Kenya: Prepare for Outsourcing

The world has become one big market, and we are all customers of and suppliers to it. Outsourcing is the power behind this integration. China and India have been identified as the fastest growing economies.

They have a GNP growth rate of seven per cent and eight per cent respectively and they are predicted to overtake the US by 2050. Part of this growth has been fuelled by the migration of manufacturing to China and the outsourcing of white collar jobs to call centres and software houses in Bangalore.

Call centres have been cited as the boiler rooms for modern business as well as job creation engines that have the potential to be the single largest employer for young graduates in urban areas.

Although Kenya currently has infrastructure hurdles that stand between it and this industry, the evolution of the industry in Kenya proves we have serious intentions that call for the development of training programmes that will facilitate knowledge to support this industry.

Access to market share will require convincing anyone thinking about a call centre in Kenya that they will be able to hire staff and keep on hiring staff long after their first year in the business.

As today's boardroom debates all over the world focus on outsourcing, Kenya should be working towards convincing companies that it can offer satisfactory levels of customer care quality and telesales expertise.

We must bear in mind the fact that outsourcing the care of the businesses' most valuable assets, its customers, to an overseas customer service or telesales operation is an enormous decision that our prospective clients will have to make.

It is common knowledge that customer service representatives in countries like Kenya can read current account balances off computer screens just as efficiently as UK- or US-based agents.

What is not proven is whether we can compete as favourably for more advanced phone-based services, such as outbound telesales or inbound/outbound customer lifecycle management services. The investment that has already gone into the call centre industry in Kenya has been enormous.

It has taken time, effort and a huge amount of financial resources, including subsidies from the government, scheduled to start this month until the undersea cable is available in the region.

The industry has been identified as one of the pillars of economic growth and it is estimated to bring in over $200 million in the next six years. In preparing Kenya for the gold rush, we must seriously invest in the delivery of requisite skills that will enable human capital deal with the complex data management and human resource issues that feature in the industry.

It is widely recognised that it is easier to train people on procedures than in underlying customer service behaviours. We must guard ourselves against falling into the trap of training people what to say rather than how to say it.

Skills training will have a major impact in positioning Kenya as a preferred outsourcing destination. We must keep in mind the fact that customers will never remember what we said, but how we said it.

Excelling in managing customers is the future of this business. Various studies on the industry suggest that alongside investment in hardware, software and recruitment, improved spending on training at all levels could yield significant benefits. Training needs to focus on providing a superior customer service that exceeds expectations always.

Ongoing training will be required to go beyond simple call handling, product knowledge and IT systems. There is need to pay equal attention to soft skills training in areas such as assertiveness, anger and stress management, self-esteem building and effective listening.

Predicted growth projections in the industry will also require multi-skilled agents who will not only handle a standard set of calls but also respond to emails, help customers navigate websites besides dealing with a host other customer requests.

These require developed customer engagement that will allow us to participate competitively in a dynamic global business environment. We need to get busy producing and preparing employees with the right mix of skills for contact centres.

We should also be quick to learn from the challenges our predecessors in the West have encountered, and specifically high turnover. We must be cautious that we do not assimilate newly trained agents into the call centres much like showing new swimmers the trick , handing them instruction manuals, and then sending them to their first race.

Against this background, there is need for transition training and coaching. This will ensure that new agents gain the right momentum to successfully stay the course and ensure Kenya gets a sizeable share of the gold.