The Rise of Global Business Process Outsourcing Companies | Mar-22

March Issue 14 2022

Articial Touch Dynamic Ways in which AI is Recasting the BPO Market

THE RISE OF

GL BAL BUSINESS PROCESS

OUTSOURCING COMPANIES 2022

Office

The BPO Story The Rise of the Outsourcing Industry

Tim Boylan Founder and CEO

Leveraging Community Advocacy to Grow Customer Excellence

Partners 360

T

he global pandemic caused havoc around the corporate world during its initial days. Nearly every business was left in confusion about how to proceed with its day-to-day operations.

Finally, internet-based business outsourcing services (BPOs) proved to be a great savior in re-establishing how business operations are carried out daily.

THE RISE OF

GL BAL BUSINESS PROCESS

OUTSOURCING COMPANIES 2021

Office

Partners 360

Giving a Boost to the Remote Work Culture

Businesses, ranging from small to large, realized the true potential of what the internet could provide to them as they outsourced their work to various BPO companies. While corporations around the world quickly adopted the work from a home model, enabling their employees to be safe, it was the BPO industry that turned out to be a great rescuer because of its already existing model of IT-enabled services (ITES).

Today, the digitization wave that was triggered due to COVID-19 has started to provide every firm with an equal opportunity to grow its business in global consumer markets. This means that the budget, while important, has not remained the top-of-the-list constraint for the companies. With the available budget, you can choose to outsource your operations to any corner of the world and get quality work done.

The BPO industry is enabling the culture of remotely handling almost every office or in-field operation from any corner of the world. So much so that any organization of any size now has the option of operating without the need for its own physical office. The bundled services provided by the BPO industry are turning out to be lucrative profitmaking options for businesses around the world.

Major firms in every sector have already established their BPO partnerships in the various worldwide markets that they are reaching out to. In such collaboration, the scale of reach these big firms have gained can be compared to none.

Companies like Amazon, American Express, Walmart, and many more are great examples of companies that are wisely utilizing the BPO industry to expand their service reach.

Services ranging from generating sales leads, customer care, data management, content sourcing, marketing, logistics, and many more are now available under the umbrella of services that the BPO industry provides. All you need to have is a well-established internet connection and a digital device, and with a few clicks, you can share your requirements with the client BPOs.

The fantastic thing is that nearly every digitally-enabled business now has the equal option of scaling its services to a worldwide market with the help of BPOs.

One of the greatest benefits of employing BPO services is that it can save you a huge amount of money. Expenses on human resources, customer care services, office equipment, and rentals can be significantly reduced. This saved capital can come in handy to further enhance the product and service experience of your consumers.

In this edition, The Rise of Global Business Process Outsourcing Companies 2022, we have curated a list of companies that provide a wide range of BPO services using the latest technologies and vitally as well as speedily assist small-to-big businesses in managing their daily operations.

Lastly, do read the CxO standpoint by the industry experts and the well-researched exclusive articles written by our inhouse editorial team.

Happy Reading!

Moreover, hiring BPO services means even if your company’s staff does not possess the necessary specialization in a certain area of service or market, you can simply outsource it and get the work done under the given time limits.

- Vishal Golekar

08 Cover Story

OfficePartners360 Leveraging Community Advocacy to Grow Customer Excellence

Articles 20 Artificial Touch Dynamic Ways in which AI is Recasting the BPO Market

32 The BPO Story The Rise of the Outsourcing Industry

Contents Salelytics, LLC

16

Driving Revenue with Advanced Technology and Continuous Innovation

24

SupportU An Impact Sourcing BPO, Building Transformational Change

CxO Jason Reeves

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Editor-in-Chief Sumita Sarkar Senior Editor Anish Miller Managing Editor Bhushan Bhad Assisting Editors Trishika, Vishal Visualiser David King Art & Design Head Rohil Shinganapurkar Co-designer Paul Belin Art & Design Assistant Mrunalinee Deshmukh Business Development Manager Sherin Rodricks Marketing Manager Joseph D'souza Business Development Executives Kelly, David Sales Executives Mark, Alice Technical Head Jacob Smile Assistant Technical Head Amar Sawant Technical Consultants Prachi, Rajeshwar Digital Marketing Manager Alina Sege Assistant Digital Marketing Manager Renuka Kulkarni SME-SMO Executives Gemson Research Analyst Eric Smith Circulation Manager Tanaji sales@insightssuccess.com

March, 2022 Corporate Ofce Insights Success Media Tech LLC 555 Metro Place North, Suite 100, Dublin, OH 43017, United States Phone - (614)-859-2600 Email: info@insightssuccess.com For Subscription: www.insightssuccess.com

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Company Name

Featuring

Brief

Akorbi akorbi.com

Sarah Haner, Vice President of Marketing

Akorbi is a group of companies, based in Dallas-Fort Worth, specializing in providing enterprise solutions that empower companies to achieve success in the global economy.

Atomatic atomatic.co

Trevor Lim, CEO

Atomatic is an agency that’s specialized in building, optimizing and streamlining systems and processes for eCommerce businesses to scale to their highest potential.

ContactCenterWorld.com contactcenterworld.com

Raj Wadhwani, President

ContactCenterWorld is the place where professionals all around the world can discover the next generation of customer experience.

DXC BPaaS and BPO dxc.com

Christopher Cognetta, Director

DXC is an IT services company using the power of technology to build better futures for our customers, colleagues, environment and communities.

