There are lots of benefits obtained from hiring offshore staff. These primarily include:

• Gaining access to an unlimited talent base;
• Having the financial advantage with the lower pay scale of offshore staff than local US employees;
• Being relieved of employee recruitment and termination tasks;
• Having the managerial advantage with the absence of legal issues that often exist with regular employees

Considering these benefits, it makes sense why most business owners and entrepreneurs, even those in the first years of business operations, opt to hire offshore staff. Aside from the savings incurred from dismissing most of the HR personnel and accounting staff, businesses enjoy the benefits of delivering products on time and, thus, improving customer service provision.

Despite the benefits provided and the success offered by offshore staff, it should also be noted that a business would not succeed in having offshore staff, alone. It is important to note that every business should still hire in-house employees to perform necessary physical tasks such as working and socializing in person with the clients. Although offshore staff provides faster results, generates more products, and limits personnel, hiring, and training costs, in-house employees provide one significant factor to a business that offshore staff is not able to provide. In-house employees prove a business is real and legit along with a mortar-and-brick facility. Seeing actual and uniformed (if possible) employees will lead customers to think that the business is trustworthy.

Considering the benefits of both offshore and in-house staff, it is safe and helpful to state that there should be a balance in hiring local employees and outsourcing most tasks. Doing so will not only benefit the company itself, it but will also help decrease local unemployment rates.

Business process outsourcing (BPO) companies consider ghostwriting as an important piece to their writing/editing services. With online publishing growing by the day, BPO companies take advantage of blogging and article submissions as a sub-genre to ghostwriting. BPO firms hire writers who will use different nicknames and aliases and write blogs on a specific subject matter. Other companies hire ghostwriters to co-write a book or e-book using the actual name of the person who will be printed on the front cover of the page.

Here are a few notable ghostwriting outsourcing services being practiced by BPO companies:

Press releases (PR) – Ghostwriters also publish press releases promoting a product, service, brand, individual, or company. Unlike writing press releases for newspaper and magazines, ghostwriters submit PR through press release directories such as PR Web. Ghostwriters take on different monikers and submit PRs in different press release directories; thus, protecting the identity of the object being advertised.

Autobiographies – Offshore companies in India and Philippines offer ghostwriting outsourcing services in the autobiography field. Individuals who influenced the world with their contributions in the fields of science, medicine, politics, and sports contract the services of a ghostwriter to author personal autobiographies with a flat rate of $4 per page.

Blogging– Web site or blog owners rely on ghostwriters to update their web page of fresh, unique content every day. Popular on-page optimization requires a ghostwriter with extraordinary writing skills and above average search engine optimization abilities.

E-books – Ghostwriters are popular for their unwavering contributions in the electronic publishing industry. Electronic books or e-books are published via PDF, and ghostwriters customize the content according to client demand.

Research process outsourcing or RPO is a segment of knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) that focuses entirely on research and data gathering. Research activities such as telephone surveys, data gathering through questionnaires and checklists, and interviews are being handled by RPO firms. Aside from that, RPO companies are also providing financial analysis and modeling, competitive intelligence and data search, and company profile preparations.

Advantages of research outsourcing

From past discussions and evaluations, outsourcing, indeed, produces commendable results. Cost reduction, efficient and accurate results, and tasks completed by specialized individuals are one of the major outcomes of outsourcing.

• RPO firms are specialized in gathering, analyzing, and interpreting information; thereby, making them more capable of efficiently performing such tasks.
• Firms have access to competitive professionals who can perform research tasks and well-trained staff to conduct full-scale consumer surveys.
• Objectivity
• Leverage specialized knowledge and expertise.
• Faster turnover
• Firms have the necessary know-how and idea where to find and locate particular information.

Disadvantages

Like any other outsourcing activities, RPO also has some drawbacks. Here are some of them.

