The Malaysia based computer whiz Arlene Teodoro packed his bags and flew home to the Philippines, going due to the tide in an improverished country that sends million of workers abroad. He leave his family and friends last 2008 in search of a decent job overseas, the 35 year old bachelor says that he is back for good because his skills are suddenly in big demand amid a business process outsourcing boom.
Arlene Teodoro said that nothing compares to being back in the Philippines. He is part of a 30 strong computer science class at a Manila University in the early 1990s.
When he was working abroad he use up all his vacation leaves to attend family events and reconnect with my family. For a US data mining firm, Teodoro now earns about $3,000 a month as a business intelligence analyst which uses a powerful software to predict such key measures as future sales and trends for clients. He said that the big multinationals from aircraft manufactures to retail chains are increasingly using the sophisticated tools and the Philippines and India offer the most cost-efficient locales for such labor intensive tasks.
In the Philippines, the data mining is one small part of the outsourcing phenomenon in the Philippines that has emerged from virtually nothing 10 years ago to become one of the country’s most important economic planks and sources of jobs. With one quarter of the population currently living on a dollar a day or less, the Philippines has for decades suffered an exodus of people who have headed overseas to escape dire economic condition. 10% of all Filipinos, now live overseas performing low skilled jobs such as maids and sailors however it is also working as nurses, IT specialist and engineers.
Last year, they sent $18.17 billion to the Philippines, equivalent to 10 percent of the country’s GDP and their importance to the nation is such that they have earned some nicknames like Mga Bagong Bayani or Modern Day Heroes. The exodus has also led to a massive brain drain and caused social disruption as families are torn apart with one or both parents going overseas and leaving their children at home with relatives. However, the rise of outsourcing is giving most Filipinos a chance to stay at home. However, the rise of outsourcing is giving most Filipinos a chance to stay at home.
The outsourcing workforce grew about 10% to 600,000 and it is expected to expand to 900,000 employees by 2016. More than 60% of the outsourcing jobs are in call centers with the Filipinos fielding telephone inquiries from or selling products to customers across the globe. They are the lowest paid in the sector, it is an entry level call center with Filipinos fielding telephone inquiries or selling products to the customers across the globe.
Though they are the lowest paid in the sector, an entry level call center job stills pays between P14,000-P20,000 a month. This is roughly an equivalent to what a Filipino maid would typically earn in a wealthier Asian country such as Singapore or a seaman’s starting salary in the global merchant fleet.
Local industry is increasing for a higher paying skills such as the data warehousing, medical and accounting transcription, as well as creative work ranging from the webpage design to animation and video games. The country has risen to have the second biggest outsourcing sector in the world behind India partly because it has a huuge English language workforce.
REFERENCE:
http://tcdn04.abs-cbnnews.com/business/11/24/11/outsourcing-stems-philippine-labor-exodus