Millennium Technology Services mtscloud.com

Andy Tan, CEO

Millennium Technology Services (MTS) is a USA based international provider of World-Class Business Solutions and IT services to the top Multi Nationals Corporations.

Octopus Tech theoctopustech.com

Dhruva Khanna, Founder and Director

Octopus Tech is a leading provider of web design and call center outsourcing services, trusted for its cutting-edge services by a long list of partners across the globe.

Office Partners 360 op360.com

Tim Boylan, Founder and CEO

OfficePartners360 is a specialized outsourcing company focused on providing custom back office and customer service solutions for small to medium-sized businesses and Fortune 500 companies.

Salelytics salelytics.com

Matt Gargo Vice President Client Operations

Salelytics is one of the nation’s leading providers of Inside Sales, Account Management and Inbound Support services.

Star CRM Singapore starcrm.com.sg

Sharada Qureshi, COO

Star CRM is a leading provider of CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software and services in the AsiaPacific region.

SupportU supportusolutions.com

Hui Wu-Curtis, COO

SupportU specializes in contact center operations; customer service, technical support, sales and back-office support.

Tim Boylan Founder and CEO

Cover Story

Partners 360

Leveraging Community Advocacy to Grow Customer Excellence

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OP360’s customers benefit from the insight and expertise of deeply experienced BPO and customer experience subject matter experts.

The Rise of Global Business Process Outsourcing Companies 2022

T

he 1990’s youth culture was strongly shaped by the increasing influence of globalization and the ongoing concern for environmental protection.

Ever the innovators, Tim Boylan and his friend, Dave Highbloom, responded by marrying the practicality of entrepreneurship with their passion for environmentalism.

Selling their Human-i-Tees t-shirts out of the trunks of their cars, they were not just responding to the issues of their time but were also planting the seeds of their vision.

The Vision Tim and Dave understood that a sustainable future required shaping a more efficient yet giving world. Their first step was to use their Human-i-Tees profits to support the youth in their local community as well as national efforts such as Student Environmental Action Coalition, Center for Environmental Education, and Save America’s Forests.

The Spark In 2010, their paths would cross again in the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry. Tim had just begun his outsourcing journey in the Philippines while Ben and Dave were establishing careers in healthcare education.

As Tim’s first clients, they saw how his unique entrepreneurial spirit and community advocacy translated into a unique value proposition. So, they wanted to collaborate, contribute, and coalesce as a team. After almost a decade, Tim’s clients became his OfficePartners360 (OP360) partners and, together, have transformed their shared vision into the reality embodied by more than 3,000 employees today.

BPO and customer experience SMEs. OP360’s practice of continuous improvement ensures that both its clients and employees benefit from the most advanced strategies and leadership/growth models, simple, focused elements to resolve complex customer issues.

As CEO and founder of OP360, Tim has been very deliberate in creating impact not only for his clients but also for his employees. From his earlier experiences working with local communities and vulnerable populations, Tim realized the deep correlation between the organizational culture of giving and delivery excellence. Exposing his employees to community service, compassionate relief, and altruistic activities translated into customer experience agents with a deeper empathy, patience, and commitment to issue resolution.

Facing the Pandemic The global pandemic proved how determined, engaged, and dynamic OP360 employees are in supporting its clients.

Despite their challenges, each employee continues to stand by the company’s commitment to growing its clients’ businesses and keeping client operations running smoothly by remaining patient and adaptable to changes in the work environment.

To safeguard the safety and wellness of all employees, OP360’s world-class Business Continuity Team (BCT) implemented business resiliency measures that accommodate the needs of both on-site and remote workers.

For employees working on-site, the BCT ensured that all facilities were manned by trained, certified occupational safety, health practitioners, and trained first aiders and stayed in compliance with health regulations and protocols.

Simplicity is Golden That mantra ‘simplicity is golden’ has served as the foundation of OP360. Keeping OP360 grounded in the golden triangle of customer, culture, and continuous improvement, Tim and his partners have reimagined a business model where outsourcing is made personal.

Focusing on these core elements enabled OP360 with the flexibility to provide intelligent and innovative solutions to all types of clients – regardless of where they are on the maturity scale, what they deliver to their customers, or how they define success.

Its culture and commitment to the community drive an unparalleled ability to hire the best. OP360’s customers benefit from the insight and expertise of deeply experienced

The work-from-home employees received corporate telecommuting packages, including wired internet at home.

To mitigate service disruptions, OP360’s Resiliency Center served as an emergency work hub. OP360 also provided employment and other economic opportunities to many Filipinos who lost their livelihoods due to the pandemic. As a result, OP360 could scale its operations, unlike some competitors that suffered setbacks.

Employee Wellness Extends Past the Physical OP360 has always prided itself in how it engrains into its leadership to be mindful of not just their team’s physical health but also to be aware of mental wellness. Each site conducts routine mental health campaigns to promote work-

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OP360 has always prided itself in how it engrains into its leadership to be mindful of not just their team’s physical health but also to be aware of mental wellness.

,,

OP360’s culture and commitment to the community drives an unparalleled ability to hire the best.

ife balance to prioritize employee welfare and holistic development. On last year’s World Mental Health Day, a lvirtual event was rolled out for employees and executives to learn effective coping mechanisms from a wellness professional. This year, OP360 aims to further this conversation by creating emotionally safe spaces for remote and on-site employees.

