Village Voice - New place for BPO !!!!

So here is the time for village too. Is the BPO only for cities?
No more it is. Village have it voice too. Twenty two year old graduate from a small village in Tamil nadu with all dreams flew to Chennai for his future. The future he and his family were aspiring for. Software profession, a bulk pay package, happy living, good ambiance.....etc. The dreams never stopped. But Chennai as many know, welcomed him with less pride. He who thought for a right future was muggled up with the unemployment. His future is and was lost.

This isn't the case anymore. One who said " I went to chennai with ambition of job in Infosys or Wipro, but did some odd jobs for a just a living in chennai " is now saying " I am employed, support my family, still i am with my family not in chennai. But i still do the same ambitious work which i was a dreaming.". This is not some disgruntled employee moaning about his Career graph. But this is the words of an employee who is working in Rural BPO. A Team lead for a team of 10 members.

Rural BPO is growing as a definite potential to change the face of rural India. Though currently viewed as social work for rural people; it is a sure shot to grow to a real business which bulk profit similar to what the big firms are making. For the rural India, these kind of BPO are there addressing the unemployment of rural area and also countering the migration of people to urban areas. These BPO do give a social status to all who work.

Jayaram K Manivannan The man in charge of Hyderabad based Byrraju Foundation's rural BPO initiative, GRAM IT, believed by many as the pioneer of this concept say that 25% of 500 employee in his BPO are the one who have returned to their village from various cities and towns. Sai Seva (Serve and Inspire Simple Employment for Village Advancement) BPO was started by the management students of Sri Sathya Sai University in May 2006. “Our idea is to help educated rural youth upgrade the quality of their lives without destructing the cultural fabric. We aim to hold back the youth from migrating to cities by providing employment here in villages,” said Mr Prashanth R., director of Sai Seva.

Sai Seva recently got a major boost when HDFC Bank decided to outsource part of its work on data capture and profiling of new account details. This means that if you happen to open a new account with HDFC Bank, chances are that your profile and personal details will be indexed at Sai Seva BPO in Puttaparthi. HDFC Bank’s head of operations, Mr A. Rajan said his bank would initially outsource about 30,000 applications to Sai Seva and might later scale up to 3 lakh. Currently, the bank’s data capturing and indexing of customer details is done in-house by some 1,000 employees spread across Mumbai and Chennai.

So, What is the cost advantage that a rural BPO enjoy over its urban counterpart ? Manivannan explains: One obvious differential is Salary. An employee in rural BPO earns a gross salary of around 4,500 - 5,000 which is less than half of what his urban peers take home each month. The other is rental and infrastructure. On a average, Rural BPO offers its client a cost advantage of around 40-60 per cent as compared to larger cities. Also these BPO don't have a night shift and have not faced any attrition so far.

Though these Rural BPO are profittable business, most of these BPO are pioneered by social organisation. "Our Rural BPO ideas was born out of need to create an economic surplus for our initiatives like healthcare services, rural education, rural sanitation. GramIT is a social initiative" says Manivannan. Sai Seva business solution was a mix of business and social factors. Any way at the end of the day, business has to make sense. If so the social side will automatically get fulfilled.

Rural BPO though slow will gain and evolve to a business model and the Indian villagers could see this a new opportunity for employment.