• Less control of research/ work
• Ambiguity of projects. Any research tasks that are outsourced must be very specific. Ambiguity (e.g hesitation to provide required information) can only prolong the project process and may even cause delays.
• Outsourcing partners or firms may not have local knowledge of the consumer distinction and behavior as well as available brands in your locale.
• Researchers are focused on utilizing secondary sources such as the internet.

Drawbacks that research outsourcing has can be overcome by planning and careful evaluation of the problem and needed information. It is always important that both sides, the company outsourcing the research tasks and the receiving firm, must collaborate to achieve the optimum results of their efforts. If any of the parties fails to communicate, then, the possibility that the project will not produce accurate results is high.

Preparing to outsource your tasks

But before you run to the phone to inquire for the research outsourcing services of any company, it is important to check the compatibility of the outsourcing company with your needs. Varying situations or needs may require certain or better yet, specific KPO firms to cater to the requirements of your company. Here are some things that you may want to consider before you start to outsource your research projects:

1. Make sure you identify your marketing problems, having a better and clearer perspective of the problem from various angles.

2. Try to be specific with your research objectives. Have an idea on what particular information you are hoping to find out. Also, identify the possible decisions that must be made based on the results of the study.

3. Define your research needs and make sure to write it down. Include the specific requirements and particular parameters of the study. General statement of the problem, research type needed, and the information needed must be specified.

4. Browse and search for possible firms where you can outsource your tasks. Ask colleagues for referrals and make sure to conduct reference checks on the companies of your choice.

5. Assess the company’s capability to render such service. Conduct online researches to see if the company has established a good reputation in the outsourcing industry. Moreover, consider the “chemistry” between you and your chosen research provider.

Research outsourcing activities will greatly benefit organizations that conduct comparatively low research activities. This is because they usually lack the needed and specialized individuals who can conduct the research properly. Moreover, even big companies can gain benefits from outsourcing their market researches as they can gradually trim down their labor cost and lessen their manpower and other overhead expenses.

Research outsourcing may or may not work for you, depending on how you handle and deal with the advantages and disadvantages of each approach. With that, it is best to first know your needs, understand the rules and consequences of outsourcing, and find ways on how you can minimize your expenses while getting the best possible results for your business.

Countries like India, Philippines, Mexico, and Chile are favorite picks among expensive and developed countries in offshoring their services. The outsourcing  industry for most developing countries like India and the Philippines help boost  its economic growth; thus, creates a win-win situation for both investor and outsource provider.

However, there are security risks involved in knowledge process outsourcing that can ultimately invade an investor’s identity. Alongside business process outsourcing (BPO), KPO delivers security risks for companies willing to offshore their services in Asian countries or in nations where employees are underpaid.

In its most common sense, companies that operate as a core unit has the ability to secure its equipment patent, labor principles, and important information. Offshore providers have the privilege to understand a company’s internal operations; thus, revealing confidential data vital for the company’s survival.

Offshore providers are then given access on the company’s records and other significant materials and equipment.

Along with security risks, here are a few hazards that KPO produces:

• Lost of control – Companies cannot freely control their business operations anymore because of the outsource provider. The company loses its control over staff selection, which often derails the company’s competitive edge.

• Low quality of work – A company also loses its power to regulate the quality of work churned by outsource providers. The outsource provider has complete control over the people who will be working on a specific account. Outsourcing companies often hire inexperienced workers to expedite internal processes, which sacrificethe overall work quality.

• Cultural and language barriers – Outsource providers are forced in dealing with diverse cultures and different languages. Internal conflict then arises, further hampering the development of both outsource provider and investor.

Companies need to understand how strategic placement can help reduce KPO-related problems. Carefully studying the offshore provider’s business mantra and its location help secure global partnerships and eliminate internal inefficiencies.

Security is important to any company and outsource providers must never break the trust given by a foreign business partner. Both outsource provider and investor must work hand-in-hand in order to succeed and achieve their corporate goals.

Knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) is a form of outsourcing, in which knowledge-related and information-related work are carried out by workers in a different company or by a subsidiary of the same organization, which may be in the same country or in an offshore location to save cost. Unlike the outsourcing of manufacturing, this typically involves high-value work carried out by highly skilled staffs. KPO firms, in addition to providing expertise in the processes themselves, often make many low level business decisions—typically those that are easily undone if they conflict with higher-level business plans.

Process transparency is a major barrier to using KPO services. Many organizations do not carefully track which decisions are made by whom, and rely so much on informal social processes (and “soft skills”) that it is unclear how much the use of KPO would disrupt existing operations. However, requirements like Sarbanes-Oxley and radical transparency movements like full cost accounting, shareholder activism and eco-labels and moral purchasing require organizations to be more explicit about when and by whom decisions are made. These trends make it easier for outsourcing non-critical jobs to be considered by qualifying the impact of decisions in advance.

Furthermore, it becomes easier to evaluate and compare success. A fully developed service economy enables KPO by treating all functions as services. So do more technical trends such as service oriented architecture, enterprise application integration and telework; it is easier to outsource a job if it is already being performed outside the head office. Organizations adopting ISO 9000 and ISO 19011 should also find it much easier to integrate externally provided KPO into their operations and audit them on a fair basis.

As of 2007, most US organizations began hiring foreign professionals under H-1 visas to do jobs in the USA for several years, after which they would return to their home countries as managers to train and supervise others, continuing to report to their former business units.

The following is an extract from chapter two of the British Computer Society book ‘Global Services: Moving to a Level Playing Field’ by Mark Kobayashi-Hillary and Dr Richard Sykes attempts to define KPO:

“KPO is merely a continuation of BPO, though with rather more business complexity. The defining difference is that KPO is usually focused on knowledge-intensive business processes that require significant domain expertise (application professionalism in the language of Chapter 1). The offshore team servicing a KPO contract cannot be easily hired overnight, as they must be highly educated and trained, and trusted to take decisions on behalf of the client.

IT outsourcing is strongly focused around technical professionalism, and the migration to business process outsourcing that introduces extra dimensions of application professionalism. Ever more complex services, as implied by KPO, demonstrate this very well. The profile of people being hired to serve within KPO service companies are more diverse than just being drawn from technical IT services – these are people with MBAs, and medical, engineering, design or other specialist business skills. KPO delivers higher value to organizations that offshore their domain-based processes, thereby enhancing the traditional cost– quality paradigm of BPO. The central theme of KPO is to create value for the client by providing business expertise rather than process expertise. So KPO involves a shift from standardized processes to advanced analytical thinking, technical skills and decisive judgment based on experience.”

In addition to the challenges faced by clients, KPO companies themselves have challenges:

• High staff turnover, especially where work is not challenging to the employee’s skills;
• High cost of training and tendency to lose the most experienced employees to the clients and;
• Ensuring the security and confidentiality of information, especially when privacy laws vary from one country to another

Business process outsourcing (BPO) is a form of outsourcing that involves the contracting of the operations and responsibilities of a specific business functions (or processes) to a third-party service provider. Originally, this was associated with manufacturing firms, such as Coca Cola that outsourced large segments of its supply chain.. In contemporary context, it is primarily used to refer to the outsourcing of services.

BPO is typically categorized into back office outsourcing – which includes internal business functions such as human resources or finance and accounting, and front office outsourcing – which includes customer-related services such as contact center services.

BPO contracted outside a company’s country is called offshore outsourcing. BPO that is contracted to a company’s neighboring (or nearby) country is called near shore outsourcing.

Given the proximity of BPO to the information technology industry, it is also categorized as an Information Technology enabled service or ITES. Knowledge process outsourcing(KPO) and legal process outsourcing (LPO) are some of the sub-segments of business process outsourcing industry.