Inclusivity Enables Access to the Best Having traveled the world and experienced firsthand the impact of diversity, Tim and his leadership team are aware of LGBTQIA+ realities. In June, OP360 observed PRIDE month with a virtual event (Love, Me) celebrating its LGBTQIA+ identifying employees attended by 2000+ participants. It has since started its application to become a member organization to the Philippine Financial and Interindustry Pride, the largest professional network in the country for the LGBTQIA+ identifying workforce.

These are only the first of many steps that the OP360 team is actively taking to amplify the voices of its diverse workforce. Protecting its most valuable assets - the employees, remains paramount to OP360. Over the last quarter, it launched a vaccination program, Together and for

Each Other (in partnership with the local government of Cebu), to vaccinate over 600 employees who had not already received local government vaccinations.

This program brought OP360’s total workplace vaccination rate to 28%, which is higher than the country’s current national average. Further extending this program, OP360 just launched OP360 Junior, providing vaccinations to its employees’ family members and dependents aged 12-17 years old. To inspire others to do their part in protecting lives during these extraordinary times, a continuing story campaign features the narratives of vaccinated employees, highlighting their motivations for getting the vaccine.

360 Degrees From its roots in environmental awareness to the 3,000+ people-focused BPO, OP360 has taken a passion for community 360 degrees and embedded it into the company’s DNA. But the impact extends well beyond the community as these behaviors become rooted in how its staff engages with customers. The empathy, patience, and understanding translate into OP360‘s ability to deliver a superior experience of world-class support driven by proud and deeply loyal employees.

The Rise of Global Business Process Outsourcing Companies 2022

Driving Revenue with Advanced Technology and Continuous Innovation

O

utsourcing has become one of the go-to options for businesses. Choosing to outsource is equivalent to requesting a helping hand. Many small businesses outsource not because they want to save money or they can’t find suitable employees, but because they prefer investing the time and effort in matters that are vital to the business. Therefore, hiring a third-party service provider may be the best decision a company can make.

Outsourcing offers rapid access to a team of highly qualified professionals who connect with the customers utilizing the latest technology and techniques by partnering with a third-party supplier. On the other hand, customers receive better service, agents address issues more quickly, and companies don’t have to worry about high turnover or infrastructure costs.

In short, outsourcing provides a great platform for both the companies and customers. Over the years, the outsourcing market has expanded rapidly, and many companies started delivering outsourcing services. One prominent company in that list is Salelytics, which provides Inside Sales, Account Management, and Inbound Support Services.

In an interview with Insights Success, Matt Gargo, the Vice President of Salelytics, sheds light on the journey of his company, its services, and the different aspects of the outsourcing space.

Please brief our audience about Salelytics, its USPs, and how it is currently positioned as a trusted outsourcing partner.

We work with Fortune 1000 companies as well as venturebacked start-ups getting off the ground. Since we don’t offer cookie-cutter solutions and customize any one of our service offerings to the specific needs of our clients, we are highly successful in a broad range of industries. We are

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adept at leveraging cross-vertical synergies to drive the best sales and service outcomes.

Salelytics was founded over 30 years ago to support manufacturers of consumer-packaged goods (CPG). From there, we branched into healthcare to include medical device and pharmaceutical manufacturers. Some of our largest client partnerships today exist in the business-to-business space for financial, logistics, industrial supplies, travel and hospitality, and distribution among others.

Overall, we have a highly satisfied customer base. The best evidence to support this is the average tenure of top clients and total client base. Top 10 clients have been with us an average of 10+ years and the overall customer base averages over five years of partnership.

Shed some light on Salelytics’ offerings and how they impact the industry and your clients?

We provide five key service offerings to clients, all of which can be customized:

We are adept at leveraging cross-vertical synergies to drive the best sales and service outcomes.

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Funnel Development: Outbound appointment setting or demand generation (date and time with qualified decision maker) Team Sell: Clients Field Sales and our Inside Sales resources collaborate to acquire, retain, and grow revenues.

Sole Territory Coverage: Our Inside Sales Associates independently acquire new customers for our clients.

Account Management: Our Inside Sales Associates take over a clients specific set or segment of customers to retain and grow through Upselling and Cross selling efforts.

Matt Gargo Vice President Client Operations

Customer/Patient Care: Our dedicated care associate supporting Inbound and Outbound needs tied to educating and supporting client’s customer or patient groups. While most of our initiatives are a strategic complement to our partner’s overall go to market strategic, our ability to take on both large Fortune 100 partners while also being nimble enough to provide the advice and counsel to smaller start-ups allows us to deploy our solutions at almost any scale.

About the Leader Our expertise in consulting with our partners and building out a custom solution ensures we design a sales or service engagement that is unique to the value goal, be it in revenue generation, service, or service into sales. As part of this, we lead our partners through a robust solution design process that looks at every component, ensuring we’re pairing the best talent, tech stack, and sales and service enablers to optimize value.

After leaving graduate school, Matt Gargo started out as an inbound sales associate for a consumer retention program. Through a variety of roles of increasing responsibility in training, talent, and sales operations, Matt established the firm’s Financial Services practice.

To call out one specific and proprietary solution, we’ve developed a patented ‘Super Associate’ application to provide real time call scoring for associates leveraging our Speech Analytics platform to listen to a selected group of key words and phrases as specific points within a call.

