Morning 10 o? clock I call up my friend Jaya who is working in a call centre, to have a small chit chat and the response I get is this.
Aunty may I speak with Jaya.
Bete who tho so rahi hai. Abhi tho office se aayi hai.
Aunty kab tak uthegi.
Bete aap 3 baje tak call karna.
And the rest of the day is spent sleeping??.because they got to work at night?.
This is what we get to hear if we call up our friends who are working in a callcentre. When the rest of the city wakes up and is ready for the day to begin, it is sleep time for the people working in a call center. No offense to those who are working in one. I know there would be lot of MS members who are working in call centers. Please don?t get me wrong. And if I am missing on any important point, please do drop in a comment and correct me. It is just a thought.. life would be so tough like this.
Though, I am well aware that the call centers provide their employees with all kinds of comforts and attention, but life would be upside down for them. Especially those who are working in the night shifts.
No doubt that India?s economy has got a boost with so many employment opportunities coming up and so many MNC?s setting their foot in the Indian market, because of availability of cheap labour. But what about the future of these call center executives who are giving their time and energy to the company, when they should ideally be utilizing it in gaining some core degrees which would help them to secure their future for sure.
What is the use of a student studying in the best of schools and scoring a scholarship, if he/she at the end of it all has to settle down for a call center just because it pays you good and has a westernized culture.
Today?s generation does not understand that there is more to life other than just starting to earn at the age of say 19 or 20. You might be proud to take care of your expenses so soon in life, but are you sure you would want to do the same thing for the rest of your lifes.
The growth path that a BPO sets up for students are that the best performer would be promoted as a team leader after 2 years of tenure in their firm. But out of thousands of them on floor, we can see only say 20 odd getting promoted.
Also, the CSR?s (Customer Service Executives) set their growth path by job hopping from one call center to the other, that pays them better for a similar kinda the job. And most of them get calls from other call centers only. After working for 3 to 4 years in a call center, even if these executives ends up getting job in some other sector, they find it difficult to adjust in a proper 9 to 5 job and especially the culture. They expect their offices to be highly westernized and expect a very high salary package as well.
Generally, these CSR?s would work whole night (their shift starts late night) and by morning they back home, half asleep. They sleep till afternoon, wake up and roam around till late evening and then get back to work. Most of them does not have weekends off and are given 2 days off between the week.
This makes them cut off from their social and family life. All they have is , friends in their workplace as 3/4th of the crowd there is young crowd. They party often with the same office crowd as BPO?s pay attention to employee satisfaction, to reduce the attrition rate, which is increasing day by day.
With the westernized culture of these BPO?s, some of the employees get into habits like addiction to coffee, boozing, fagging and partying all nights in expensive restaurants and spending exorbitantly on accessories to keep themselves up to date.
My personal opinion is that call centers job should be taken only by those who just want to work for a short while in their life or those who are in real need of finances. It should not be opted by those who are capable enough to carry on their studies and fetch a valuable degree, which would add value in future. It may seem quite fanciful to be in such an environment, but it has its side effects too.
There are people in our society who look down up on call centre jobs. Many marriage alliances are rejected only because the girl has been working in a call centre. And the unfairness is that if a guy is with a call centre, it is not at all an issue. Don?t know why people don?t understand that working in a call centre is as safe as in any other firm. Just that you got to be determined and should not get carried away by the happenings. Well I mentioned this point not to take this as a reason for not joining a call centre. Couldn?t care less about people with such mean thinking, but I have already highlighted many aspects which are worth considering for not taking a call centre job as a career option.
I have friends who crib about their experiences of being associated with a call center. They crave to come out of this industry but are not able to because they do not find any vacancy that would match their requirements or in which. But there are some who do not realize what they are missing out.
Anyways, inspite of all these points, hats off to those who are achieving big in this industry. Keep up the good work. And I don?t mean to discourage anyone working in a BPO, but I just wanted to point out some facts that is worth considering.