PeopleSupport Likes Manila’s Americanized Workforce
LOS ANGELES– PeopleSupport, Inc., an e-customer relationship management provider, says
it has been able to continually streamline costs by moving some of its operations
overseas. But, they say, they had to find an Americanized culture and did so
in Manila, Philippines.
According to PeopleSupport CEO, Lance Rosenzweig, “As we have expanded our
service offering in the past year, we have also made important moves to keep
our costs in line. One has been to expand our offshore operation in Manila.
In the past year, PeopleSupport has made significant investments in database
technology with Siebel to make certain that our customers have the choice to
be at the leading edge of eCRM.”
But, beyond watching the bottom line, PeopleSupport says they had to address
cultural, geographical and political issues as well. According to Rosenzweig,
“Our choices were limited in finding the right offshore location. Our eReps
understand American English and are university educated. Manila was one of
the few places that met that requirement.”
It’s not unusual for tech companies to go offshore, but PeopleSupport says most of those moves
are for systems development and IT support. The company says that, for these types of
operations, having an American culture is not as acute an issue as it is with CRM
management.
“Our business is technology driven, but it comes down to people relating to
people,” Rosenzweig added. “Our eReps need to understand the American consumer and
business. An instant message chat requires instant knowledge about how to solve a
customer’s issue in Internet time American style. We found that Manila is
the place for that.”
“Our geographical considerations were not as tough a challenge because we
have technical and staffing redundancy between our two main customer service
centers in Manila and St. Louis. Additionally, we have generators at each
location that can keep us up-and-running for up to 30 days. Our service
centers are virtually interchangeable. As far as the political climate,
Manila has welcomed us with open arms as we have created jobs and
opportunities in the region. We have an incredibly enthusiastic workforce
there,” he said.
PeopleSupport says they expect to create dozens of jobs in Manila in the coming year.