He drove the growth of the company’s largest client while standing up internal and external compliance and auditing, a modern, speech-enabled quality assurance methodology, and a consultative sales practice focused on leveraging the right technology to drive incremental sales and best-in-class customer satisfaction.

This application is then tied directly into our Gamification platform to provide scoring and tracking to keyword adherence at the associate level that correlates directly to the sales or service goals of the client. This direct tie in has dramatically shortened the speed to ramp for new associates by up to 50% in some cases.

In this area, Matt helped spearhead the establishment of the firm’s data warehouse for business contact intelligence, a proprietary tool used to uncover addressable markets with lead scoring for likelihood to contact.

Combining our real-time Super Associate with Lingua—Salelytics proprietary full transcription speech analytics platform—we have empowered our coaches to find opportunities faster than ever and have equipped them

Matt has also been at the forefront of the transformation of the associate talent and training model from regionalized, brick-and-mortar centric to one that is national and virtual.

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to speed the diagnostic function of coaching and developing associates.

What used to take hours in the ‘old days’ of listening to call after call can now be accomplished with a quick text search across hundreds or even thousands of call interactions and filtered by call outcome or any variety of call meta-data.

Both tools are fully integrated in our proprietary performance monitoring and development tool ROADMAP, driving a seamless integration of call analysis and coaching.

Being an experienced leader, share your opinion on the impact of adopting modern technologies within the business outsourcing space and what more could be expected in the future?

Over the past 10 years, there has been a rapid evolution of call center technology aimed at enabling sales and service outcomes and driving better, more prepared associates.

Tools such as speech analytics and gamification have become central to how we go to market and key components of delivering upon program KPIs. These tools also help reduce the initial time to performance ramp and part of our tactics in keeping associates engaged and ultimately reducing churn. The use of chat and videoenabled chat has tied teams together at a distance and has made cross continental collaboration easy to a measure no one would have believed a decade ago.

In this area, the future promises the maturity of many of these nascent technologies and a further application transforming both the in-office and remote training experiences to where oral and written assessments are supplemented with tools that numerically measure sales and service readiness based on talk track deliver and voice analytics prior to an associate taking their first live call.

For associate in production, expect the further automation of performance analytics through AI-driven speech and sentiment analytics as well as the automation of the call quality and compliance functions.

Considering the current pandemic, what initial challenges did Salelytics face and how did you drive Salelytics to sustain operations while ensuring the safety of your employees at the same time?

As we were primarily a brick-and-mortar call center business, we’d never been tested to deploy technology and lead our teams remotely. For us, however, there was never a

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consideration around whether we would stay in the office or migrate our employee’s home – we were committed first and foremost to the safety of our employees.

Our largest initial challenges were around deploying and testing our tech stack remotely and at scale and servicing our remote employee’s hardware and software – especially when troubleshooting remotely. Our second challenge was in training and onboarding new employees who would never work in the brick and mortar. By building out proprietary tools to help with workstation pick up and leverage virtual interviewing and training platforms, we found we’d improved our ability to hire and train.

With the introduction of MS Teams and enabling video across our employee base, we found we were quickly able to duplicate the in-office camaraderie and support even as we sat in disparate locations. Separately, while we had never specifically intended our proprietary Sales Enabler technology to support a remote worker, we found that with minor changes, they were well suited the job of continuing to drive top notch performance and employee engagement.

What would be your advice to budding entrepreneurs who aspire to venture into the business outsourcing services market?

While it is easy to get distracted by all the technology and tools, the first step is to focus on setting up the basics of the sales or service operation, determining the right KPIs and building a culture and cadence of accountability where everyone has clear visibility into what success looks like at every aspect of the process and level.

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The technology provides no short cuts into ensuring the basic blocking and tackling exists and can only support a program built on a firm foundation of experience and rigor and cannot fill in the cracks where corners have been cut or outcomes unclear. Second to that is garnering the right talent for the task and being able to target the intersection of skillset and wage for your initiative.

While it may seem contrary – in most cases wage-level alone is not the key driver in employee satisfaction and retention. Having a robust understanding of your talent and being able to build processes to vet talent into the right role will ensure KPIs are met but will also bring longer term employee satisfaction and reduced churn. As attrition training is one of the largest drivers in performance and margin erosion within BPO, it is critical that all of these pieces work together as compliments.

How do you envision scaling Salelytics’ operations and offerings in 2022 and beyond?

paramount. The pandemic has accelerated the desire to work from home and forced companies to confront this as a viable option to a degree ever before seen. Due to the shear success, we’ve now looked at how we can mine for talent at the intersection of wage and skillset regardless of geographic location.

Where we were tethered to the geography and its inhabitants, having the flexibility to pull the best talent for the price point has been transformational. While the brick and mortar will always be a part of our model, we now have fully virtualized clients spread across markets gives us scale, skills, and flexibility we never enjoyed prior to the pandemic and tied to a finite set of locations.

Due to this change in our approach, we’re in the middle of a labor crisis yet have onboarded more associates over the past two years than pre-pandemic. If it weren’t for our embrace of this new mode, we would not have been able to deliver upon our growth objectives over the last two years.

The future of scale is tied to a national model for talent. The old days regarded the location of brick and mortar as

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Dynamic

Ways in which

is Recasting the Market

BPO T

oday, the world is witnessing the growth of artificial intelligence and its impact on every sector.

