Although service providers are focusing on recruitment and retention of skilled manpower, steps are also being taken to reduce the adverse impact of attrition on business continuity through building robust processes, especially with respect to data security, reducing dependency on individuals by making relationships and processes system-driven rather than person-driven, increasing back-up bench strength and investing in adequate succession planning.

Killer Stress
Stress is like a ghost that continues to haunt the BPO industry. Long work hours, night shifts, long travel hours repetitive nature of work and absence of adequate holidays continue to cripple employees.

Over 31% of respondents complained of long travel time as the key reason for stress while around 30% blamed work overload. Work timing is a close third with insufficient holidays and long work hours playing the spoilsport too. Defends Richa Tripathi, head of HR at Wipro BPO, "Since ours is a 24x7 industry and we are expected to work on festivals, we ensure that employees do not lose out on the spirit and fun associated with these festivals."

But fun or not, stress continues to be a pain point among a significant proportion of BPO employees. With stress come various ailments. The most common ailment that afflicted most employees is sleeping disorders, followed by digestive system disorder, as our survey reveals. A recent report published by the Delhi Diabetes Research Centre (DDRC) reveals that employees in call centers are the latest to fall prey to Type II diabetes: increased blood sugar levels due to unbalanced diet and stress.

Looking Ahead
If outsourcing to India was initially triggered by reasons of quality and cost, the Indian outsourcing story now has, as its key players, companies that are fast scaling up to equivalent international standards of innovation, quality, and productivity-not to mention the educationally- and technically-qualified talent pool that makes this possible. The fast-growing industry is ever changing, adapting to new ideas as well as opening new avenues of operations for multinational companies. How they balance their workforce challenges with the need for high quality output will decide the future growth of these companies as well as the growth of the outsourcing concept itself.

Bhaswati Chakravorty
bhaswatic@cybermedia.co.in

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