Nasscom, BPO companies like Genpact, Dell, Cognizant and others to visit campuses to create awareness

MUMBAI: The business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, which until a few years ago had thousands of youngsters joining it, is not so cool anymore, thanks to more glamorous competitors such as startups and IT firms with high-end profiles. The National Association for Software & Services Companies, along with 11 BPO companies, now plans to confront this unpopularity head-on — college by college. The 11 firms partnering Nasscom include WNS, Genpact, Dell BPO, EXL and Cognizant BPO.

In December-January, company heads, learning and development leaders and marketing heads from the BPO sector will visit 24 colleges to explain the industry's need for data analysts, automation experts and specialists for high-skilled work. "A BPO is not just a 'call centre' job. Fifteen per cent of the workforce comprises engineering graduates, 12-15 per cent are accountants and 8 per cent are medical doctors, and this message needs to be conveyed," said KS Viswanathan, vicepresident of the initiative for the IT lobby group.

To convey this message to graduates, Nasscom is even evaluating presentations by global advertising companies to spruce up the message across social media. JWT and O&M are reported to be the two major contenders. The two agencies could not be immediately reached for comment.

According to Nasscom data, by 2020, the BPO sector will employ 2 million and analytics will become the industry's biggest driver by 2016. "No one who passes out of an engineering college wants to join the BPO industry. It's considered a 'failure' industry. It's the last option for most," said a senior marketing executive at one of India's top five BPOs. The re-branding drive aims to change this image.

To convey the shift in services, Nasscom last year decided to rename the sector as Business Process Management (BPM) and created an industry council to create ways to change public perception.

BPO companies are not just fighting with rivals such as Accenture for business, but also for talent. And the recent rise of the startup industry in India had added to the competition. Companies such as First-Source are investing in analytics startups while Hinduja Global Solutions-1.22 % is setting up a corporate venture capital fund to get access to products and talent.

The colleges shortlisted in the first phase of the exercise are based in Bangalore and Chandigarh. Later, the industry plans to rope in more institutes and even get the government to talk about its contribution, added a source. Also on the cards are analytics contests in colleges, Viswanathan said, similar to those conducted by top IT companies, to showcase the sector's need for high-end skills. Winning colleges will get multiple internship opportunities to experience work at a BPO.

"Ideally, the industry would like to be able to hire 1,000 people from these colleges," said a top executive at one of the BPO companies participating in programme. "The demand from the companies is there, but first we have to brand it so that it is attractive for the students."

Though the Indian BPO industry started with call centres, the bigger firms have been moving to higher-value services such analytics, finance & accounting, and healthcare services. In fact, in Genpact's latest conference call with analysts, the company was asked how it intended to compete with players such as Accenture. And a BPO like EXL — which has a workforce of 23,000 — employs 1,500 data scientists.

"While the industry has transformed immensely, the public perception has not. It is often considered a place for back-room and mundane tasks, which is far from true today. We want students and budding professionals to know that patents and high-end solutions are created as much in this industry (if not more) as any other!" said Keshav Murugesh, CEO of WNS Holdings. Murugesh is also the chairman of the Nasscom BPM Council.

Sandip Sen, CEO at Essar Group's BPO arm Aegis, said, "Students want to go to startups and IT companies. We want to tell them (that) we do high-end work and file for patents in this industry too." The industry is expected to post $50 billion in revenue by 2020 and nearly 60 per cent of this will come from high-end services such as analytics and finance & accounting by the end of the decade.

"Sectors can be re-branded and tying up with (an) advertising company is a good start. Industries such as IT, Indian Army have in the past done this to make a career with them desirable," said Santosh Desai, India CEO and MD of Futurebrands India and former president of McCann-Erickson. Desai added that an initiative like this will need more methods than just social media and it will take two-three years for an image makeover to work.