Every industry is adapting to this change and looking to use these two technologies to run their business.

Business process outsourcing (BPO) is one of those famous and one of the fastest-growing global industries, with a wide variety of services ranging from accounts payable to clinical trials management. The BPO market is rapidly growing due to the concurrent growth of cloud computing, big data, and artificial intelligence (AI).

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been the technology of the future for quite a while now. Science fiction movies and novels have predicted a future in which AI ruled over humans or a post-apocalyptic world where human beings barely survived against AI. While these predictions are spectacular and entertaining, we are far from having robots with state-of-the-art artificial intelligence which control our lives. However, there is one area in which the impact of AI is real: business process outsourcing.

What is Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence?

Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are two of the hottest topics in technology right now. However, AI and ML are often used interchangeably or confused with one another. The reality is that AI and ML have distinct definitions, and we must understand them for both their use cases and capabilities.

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Ar ficial Touch

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Machine learning is a subset of AI that defines a system that automatically learns and improves from experience without requiring explicit programming. Machine learning uses software to crawl through data, remove unnecessary information, and develop solutions. It is often used for predictive analysis and decision-making.

AI will help companies in the future, even if just in the form of better security, hopefully avoiding some common pitfalls. Businesses of all sizes are responsible for providing their customers with a safe and secure experience. With machine learning, you can use your resources to protect your customers from both cybercrime and identity theft.

Artificial Intelligence and Business Process Outsourcing

AI-based Interactive Voice Response

While the general public may think of artificial intelligence as a fancy means to develop the latest technology, many companies have started including artificial intelligence in their business operations. However, many BPO companies have yet to make proper use of it. While many of them have begun to incorporate machine learning into their services and apply these AI skills toward customer-facing business processes, many organizations are examining the perks of artificial intelligence within their BPO projects.

There is a lot of buzz around the development of virtual assistants and AI-based systems with more natural language processing. The reason for this interest is that customers are increasingly moving to voice search rather than typing into the search engine. If you are interested in AI, deep learning, and neural networks, Chabot is exactly what you need! It also creates a ground for building your own enterprise-class AI-based virtual assistant right on your website.

In Conclusion

Great Customer Experience From the initial stages of customer interaction to the final output, customer experience has always been at the forefront. While the traditional customer service solutions were reasonable, they encountered certain inadequacies to meet all the changing customer demands. And entering into the newer stage, where machines will be working in tandem with humans and powerful AI tools control all this. It is still in the developing stage, and a lot more research, innovation, and integration are required to make this industry more useful.

Documentation Method Paperwork has plagued businesses for centuries. It is truly a common enemy. Stories are told to scare young employees and interns about the tremendous amount of investment that a company puts in their employees only to unnecessarily spend it on handling paper files that could be replaced by software. In many countries, the government sets up forms and procedures for regulatory documents and handling paper correspondence. By digitizing your mail, you can deal with all these elements through the use of software specially designed for this purpose.

In today's business landscape, it's obvious to see the growing influence of artificial intelligence and machine learning on almost every process. From Virtual Assistants to self-driving cars, these are all examples of AI put into action, but this technology has been available for a long time in some industries.

With the use of artificial intelligence, growing your business through BPO is easier than ever. There's no doubt that robust control technology and a trusty BPO partner can keep the controls in good shape, propelling your business's growth. As a business owner, you will always want to invest in technologies to ensure the maximum ROI and savings — innovative technologies are your best bet.

- Bhushan Bhad

Safety and Security Customers are the crux of your business, and satisfaction is a major component of keeping customers. Security is another area with no exceptions, and it can be a tricky subject or something that can be brushed aside too quickly.

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The Rise of Global Business Process Outsourcing Companies 2022

Support U An Impact Sourcing BPO, Building Transforma onal Change

B

usiness Process Outsourcing (BPO) is an important industry across the world. The BPO industry assists in delivering reliable, significant, and constant support to crucial business processes. It has widely adapted to the needs of various industries to support them in streamlining their operations. Industries such as banking, manufacturing, healthcare, financial services, insurance, IT, etc., take active help from the BPO industry to improve productivity as well as cut costs.

One such organization is SupportU, headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. It has built itself into a trustworthy and result-driven BPO organization. It offers specialized services in contact center operations, technical support, customer care, sales, and back-office support. The company provides its services across all the available channels, including inbound and outbound voice, SMS, chat, and email.

SupportU is a woman, minority-owned business process outsourcing organization formed on some fundamental principles. It does not believe in the business of labor arbitrage and wants to create an organization that betters the lives of others.

The Beginning SupportU was founded by Hui Wu-Curtis (Co-founder and COO) and Ron Petrie (Co-founder and CEO). With broad professional experience in the BPO industry, both formed the company with several intentions in mind. “My business partner and I have always worked in the outsourcing industry in various capacities, and we have learned that—with this model, like anything else—it is time for change and disruption,” Hui says.

The co-founders built the organization from the ground up with some simple principles:

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We have created a track record of establishing business rela onships that emulate ourits values of transparency, accountability, genuineness, and determina on.

1) Make the investment upfront with the savviest technology solution that will continue to evolve as BPO business and markets evolve.

2) All technology considerations start with the organization's employees in mind and how those resources will help them do their jobs better, faster, and more efficiently.

3) How the organization integrates the available technology stack into a world of possibilities for its clients so that it may evolve its businesses forward.