Industry

India has revenues of 10.9 billion USD from offshore BPO and 30 billion USD from IT and total BPO (expected in FY 2008). India has some 5-6% share of the total BPO Industry, but a commanding 63% share of the offshore component. This 63% is a drop from the 70% offshore share that India enjoyed last year, despite the industry growing 38% in India last year, other locations like Eastern Europe, Philippines, Morocco, Egypt and South Africa have emerged to take a share of the market. China is also trying to grow from a very small base in this industry.

However, while the BPO industry is expected to continue to grow in India, its market share of the offshore piece is expected to decline. Important centers in India are Bangalore, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai and New Delhi.

The top five Indian BPO exporters for 2006-2007 according to NASSCOM are Genpact, WNS Global Services, Transworks Information Services, IBM Daksh, and TCS BPO.

According to McKinsey, the global “addressable” BPO market is worth $122 – $154 billion, of which: 35-40 retail banking, 25-35 insurance, 10-12 travel/hospitality, 10-12 auto, 8-10 telecoms, 8 pharmaceutical, 10-15 others and 20-25 is finance, accounting and HR. Moreover, they estimate that 8% of that capacity was utilized as of 2006

BPO Benefits and Limitations

One of the most important advantages of BPO is the way in which it helps to increase a company’s flexibility. However, several sources have different ways in which they perceive organizational flexibility. Therefore business process outsourcing enhances the flexibility of an organization in different ways.

Most services provided by BPO vendors are offered on a fee-for-service basis. This helps a company become more flexible by transforming fixed into variable costs. A variable cost structure helps a company respond to changes in required capacity and does not require a company to invest in assets, thereby making the company more flexible. Outsourcing may provide a firm with increased flexibility in its resource management and may reduce response times to major environmental changes.

Another way in which BPO contributes to a company’s flexibility is that a company is able to focus on its core competencies, without being burdened by the demands of bureaucratic restraints. Key employees are herewith released from performing non-core or administrative processes and can invest more time and energy in building the firm’s core businesses. The key lies in knowing which of the main value drivers to focus on – customer intimacy, product leadership, or operational excellence. Focusing more on one of these drivers may help a company create a competitive edge.

A third way in which BPO increases organizational flexibility is by increasing the speed of business processes. Using techniques such as linear programming can reduce cycle time and inventory levels, which can increase efficiency and cut costs. Supply chain management with the effective use of supply chain partners and business process outsourcing increases the speed of several business processes, such as the throughput in the case of a manufacturing company.

Finally, flexibility is seen as a stage in the organizational life cycle. BPO helped to transform Nortel from a bureaucratic organization into a very agile competitor. A company can gain the advantage of maintaining ambitious growth goals while sidestepping standard business bottlenecks. BPO therefore allows firms to retain their entrepreneurial speed and agility, which they would otherwise sacrifice in order to become efficient as they expanded. It avoids a premature internal transition from its informal entrepreneurial phase to a more bureaucratic mode of operation.

A company may be able to grow at a faster pace as it will be less constrained by large capital expenditures for people or equipment that may take years to amortize, may become outdated or turn out to be a poor match for the company over time.

Although the above-mentioned arguments favor the view that BPO increases the flexibility of organizations, management needs to be careful with the implementation of it as there are a few stumbling blocks, which could counter these advantages. Among problems, which arise in practice are failure to meet service levels, unclear contractual issues, changing requirements and unforeseen charges, and a dependence on the BPO which reduces flexibility. Consequently, these challenges need to be considered before a company decides to engage in business process outsourcing

A further issue is that in many cases there is little that differentiates the BPO providers other than size. They often provide similar services, have similar geographic footprints, leverage similar technology stacks, and have similar Quality Improvement approaches.

Threats

Risk is the major drawback with Business Process Outsourcing. Outsourcing of an Information System, for example, can cause security risks both from a communication and from a privacy perspective. For example, security of North American or European company data is more difficult to maintain when accessed or controlled in the Sub-Continent.

From a knowledge perspective, change of attitude in employees, underestimation of running costs and the major risk of losing independence, outsourcing leads to a different relationship between an organization and its contractor.

