Outsourcing
I was watching this movie 'the other end of the line' a few days back. Since then a few scenes in the movie are etching in my mind. There is scene where they show the training session at a BPO. The trainer teaches literally everything from toilet paper to Honululu in American context. They teach the accent as well of course (oh I remember that is why, when I visited one of my acquaintance in UK, while I was on a training on operational issues of our product, asked me if was being trained in English accent. That was his ignorance or deliberate move, i still wonder.)
So when I saw that movie and when ever I think about this whole thing, somehow I am never able to appreciate it. I realize that I must appreciate this idea as a person who understands a b c of business. But the least I can say about outsourcing is that it is one of the most humiliating concept for Indians of this age. It is a new way of not giving ourselves a better chance to develop and grow.
It is really sad to watch our young people do this kind of work, while trying to help american firms draw more profits. I have no problem with them having more profits, but I have problem with short term nature of it. Our people learning the accent to fool other Americans, learning how they walk and what they like, I say, is a wastage of their time. They are learning something which is not useful for them except this temporary job. While this should be the most productive time of their lives, they are sitting in these night dens, calling up random people who don't respect them and who don't even want to accept them as Indians.
I understand that these people might have had no jobs at all, if these call centers weren't around. But I really wish, we had a better idea to solve this problem. We could use their talent in generating value which we could preserve and flourish. I'd hoped some people would have had more chance to come up with ventures or would have got better trainings to deliver value to lot of organizations in India who keep starving for talent.
And what is our friend Obama harping about. I wish I could tell him, you know what? keep your jobs with you. Thank you very much for all this help that your companies provided as this while. How very kind of them. Take your jobs of call center back and put all the guys who lost jobs in I banks, retail, automobile etc. in fin crisis into these call centers and let them earn all this money. However, I am not sure this will make his fellow countrymen happy.
But obviously, like we didn't have a better idea to solve this problem, it seems Mr Obama too had no better solution to his people's problems.
So when I saw that movie and when ever I think about this whole thing, somehow I am never able to appreciate it. I realize that I must appreciate this idea as a person who understands a b c of business. But the least I can say about outsourcing is that it is one of the most humiliating concept for Indians of this age. It is a new way of not giving ourselves a better chance to develop and grow.
It is really sad to watch our young people do this kind of work, while trying to help american firms draw more profits. I have no problem with them having more profits, but I have problem with short term nature of it. Our people learning the accent to fool other Americans, learning how they walk and what they like, I say, is a wastage of their time. They are learning something which is not useful for them except this temporary job. While this should be the most productive time of their lives, they are sitting in these night dens, calling up random people who don't respect them and who don't even want to accept them as Indians.
I understand that these people might have had no jobs at all, if these call centers weren't around. But I really wish, we had a better idea to solve this problem. We could use their talent in generating value which we could preserve and flourish. I'd hoped some people would have had more chance to come up with ventures or would have got better trainings to deliver value to lot of organizations in India who keep starving for talent.
And what is our friend Obama harping about. I wish I could tell him, you know what? keep your jobs with you. Thank you very much for all this help that your companies provided as this while. How very kind of them. Take your jobs of call center back and put all the guys who lost jobs in I banks, retail, automobile etc. in fin crisis into these call centers and let them earn all this money. However, I am not sure this will make his fellow countrymen happy.
But obviously, like we didn't have a better idea to solve this problem, it seems Mr Obama too had no better solution to his people's problems.
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