When asked about how the company differentiates its services from its competitors, Hui says, “It simply comes down to the fact that we take the time to understand our clients” businesses, go in with a consultative mindset, and deliver outstanding performance, data, and analysis that is value-added and actionable for our clients.”

Fundamentals of SupportU The company purposefully focuses on providing employment opportunities for people of the underserved communities (single-parents, LGBTQ, the formerly incarcerated, minorities, women, military spouses, and

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Hui Wu-Cur s COO/Co-founder

college students). It believes in creating a safe environment for people to be themselves, celebrate diversity, and see differences as a value.

The BPO company supports and educates its entire staff to be successful. It provides its people with promotional and career opportunities so that they may change their economic conditions given their desire to succeed. Starting at the company’s core with its people translates to providing its clients with exceptional service and support from people who want to be seen as winners — not people seen as different or less skilled.

“We have created a track record of establishing business relationships that emulate its our values of transparency, accountability, warmthgenuineness, and determination,” Hui quotes on the founding fundamentals of SupportU. The founders have established themselves as experts in the industry with proven results across many verticals and a strong desire to push the boundaries of progress for the BPO industry.

The Initiator – Hui Wu-Curtis, COO/Co-founder Hui immigrated to the U.S. when she was five, with her parents and younger sister. They were the first wave of their family to escape the Vietnam War. Her father had only $200 in his pocket. He was also the only one who spoke any English in the family.

Having dealt with so much adversity already, her father still fought hard for the family's survival because he truly believed that the U.S. was a country of opportunity for everyone.

While in college at San Diego State, Hui worked a parttime job in a call center, taking calls and relaying messages to people's alpha-numeric pagers. “I lasted about six months because it was horrible. I never met my supervisor. There were so many people everywhere, and it seemed unorganized. This was not a place for me,” Hui describes her first job experience.

various call centers in nearly all major industries, each time learning as much as she could and absorbing all the information. This provided her with the knowledge and hands-on opportunity to learn about all aspects of the business, understand existing and newer technology solutions, and discover how to execute for results.

Over time, she learned that the multi-discipline approach in call center management has many parts that are all interdependent. She also learned to successfully juggle all the moving parts of a call center to make it successful.

“From there, I’ve been asked to create new call centers, fix the call center, or take the call center to the next level, all of which I’ve done very successfully over the years,” Hui shares.

She observed throughout each company that minorities, both male and female, needed to work much harder to get noticed, often never being given the opportunity to grow and advance because they didn’t look, sound, or dress the part. The other reality was that, in the industries in which she worked, very rarely were there any minority leaders or executives that understood and knew the challenges these groups face.

Working on the brand and BPO side, she has developed the unique perspective of both.

“As a client, I’ve experienced the pain points of working with BPOs of all sizes and geographical locations. Now, as I am on the BPO side, I know what clients are looking for, and can work with my operational team to ensure we never cause those same pain points for our clients,” Hui tells us.

With her years of work in other organizations, she understood how to find degrees of difference between a company’s focus and how it should function. So, she decided to leave the position of CEO in her last company and start her BPO with her business partner, Ron Petrie — himself a former CEO at a smaller BPO and a businessdevelopment executive, leading sizable sales teams for years.

Several years later, she had an opportunity to go back into a call center, but in a supervisor capacity, so she took the chance. She thought it would be challenging to learn more about this unique environment and figure out how one could effectively manage people who were always tied to the phones.

After seeing all the politics, greed, and mismanagement, the co-founders decided to build their BPO that focused on bringing together the best leadership talent, coupled with the best technology, to create a safe, collaborative, and innovative environment for marginalized people. “We embrace and value diversity and will provide career opportunities to them as we continue to grow,” Hui tells.

Subsequently, she spent the next 25+ years working in

Today, 65% of workers in a call center cannot afford (or are

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not offered) health insurance. Hui says, “This is not okay with us. We feel that it is important for all our team members to have health insurance, which is why SupportU runs as efficiently as possible, so we can reinvest those funds into providing health insurance and other benefits for our people.”

The founders strongly believe in a culture where people see and feel that they are important to the company. SupportU is committed to putting its employees and clients first. By doing so, it continues to drive loyalty and performance.

Modern Technologies in the BPO Industry Both the founders have spent time at companies where the technology was all over the board. Some bought technology without knowing how or where to use it. Some didn’t buy any technology because “things have run just fine for all these years.” Some simply feared early adoption.

“First, technology is NOT the solution to everything. It is not going to fix all your company’s problems magically.

What technology CAN do is provide a very effective tool(s) to run your business, IF given the right outlook of how it interplays with people and processes,” Hui explains.

“We have been fortunate enough to invest upfront in the best technology. The best doesn’t mean the most expensive.

We were very deliberate in how we built our technology stack of solutions. We looked for solution providers that had an innovative solution, who were flexible, agile, and entrepreneurial in spirit,” she adds.

SupportU wants to push the boundaries of success in operations and service delivery in partnership with these various solution providers. The organization’s approach to considering its technology solutions always had its people in mind.

Does it make employees’ jobs easier? Does it provide visibility to its leadership in an easily digestible way for them to manage and make business decisions? Does the technology solution help the company identify where it needs to help people? Does the technology help company to identify issues of which its clients need to be aware?