Risks and threats of outsourcing must therefore be managed, to achieve any benefits. In order to manage outsourcing in a structured way, maximizing positive outcome, and minimizing risks and avoiding any threats, a Business Continuity Management (BCM) model is required. BCM consists of a set of steps, to successfully identify, manage and control the business processes that are, or can be outsourced.

Another framework, more focused on the identification process of potential outsourceable Information Systems, L. Willcocks, M. Lacity and G. Fitzgerald identify several contracting problems companies face, ranging from unclear contract formatting, to a lack of understanding of technical IT- processes.

Cost-saving, according to what survey or collective piece of surveys, is still one of the top outsourcing concerns that companies focus on when deciding to outsource some of their services.

While the economy is still recovering from recession, outsourcing is still one of the sought-after services today. With various services that have branched out, outsourcing can certainly cater to various needs of your company. May it be for businesses are too general, be specific, information technology, human resource, or even legal tasks, outsourcing definitely has the right services for you.

Areas Commonly Outsourced

Countries that had its fair share of economic downfall, adopted outsourcing branches including Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), Knowledge Process Outsourcing (KPO), and Legal Process Outsourcing (LPO).

Studies reveal that among business applications, the most commonly outsourced tasks are database-related jobs and web site hosting.

Risks in Outsourcing

Outsourcing has its rewards and risks, and companies are aware of the advantages and drawbacks that outsourcing have to offer. Various drawbacks have been associated with outsourcing. Yet, three are considered as the top disadvantages that concerns companies. These are: data security, contract lock- in, and vendor management.

For tertiary education students, leading companies in the IT industry have created different programs in which they can enroll. The programs for college students are Service, Science, Management, and Engineering (SSME) of IBM, Cisco Networking Academy, and Oracle Academy. Students under these programs are required to speak in English, which further helps in the development of their proficiency in the English language.

Aside from the IT industry, leading universities in the country also provide training programs intended for the BPO industry. For instance, De La Salle University (DLSU) Graduate School of Business and Ateneo de Manila Professional School have hosted a training program for supervisors and managers of the BPO industry. The supervisory program for managers could be credited to an MBA degree program, according to Jamea Garcia, executive director for talent development.

“It will cover competencies needed by managers specific to call centers and BPO firms, including leadership skills and performance reviews,” explains by BPAP CEO Oscar Sañez.

English trainings and call center courses are also provided by different establishments and institutions. They are necessary in equipping and familiarizing students with the English language, usage, and accent.

In the programs provided by different companies and universities, the government is also doing half of the job by encouraging foreign investors and firms to establish their businesses in the country. Moreover, the government and the business sector have encouraged the use of English language. In the efforts of the Philippines government to support the rapid growth of the BPO industry, they have granted 100 hour training for interested individuals who wanted to enter the industry. This is in response to the call of the BPO industry to continuously create a steady supply of talents for the industry. Furthermore, this is an effort of the Philippines to target international BPO clientele.

“BPO and e-services are key drivers of the economy, generating investments and jobs, alleviating poverty and improving the lives of the people. We are proud to be among the world’s leaders in these fields,” former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo said in an interview.

Hello Joe

Due to the comparatively high basic salary offered by most outsourcing firms, particularly call centers, new graduates often target call center agent positions as an initial option for employment. Regardless of degree, call centers or outsourced contact service companies can absolutely hire anyone with an emphatic command of spoken and sometimes, written English.

A call center is a company that provides communication and support services for bigger companies. Call centers handle customer inquiries, complaints, and provide technical support for different products and services involving insurances, electronics, advertising, telecommunications, e-mail management, and even charity work.

Other services of outsourcing firms include legal process outsourcing, which offers legal and consultancy services, while knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) caters to knowledge and information-related decisions made by its employees.

