subject: Protectionist Measures towards BPO [print this page] The outsourcing of BPO work to offshore destinations is the eye of a political storm in America. There is a raging debate over the protectionist measures that President Barack Obama wants to initiate so that he can curb down the tide of call center jobs moving away to the foreign shores. However, his vision of how things should be done turned out to be flawed. When he and his party tried to push the anti-offshore outsourcing bill in the Senate, it was scaled down by a majority vote. The motion fell a few votes short, implying that the question of outsourcing telemarketing services to the offshore destinations was a close call. In such matters, you cannot help but think that the country is divided into two: those who want the industry to carry on as it is and those who want to bring back the jobs back to domestic BPO service units. There is no definite answer or solution. Let's look at the questions from both sides.
President Barack Obama got it right when he felt that the only way American call centers can get back those outsourcing jobs was by pulling the plug on offshore destinations. He knows, like his predecessors, that the expensive call center services of USA cannot compete with those of units working out of India or the Philippines in terms of prices. However, as much as he may want the business community to back his vision, their bottom lines matter more to them. And when thinking on those lines, they cannot help but think about the price of telemarketing services. They are wary about adding too much on the expenditure side of the ledger. That is exactly what is going to happen when they are forced to use the domestic call center units to get their work done.
The Obama administration wants the companies neck-deep in outsourcing to curtail their projects and bring them back to the shores of USA. They are talking about imposing taxes on the companies who use offshore call centers to get their work done. Government agencies have been asked not to use offshore BPO units for their use. The administration is also discouraging skilled workers from coming to the country for work. Foreign ministries have been cautioned not to grant visas that may threaten the population of skilled foreign workers in the country to shoot up. Such protectionist measures are harming the image of America as a world leader when it comes to jobs and career opportunities.
From the perspective of the BPO sector, the measures of the Obama administration are not feasible and will not really go on to make many dents in the profit. Companies are wary about touching anything that does not smack of profit. Pulling back their telemarketing work, or abandoning their captive BPO service centers, is beyond their comprehension in an economy that is just on the path of recovery. No company would like to make investments that don't add to their profit graph. The Obama administration might as well look at other options on the table.