Some of the toughest jobs in any call center are at the frontline agent and supervisor levels. SupportU has built its technology stack with some of the most innovative and fluid solutions in the market to

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1) Support its employees, so they gain proficiency sooner and outperform others 2) Provide leadership with the tools to manage their operation and people effectively 3) Identify issues and trends for its clients’ businesses, and 4) Allow for the company to run efficiently so that it can reinvest savings back into its people via healthcare and other benefits There are many BPOs that do great work with their technology solutions, but as a client, Hui found it hard to visualize how those solutions would benefit her business.

SupportU provides that consultative approach, understanding the clients’ business models and proposing opportunities for technology solutions that will help grow and advance their companies. SupportU takes the guesswork out of the equation and provides opportunities for their clients.

There are many technology solutions out there, and the founders understand the need to keep up with them from a market awareness aspect, but many companies are not willing to make a big investment just yet. The company has done several pilots for clients so that they can experience the functionality of a particular technology and how it impacts customer experience without a huge capital investment upfront. It is a smarter way of leveraging outsourcing partnerships in addition to labor support.

Fighting the Pandemic “Rather than looking backward, I’m focusing on the future.

COVID-19 continues to permeate many countries, and there seems to be no end in sight. As a business, we must be savvy enough to understand how and what we need to do to pivot during this new normal,” Hui says.

“We also must listen to what the aftermath is telling us.

While we can continue to uphold the safety protocols of distancing people at work or utilizing work-from-home, there is also the significant theme of “The Great Resignation.” For the first time, a massive portion of our labor workforce is telling us that they are tired and fed-up with employers treating them poorly at work; tired of low wages, poor working conditions, terrible bosses, long commutes, etc.,” she adds.

SupportU is aiming to be that disruptor in the BPO space because, although it is a smaller player, its executives come from much larger corporations who understand what it means to be competitive, to differentiate, and to value

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talent. The company is making investments in its people and technology while remaining agile. Our ability to be incredibly adaptive and flexible is key to our success.

and believe that by doing the right thing, everything else will follow,” she adds.

Objectives for 2022 and Beyond

Words of Guidance Some entrepreneurs, who know very little about BPOs, become successful out of blind luck. Others truly learn and work hard to be successful. For anyone who wants to get into this space, learn as much as you can about the operations and what clients are looking for. Then ask yourself why you want to get into this business. It is a relationship-based business, and building your network and reputation matters. It also takes funding to get your operations started.

“Starting a BPO is not unlike starting other businesses, but you must determine if this is something you want to do or is it something you love doing. If you love doing it, then all the hard work will pay off,” Hui advises.

“We created SupportU because we love this andbut wanted the ability to run a company the right way, and we believe strongly in giving back to our people and our community in the underserved areas. We are mission- and value-driven,

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In the BPO business, it is about planning, building your pipeline of opportunities, and networking. Nothing happens overnight. “We are well prepared in our planning process to be a few steps ahead as we continue to grow. Our technologies and processes are automated, and for small companies, this just doesn’t happen at the early stages,” Hui notes.

“We are big-company minded with big-company resources for our future and well-positioned for growth. Ron and I are always watching the various markets, shifts, and new entrants so that we understand the changing conditions in the marketplace,” she adds.

The company is watching, learning, and gauging activities in and around the industry so that it can be proactive and ready versus reactive. “Given the right client interest, we are also flexible to operate in other geographical locations, but for now, we are focusing our delivery onshore in the U.S.,” says Hui.

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Wealth:

The ‘taboo’ topic

within American culture

- Jason Reeves MA, CEPF, Founder and CEO of Segue Wealth Management

I

n the U.S., “We’re middle-class” has often been the response of many when asked what their household income is. Often fraught with giving a specific answer for fear of judgment in one way or the other, for making too much money or not enough, most people just aim for the middle.

So, when I came across an article in Forbes Magazine about Professor Nina Strohminger’s vague question to her students at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business about what they thought the average American worker makes per year, it instantly brought back a memory from my college days.

During my time as an undergrad at Berea College, one of my favorite professors, Dr. Jill Bouma, asked our class a similar question. “After graduation, what do you all think would be a good salary to make in your professional careers?” The consensus answer: $50k per year. Now, obviously, this was back in 2006, and factoring in inflation, this amount would be closer to $70k in 2022.

Nevertheless, as a student coming from a family of limited means, $50k per year was really very good. Dr. Bouma juxtaposed our responses to students that she’d previously taught at a university with students from higher-income earning families, whose consensus response was “at least $100k,” and it actually led to an eye-opening and ultimately career-defining moment for me.

Whether we would like to admit it or not, the U.S., My

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Country Tis of Thee, is one that is built on social constructs. This includes not only race but socioeconomic class. Furthermore, whether we would like to admit it or not, financial education, financial literacy, and family business succession planning have allowed for families who have accumulated mass amounts of wealth to transfer it efficiently and effectively from generation to generation.

Ultimately what this does is allow those families to educate their heirs on strategic wealth management, effective investment strategies, and how to not only protect what they already have but to continue to grow their empire. Those who are not of means are often left out of the personal finance and business management discussions that these families are having due to a lack of knowledge and or exposure to these guiding principles.

As stated in the article, over 25% of the students thought that the average American worker made over six figures annually. Obviously, this is twice the amount of what the real number is (approximately $52,520 in 2021).

However, one could argue that for those students, a majority of whom probably come from a financially stable family of means, six figures are ‘average.’