The Philippines’ Edge

Jobs in call centers are highly prolific in the Philippines. The country’s population of English-adept professionals make them a perfect candidate to become part of any high-paying outsourced contact service solutions brought up by market leaders situated in the United States, Australia, and United Kingdom.

Aside from the country’s talented roster of English-speaking manpower, the Philippines is also proud of its powerful telecommunication infrastructure.

Money Matters

With the attractive compensation offer that call centers and outsourcing firms offer, a fresh graduate cannot resist a salary minimum ranging from P20,000 to P40,000. These rates are higher compared to the  paychecks that an ordinary employee receives. For instance, an entry-level employee working in a local company receives a minimum of $160 (Php8,000); a bank teller gets about $150 (Php7,500); an office assistant around $140 (Php7,000).

Call center agents also receive financial packages such as signing and performance bonuses.

The “sunny side” of the industry

Branded as the “sunshine industry” of both the government and the business sectors, outsourcing firms continue to expand its reach over the Philippine economy in an effort to create more employment opportunities and territorial investments.

Outsourcing firms are continuously building more establishments, which will not only give focus to Metro Manila as the country’s central hub for employment, the plan is to give rise to other locations capable of rendering outsourced services.

The Philippine government has declared 10 new, possible locations called as the “next wave cities” as areas that will house outsourcing hubs in the country. Provinces and cities like Iloilo, Bacolod, Pampanga, Davao, Angeles/Clark/ Mabalacat/ Dau, Cagayan de Oro, Malolos/Calumpit, Metro Cavite, Baliuag/ Marilao/ Meycauayan, Lipa, and Metro Laguna were considered as the top locations for outsourcing firms where they could invest and set up their establishments.

Curriculum Adjustments

Although the country is home to almost close to a half-million English-speaking students, only a few can enter and support the needs of the industry. Only 5% of 380,000 graduates qualify as call center agents.

To increase the number of potential call center employees and encourage more individuals to work for the BPO industry, government agencies have created training centers which will develop English-speaking individuals, proficient transcriptionists, and adept IT professionals aimed to serve foreign investors in the country. Moreover, these training centers were establish to provide formal training and certification to individuals who wanted to venture into the outsourcing industry but still lack the skills and qualifications needed.

The Technical Education and Skills Authority (TESDA) have provided a number of scholarship programs for aspiring call center professionals, and increase the probability of its students to earn a spot in the very populated industry called call centers.

Gratification or Exploitation

Call center agents in the Philippines often receive questionably low wages as compared to their foreign counterparts. For instance, a Filipino telemarketer earns an annual salary of $3,964, while agents stationed in Singapore performing the same job earns at $16,884.

Another issue that local call center agents find very disturbing is how each and one of them is strictly-monitored for performance countermeasures. Employee turnover in this industry is unusually high due to productivity target a certain employee must cordially meet.

Moreover, there are also issues concerning health and safety of the employees working for the BPO industry. The shifting schedule makes it hard for the employee to perform at a high and competitive level.

The government needs to address the situation in order to protect its workforce from financial abuse and health-related syndromes formed when working in different foreign time zones.

Some studies point out that revenues are over one billion dollars and the average number of recruits in call centers is 100 per week, making it one of most profitable and major sources of job opportunities.

Key advantages

Call center operations in the country are effectively wielding these key advantages:

• Large and employable workforce

The Philippines’ educational system is very much patterned after that of the United States, which is why its people have strong command of American English and affinity with the American culture and way of life.

In addition, they can be trained in voice/accent and culture in order to bridge language barriers. The offshore outsourcing industry’s employee turnover rate in the country is relatively low, as compared to other countries.

• Stable real estate and telecommunications infrastructure

The country’s Internet technology continues to be dynamic and expansive, which is vital in offshore call center operations. The population can easily and naturally adapt to the latest innovations in telecommunications.

The quality of life appeals to expatriates. Real estate and facilities are affordable and of high quality, with tax incentives being given to foreign investors by the government.

