OK, I used to work for a telecom-GSM company here in the Philippines. I was a system administrator for quite some time under the network quality department which specializes in putting up and optimizing cellular phone sites. In our pool, there were 12 contractual engineers who were outsourced from agency staffing/recruiting firms also situated in the Philippines. What these individuals did was survey possible cell site locations. They worked without benefits for short. Just the pay. They earned roughly 20,000.00 philippine pesos or $400.00 a month (which is a par amount of salary by Philippine standards). Everyday, they get exposed to hazards like, probable accidents (because they go to regions where there are rebel forces), microwave radiation (emitted by cell sites) and they don't get no travel and safety insurance, medical benefits and alike. That is one disadvantage. A company does save up a lot of money, but basically don't take care of their people, because come to think of it, those aren't their people at all. They were merely hired from staffing/recruitment companies. Of course those types of companies (i mean the staffing/recruiting) also don't want to spend on employee benefits. In a sense, they do give par to high salary for their employees to work for their clients, but don't actually take care of their people.
Another instance I should stress on is that employees who are outsourced, don't feel at home with the company they're assigned to. They have this "bias" mindset that they have no favor from the management of the company they were assigned to.
Quality wise, at first, outsourced employees work hard. They work hard primarily to get the attention of their client company. Like "hello i'm here, i work hard, please make me a mainstay in this company" but when they've been working for years without getting absorbed by the client company, the Q-level starts going down. Instead of concentrating on the job they're supposed to do, they slack off and wait for their contracts to end. Especially when the client's management starts hiring headcount, preferring new entrands rather than absorbing them and the experience they garnered and familiarity with the company.
Touching on the tech-support-call-center phenomenon in India and the Philippines, all I see is a fast turn-around in recruitment. Here and India, (where time zones are like 12 hours ahead of the states) people have to adjust their sleeping habits to support the products of the west. Because usually, tech-call-centers perform support for the Americas and Europe. This posses an issue with sleep. Tech's easily get tired cause they sleep in the day, and stay up during the evening.
It would be frustrating. I'm glad I never applied for any outsourcing companies in the past. Because I had compatriots who did, and were quick in jumping from job to job.
But I still feel that outsourcing is a need of companies now-a-days because of budget constraints and other reasons I mentioned in my first reply.
Hope this helps
Robert Andrew G. Pangilinan
Business Analyst/Consultant
Philam Systems, Inc. - AIG Group of Companies