Thus, the responses they gave reflect the life they live and with whom they and their friends and families associate. As with the proximity principle, you tend to become and pattern your behaviors after those you spend the most time with. As the old saying goes, “birds of a feather flock together.” If family A is one that is ‘middleclass’ and has discussions with their kids about money www.insightssuccess.com

and personal finance, while family B has discussions about the latest and greatest trends on social media, the long-term effects in both scenarios will show themselves over time.

In the same way, if one’s circle of friends is having discussions on investment strategies, risk management strategies, and who is their wealth management professional, they are more likely to bear positive fruit from those discussions. Thus, it is not that the Wharton School of Business students were out of touch with reality; it is that those students’ reality is not that of an ‘average’ American. There are levels to it.

The doors of opportunity and advancement are as open as they have ever been. Access to formal education for all races, genders, and creeds has never been more readily available as it is today.

As parents and mentors to the next generation, we have done a good job of challenging them to pursue education. Yet, that’s only one step. It is our responsibility to educate our students, kids, and heirs to be financially literate. This comes through financial education, which, ironically, is not taught in schools or required to graduate at any level. It is an acquired skill that must be pursued independently and consistently over the course of one’s life.

Exposing our youth and young adults to personal finance advice, how to use an insurance investment strategy, and the importance of estate planning will open more doors and ensure the financial well-being of our generations to come.

Many will become entrepreneurs and business owners, so it is not only important to work with an asset and wealth management professional but to also work with them on business succession planning so their children’s children can reap the rewards of the sacrifices they personally made to have a better life and change their family tree. It is time to level up.

The Rise of

the

OUTSOURCING Industry T

he term outsourcing, or offshoring, refers to the transfer of production processes to a foreign country wherein remotely located workers in host countries handle certain steps of the production process.

There are several reasons why firms prefer to “outsource”some of their operations. First, it is generally more cost-effective than if all services were provided by internal resources. Second, it is flexible, allowing firms to allocate work quickly and efficiently according to their changing requirements; and third, it allows firms to tap into foreign talent pools. In recent times, many companies have started moving their software development activities offshore as well.

Outsourcing is an increasingly common practice in many different industries. In the case of the IT sector, this has led to a marked increase in outsourced projects due to high demand and availability. As soon as there was a demand for labor-intensive work, other sectors started to hire foreign providers instead of building their capacity or retraining their existing staff.

The key trend in the IT services sector is specialization focusing on four areas: application maintenance, systems maintenance and support, BPOs, and infrastructure management.

The 1970s to early 1990s India’s outsourcing has shown exponential growth over a period of time. The idea and concept of outsourcing came

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The BPO Story

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nto existence from the 1970s to the early 1990s. A shortage of skills and cost was the prime driver for outsourcing to iIndia then; the country that gave birth to civilization itself was now becoming known as the world’s back office. The companies in the West jumped on the bandwagon and outsourced work to Indian companies at lower costs. The cost factor was a prime driver for outsourcing to Indian companies.

1994 to 1998 The era of information technology outsourcing in the year 1994 to 1998 was a crucial turning point. Before this period, just a handful of clients outsourced their projects.

The advancements and success stories that put India on the global map were related to this period. Several companies benefitted from the Japanese economic slump and slowly became reliable IT service providers through hard work and dedication. Many old-time IT companies faced a lot of flak from the domestic establishment for taking away jobs from the country in the early 90s but soon emerged as an unstoppable force after 1995. The creation of a reasonably good support ecosystem with adherence to industry standards made Indian companies prime targets for clients across the world, especially for mid-to-large level outsourced projects.

1999 to 2001 The Outsourcing Industry in India has been rapidly growing since the year 1999 to 2001. The industry has been undergoing several changes since its inception. As more and more companies started shifting their focus on offshoring and business process outsourcing, the demand for quality manpower started rising at a rapid pace. The year 2001 saw a large number of companies showing interest in this sector.

Thus, the world’s largest outsourcing industry – India, suddenly found itself at the center of global attention in the year 2001, with all the major players in the industry striving hard to make it big in this lucrative market by acquiring new clients and winning a larger share of their operations to outsource.

outsourcing industry caters to both large-scale applications as well as minor projects to several leading software development companies operating all over the globe.

Outsourcing has helped carry out high-end IT tasks for a long time now. The industry has undergone many changes and has become one of the most qualitative and advanced industries. Indian companies have helped corporations across the globe in one way or another, from offering the best IT strategies to effective management of large-scale applications. At present, companies are now focusing on research and development activities, architecture, and business integration, which otherwise were considered complex work.

They are leveraging their experience in delivering their own IT services to make a mark for themselves. The outsourcing industry in India is now a target of large corporations and medium-sized companies across the world, particularly from the oil, financial, and technology sectors.

IT and software services are the fastest growing sectors in India, but outsourcing, in general, is moving beyond the services sector these days. Though businesses want to outsource to India for its low-cost, high-skill talent pool, BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) has been a more popular segment due to the lead players in that market. In fact, BPO has been growing at a rapid pace and has achieved a double-digit growth rate.

- Bhushan Bhad

2001 to present From 2001 to the present, the industry of outsourcing has changed greatly. When it came into existence, the land of opportunities, India was the main and sole destination for companies looking to outsource their tasks. In this competitive and globalized market, companies have to come up with new ideas and strategies to survive. The

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