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Call
centre professionals are a disillusioned lot today, and the reasons
are not difficult to guess. Limited job options, monotonous work
and stagnation at the initial stages of career are resulting in
higher than the expected rate of attrition. The industry is also
plagued with the lack of career growth opportunities, whether it
be in sections like telesales, customer service and the help desk
segment, or general call centre operations (e.g. training, HR, quality
and payroll), very few manage to climb to the top. A majority of
them are stuck at the lowest level as customer support executives
with only 20-25 percent making a mark and getting promoted. All
this is creating a lot of disappointment among the young workforce.
 Take
the case of Simran and Priyanka. Both were picked up by a well-known
Delhi-based call centre through campus recruitment. Very happy and
excited initially about their fixed salary and the accompanying
perks, they jumped for the opportunity. A year later both are planning
to quit. Similarly Suman (who was lucky to get a promotion and become
a team leader), plans to quit in a month’s time, while customer
support executive Kirti has decided to stick on for another three
months in expectation of a future promotion. Speaking on the reasons
behind her reasons to quit, Suman says that she had reached a saturation
level, where not only was the work getting monotonous, but also
exhausting. “After spending almost a year with the company
and getting double promotions, I suddenly realised the limited career
scope in this field, and what after five years?” These and
many other career-related questions are making many call centre
executives and managers rethink their choice of career. While many
call centres claim to give career guidance to their employees, the
reality is very different.
Even
high-performers are not untouched by the feeling of stagnation.
Sandeep, who is presently working with a recently started call centre,
decided to make a career shift in spite of getting a double promotion
and another expected one lined up. According to him, besides money
it was the different work profile which had attracted him in the
first place. “Initially things looked very exciting, however
after spending six months I realised that the job was getting monotonous
and stagnation was setting in. Even though I could have got another
promotion and was managing some of the people whom I had started
with, the spirit wasn’t there,” he says. Though Sandeep
is very excited about his new assignment as the assistant project
manager, he is not very sure about his future plans five years down
the line. And this seems to be the case with many individuals who
are generally left at the crossroads, as the initial years seem
very good, but later have to face some harsh truths. Many individuals
even after spending two years in the industry (which is considered
to be good), feel that they hardly have a career choice.
“Most
of the companies follow a regular growth chart of starting at the
lowest level as the ‘customer support executive’ to becoming
a senior CSE, then a team leader, a project manager and finally
manager of operations. However, in a period of two years, one can
only reach the level of a team leader or a project manager, depending
on the performance and the company’s policy. But, this journey
is very monotonous and a lot of patience is required. Also after
reaching that level, one is not sure about the career option as
there are only 3-4 choices of becoming a consultant, joining as
a manager somewhere else or starting your own call centre. Beyond
this there is hardly any kind of vertical movement which an individual
can think of,” says Abhay, working as a team leader in one
of the biggest call centres in India.
Though
the industry insists on the availability of jobs, the reality is
that very few are actually available to an individual wanting to
make it as a career choice. Majority of the positions in the operations,
IT and telecom area are either too specialised or outsourced by
the company. According to a GE official, many companies outsource
their onsite staffing, resourcing, HR, inventory or even legal requirements
as they are not sure of getting it fulfiled from their own employees.
This only limits the possible career options available to an individual.
Agrees Mahendra Saxena, managing director, Sapphire CallNet, who
feels that most of the Indian call centres outsource 100 per cent
of their functional requirements, as it helps them to solely concentrate
on building on their business.
According
to Saxena, the reason behind this chaos is the lack of a ‘knowledge
repository’ within the companies. “While many organisations
had started their operations keeping the ‘most happening industry’
status in mind, what was lacking was a clear understanding on their
part for making use of available skills. Most of the companies are
concentrating on hiring people and expanding their base mainly at
the CSE level,” he says, adding that this is only making the
situation worse, as career planning of individuals at management
or higher levels is being overlooked.
This
has made things worse and is hampering the growth of the industry
as many people give it a ‘stop-gap treatment’ for their
future plans, be it an MBA or another career objective. Experts
however
believe that things are expected to change and improve in another
8-12 months time, with more maturity and understanding of the future.
Saxena of Sapphire CallNet says, “Due to more business coming
in, the industry will also witness broadening of scope in the career
opportunities available in the call centre industry. Not only would
this lead to availability of opportunity in an organised and specialised
mode, but also enable movement across horizontal segments.”
According to Rahul Thapan, Head-Education, Tata Infotech Education,
which has started a course on the call centre training, in a service
and performance-based industry, there would be a lot of opportunities
available to individuals in terms of lateral growth. “An individual
wanting to make a career outside the call centre industry can always
opt for industries like finance, banking, healthcare, airlines or
any field he specialises in,” he says. He albeit admitted that
this kind of a career option is not available to individuals presently
working in the industry. Thapan believes that besides growth opportunities
for customer service executives there is also going to be a lot
of demand for project managers, as they can shift to the IT industry
too. “I believe that in one year the demand will outstrip the
supply and we will see a lot of horizontal moment across the industry,”
he says. But till that time the industry has to find out ways and
means to calm their insecure workforce.
WHY
DISILLUSIONMENT ?
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Limited career opportunities
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Early stagnation
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Late promotions
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Monotonous work
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Lack of long-term option
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