• Cost-effective labor and operations

Global firms turn to outsourcing activities in order to cut down their operational and labor costs, especially in a country like the Philippines where costs are relatively low.

Outsourcing operations and activities

How are call center operations in the country implemented?

Outsourcing firms such as call centers provide a wide array of services such as customer care, technical support, financial services, travel services, and others, handling both inbound and outbound calls.

The time difference between the Philippines and the United States is 12 hours. Thus, most call center agents have to work in graveyard shifts. To provide continuous services 24 hours a day, these call centers would typically operate in three shifts.

Usual shift is from midnight to around 8:00 in the morning, which is daytime in the United States. In addition to their basic pay, call center agents receive night shift differentials.

Many large call centers operations in the country have their main headquarters abroad, some of them, however, are owned by domestic telecommunication firms. These companies would have seats that range from as low as 500 to up to 5,000 or even more.

Recruiting and training agents

Typically, outsourcing firms are looking for aspiring call center agents who possess the following:

• Excellent English communication skills

• Customer service skills

• Problem-solving skills

The country is abundant of skilled workforce. Most college-educated applicants have these skills, owing to their proficiency in English and application of IT.

All call center aspirants undergo a rigorous recruitment process to ensure that those who get hired are competent and dedicated to their jobs. It all begins with a screening by phone to determine if the applicant has good voice and response quality.

After passing the phone screening level, applicants would be scheduled to appear for an initial job interview. They need to be able to express themselves confidently and clearly before a team of recruiters who would evaluate their attitude and skills.

Subsequently, they take tests in aptitude and typing, including call simulations. For the final stage, recruiters would evaluate specific skills such as customer service skills, technical skills, as well as sales and marketing skills.

Before they take actual or live client calls, successful applicants who get hired are obliged to complete a specific training period, which usually takes one month. This training includes:

• English and accent training

• Customer service skills training

• Product or service-specific training

Call simulations and other tests would be given throughout this period so they can listen to actual calls by call agents and handle live calls themselves with the help of their trainers or coaches.

Ultimately, outsourcing companies provide refresher courses and further training from time to time in order to:

• Maintain quality of service

• Update on upgrading of technology

• Familiarize with latest product and service offerings

Knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) is as essential to every business as BPO. In fact, some say, KPO is more necessary and critical in the success of every business, especially those that are still in the start-up stage. Currently, there exists a variety of KPO services in a wide range of industries and fields. And the Philippines is one of the outsourcing destinations that lead this fast growing industry today.

KPO in Philippines include the following services, among others:

• Patent research
• Research and development services for advanced, innovated, and more effective medication/treatment
• Market research
• Database development
• Analytical services
• Financial modeling
• Design and development in automotive and aerospace industries
• Content development
• Publishing and legal support
• Review of litigation and transactional documents
• Contract drafting
• Due diligence reports
• Computational fluid dynamics analysis
• Formatting client reports
• Conversion of findings to accessible knowledge
• Data enrichment and warehousing
• Genetic profiling
• Template designing
• Text composition

Most of the KPO services offered today require complex skills including analytical and decision-making skills with specifications in various industries such as engineering and research and development, writing and communication, pharmaceuticals, and health care services. Hence, most individuals providing KPO in Philippines have either previously completed or are currently in the process of completing/acquiring a degree in medicine, law, engineering, and have PhDs or MBAs.

Because KPO services are oftentimes provided and performed by professionals and/or licensed individuals, benefits obtained from KPO services are more advantageous than benefits from other outsourced services. Such benefits include:

• Cost savings,
• Reduced processing and analysis time,
• Increased revenue,
• Improved quality,
• Improved operational efficiencies, and
• Access to skilled workforce

As with other outsourced services, KPO in Philippines is able to generate savings on labor cost and professional development expenses. Since these are extremely costly for most businesses, especially those that are starting up, business owners would most likely hire outsourced services than spend time and money on the professional development of its current employees as well as on training new employees.