for their extravagant creative skills, are the most wanted talents for the creative industry globally. The Philippines should be the first to maximize these “gifted” people and make the creative industry in the country be significantly known worldwide.

Aside from creativity and other professions in demand over the online job contractors, the opportunities for Filipinos to teach English online are one of the top opportunities to make money.

Economist Bernardo Villegas in a separate interview earlier said that Filipinos can get multiple job offerings via the Internet, or even start off a home-based business without having to incur big capital, as long she/he knows to communicate English.

Villegas said that although there is increasing number of employment opportunities in the Philippines, Filipinos do not have to limit themselves to finding jobs in companies, as outsourcing opportunities for individuals is now surging in the worldwide web.          

“Those who are innovative enough can take this opportunity,” said Villegas, adding that earning dollars these days do not anymore mean leaving family and going abroad.

Villegas, an economic professor of the University of Asia & the Pacific (UA&P) made mention of the emerging ESL (English as Second Language) online opportunities for Filipinos.

Already, he said some innovative Filipinos are taking advantage of this no-capital venture, by teaching non-English speaking nationalities, including Koreans, through the Internet.

ESL demand is said to be not only limited to Koreans and other foreign nationals who are coming to the Philippines to learn English, but also to the large number of non-English speaking nationalities who prefer to stay in their home country and learning the English language virtually at the same time.

A growing number of Filipinos has already tapped this virtual job opportunities taking works for international companies which are now embracing the outsourcing channel to get workers from all over the world.

The web’s top online contractors, such as oDesk, Elance, Freelancer, Guru, PeopleHour and vWorker, are just one of the few reliable online employers that give good outsourcing jobs to different fields.

These sites often manage the payments, and make money by charging membership fees and/or take a cut of the payment. The cuts can range from four percent to 15 percent. oDesk charges 10 percent but does not charge a membership fee. /JMD (FREEMAN)