There were a couple of highlights this last week: one was presenting a diagnostic review and recommended models of the whole of Victorian Government contact centres (40 centres) and telephone service lines – fascinating; another highlight was dinner at Fifteen in Melbourne with DiData's Craig and Jane; also brilliant was attending the CCMA lunch and seeing an excerpt from a musical playing in Melbourne called 'Call Girl The Musical'. Funny. Less funny but better looking were Joel and Simon from Salmat e-learning (previously A-frame) presenting their approach to effective education in the contact centre delivered via online applications; next highlight was watching Laurence deliver a Customer Engagement presentation this morning at the Customer Contact Conference at Luna Park that he had never seen before due to other Analyst, William, calling in sick this morning after spending all night hurling. Funny. Or, not funny.

But the greatest highlight this week is yet to come. Tomorrow at the Customer Contact Conference, Senator Fielding will be giving an opening speech on his 'anti-offshoring bill'.

This is the Family First Senator Fielding's press release (in italics) and my response:

Yes, because that's what organisations do. They casually kick jobs overseas. Ah, no, they usually spend at least 18 months doing a feasibility study and negotiating the off-shored arrangement. It is a highly strategic and well considered decision to have an off-shored operation that is treated with the gravest seriousness by Australian-based organisations. There is no booting, kicking or any other such footballing action.

<"Our proposed legislation, called the Keeping Jobs From Going Offshore Bill, will ensure Aussie call centre jobs stay in Australia rather than outsourcing them to Asia and other countries," Senator Fielding said.

Really. I wonder if Senator Fielding knows that in 2008 the attrition rate for agents was 49%, with 72% of those agents who left their contact centre leaving the industry altogether, and the cost to replace these agents is $19,000 each. Two thirds of the 260,000+ employees in this industry state that their contact centre job is not a career but a transitional job on their way to another role in another industry. Over half of Australian agents state that they find their jobs, on daily basis ... boring.

By not allowing contact centre work to go offshore, particularly the high volume low value transactions such as those the banks and telco's deal with, Australian-based businesses will have to increase premiums on services and products to pay for the high cost of labour in this country. How will that go down in a recession? Not well I would suggest. The average base wage (HR related expenditure is about 61% of the total operating budget of a contact centre) is about US$38,000 for an Australian agent compared to less than about US$6,000 for an agent in Philippines, India, China, Thailand, Vietnam or Indonesia. These savings can be passed on to Australian consumers, or can be used by the organisation to survive the GFC thereby retaining other types of employees.

And why mention 'Asia' with a critical tone Senator? Not a touch of racism is it? Or do you not know that countries such as the Philippines do a bloody good job in servicing Australian consumers, even if they are Asian.....

"We have to put a stop to the ridiculous practice of outsourcing Aussie jobs to other countries and give ordinary Australians a say on who has private information about them ..."

The word 'ridiculous' is a formal business word is it not? NO. It's the word of a person who is perhaps not schooled in the world of business. And, gosh, since the global BPO industry is worth well over AU$80 billion, then there must be a lot of ridiculous CEO's in the world. What were they thinking??

And worried about Australian's private information going overseas? Fair enough, Senator, but did you know that in many cases the private info remains in Australia and only accessed remotely by agents based overseas. It doesn't actually have to leave our sunny shores.

"..... When Australians call their bank or phone companies they want to speak to an operator who is based in Australia not someone in India or the Philippines."

Yes, perhaps, but are they willing to pay a lot more to the company they are calling in order to have an Aussie answer? And, let's face it, if organisations are stopped in sending jobs offshore then I guarantee that they will immediately investigate automating the call process and whack a speech recognition or automated IVR in place, thereby eliminating the live attendant's job anyway.

"Big business in Australia makes huge profits on the back of job cuts and it is Australian workers and families that pay the cost with the loss of local jobs."

Um, not sure Senator that big business is making huge profits right now, more like struggling to survive I would have thought.

"This legislation gives the power to outsource these jobs back to ordinary Australians."

There is nothing ordinary about Australians....;)

Clearly, I am not supportive of this Bill, however I know that Mike Meredith and the ATA are actively supportive of Senator Fielding's position, as they should be. I take the counter argument to make sure there is sensible debate in the industry about such important matters. With one-third of Australian businesses having outsourcing (on or off-shore) as one of their top 10 priorities over the next 12 months, Senator Fielding will have a difficult fight. Australia will be the top choice of locations to outsource to (which is good as we have some cracking great Aussie outsourcers such as Customcall, Salesforce and UCMS) followed by India, NZ, Philippines then Malaysia.

I know that my articles and blogs on this topic normally hit a nerve with readers, and I have been called 'unpatriotic' in the past..... ;( but please don't have an emotional response to this argument, just do ensure you think about all aspects of the Senator's proposal...;) So, our journo Simon Sharwood will be in attendance at the conference (I would love to but will be on a plane as usual) not to heckle on my behalf, but instead to draw some facts to the Senator's attention.

>Anyway, I didn't get away with only highlights this week. The lowlight of the week was this morning when 5-year old Saxon looked deeply into my eyes and said:

Saxon: "Mummy, are you old?"

Me: "Um, well, gosh ... yes.... I suppose. Why do you ask?"

Saxon: "Because your face is all squashed up"

>OMG!! Source: unknown callcentre.net your call