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Recently 12,500 people had the special privilege to be invited to Buckingham Palace to enjoy the Jubilee Chicken (a special creation of the Royal Chef), champagne and other goodies at a sumptuous dinner held on June 1, 2002 to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth’s ascension. This was accompanied by a concert by famous singers such as Paul McCartney. The "exceptionally lucky 12,500" never knew they were selected at random from a database given to Softex Consultants in Technopark by a UK-based call center. Since dining at the royal palace was a cherished dream for many, the response was overwhelming and millions of requests had to be processed at random within 45 days. "But we could do it within 12 days time," according to RP Lalaji, CEO, Softex Group.

The conventional call center business could reach a dead end unless value-added services are identified and solutions are found for the HR problems that the industry faces. A Kerala-based company in Technopark has now come up with a novel solution for both—by moving into Call Center Data Documentation (C2D2) and employing university students on part-time basis, to be agents on call.

Many of the World Cup Soccer predictions made by leading channels of Europe were actually based on data processed at Softex, Lalaji disclosed. C2D2 is the new flavor of the business and Lalaji is the first to identify this niche area. Millions of calls are handled each day by the call centers in US and Europe. But as the call center agent’s forte is good voice culture, they may not be good at constructing databases from spoken data. Some of these calls are made in response to certain promotional campaigns, and the promoters are more interested in the names and addresses of the callers. Softex spotted this weakness of call centers and forged software tools to tackle this problem and offered its free services to select call centers. "They have all now turned into paying customers and a new industry has been discovered," claims Lalaji. C2D2 could become a boon to many call centers who are unable to logically construct data from inbound and outbound calls. "Without this kind of value addition, the prospect of further growth of the Indian call center business itself could be stymied," says Lalaji. This is because call center customers are interested in getting a database that they can utilize for further promotional and marketing activities.

About 60 % of C2D2 work force in Softex comprises engineers because software tools have to be generated for each new assignment. Different types of knowledge workers can be deployed in this segment. "We expect C2D2 revenues to touch Rs 3 crore this year, Rs 10 crore in second year and reach Rs 20 crore in the third," claimed Lalaji. Softex Group has also successfully brought in the ‘earn-while-you-learn’ style of campus culture adopted in western universities, into Kerala. Now the company has 120 students who are working part-time who earn 80-150 paise for each call center data they process. "Four years back we tried the same with Medical Transcription. We had inducted a number of medical students but it didn’t succeed because they were unwilling to learn the finer details of the job," says Lalaji. But this concept is easier to adopt in the call center business. By next March, Softex hopes to have 300 ‘agents-on-call’.

"There was an overwhelming response to our advertisement seeking students for part-time employment. We could select only one-tenth of them," adds Lalaji. The fact that Technopark is close to the Kerala University Campus and Engineering College helped a lot in attracting the ‘young earn-while-you-learn’ workforce. Fluctuations in business, results in most call centers having more seats than they require at some point of time. Here again, if ‘trained agents-on-call’ are employed it could result in HR savings. The Softex Group plans to bring call center business to Technopark through a tie-up with any leading call center as it could bring captive C2D2 business here itself. It also intends to continue its existing MT, and mobile software applications business. Now having discovered C2D2, Softex seems poised to soar!

Sreekumar/CNS in Thiruvananthapuram