In America right now, we're facing economic fears and the looming idea of a recession.
There's been a lot of talk about the outsourcing of American jobs by the media and the political world. When candidates talk about outsourcing, they are typically referring to offshoring, but not the outsourcing industry that employs Americans. How come there hasn't been any talk of homesourcing?
It's a legitimate question. We're thinking it could be sheer ignorance... Homeshoring seems to be talked about more on the web, mostly in terms of the capabilities of VOIP technology and social media. Homeshoring companies use forums, chat rooms, webinars, and some other "fancy" stuff to connect their employees to a job online.
If you think about it, it's really amazing and hard to imagine that this could be the future of call centers. It's a fantastic solution for turnover rates in the customer service industry - something that brings consumers to spend more money. Customer service workers that don't have to succumb to the strange dynamics of a call center are a lot less grumpy. If you've ever worked for a traditional call center, you'll know what I'm talking about.
I worked at a call center when I was 20 years old, in one of those "get in a line" cubicles, where you shared headsets with an anonymous night crew member. We had to have log out of our computers on timed bathroom breaks. We were monitored all the time. We got yelled at by people on the phone all day, and we did the best we could to fix their problems - or sell them something. And our company meetings? They handed out prizes --- which was pretty much the best part of the job. We were eligible for raffles if we bothered to show up for the monthly team meeting. People quit all the time, and moved on to another company that we heard didn't "suck as bad". Customer service is a stressful industry. (And for a while, I took 240+ calls a day, and won a prize for it... A piece of paper with my name... 5+ ratings... Whoo-hoo!)
The actual setup of a call center is demeaning, at least depending on the pay. No offense to the customer service industry - but sometimes you feel like a caged animal in a mill. I always had a cold or the flu, just like my coworkers due to the shared headsets. There was always leftover coffee in the breakroom from some other shift. (You'd forget that it had been sitting there for 8 hours.) The call center crew was an interesting mix of people - we all had different reasons for working there. For the younger ones of us, the pay was good. But the truth was that a lot of people had kids, and child support, and few skills...or someone in their family they had to care for. Some people were alcoholics. Some people had to go to school at night and work all day. We even had a few people that were in the US on school visas to learn IT skills - and take them home to Pakistan.
We all stayed because we needed the money. Many of us were miserable at work. And misery spread easily when raises were halted (yup, telecom industry recession) and work reviews meant nothing. We complained a lot to eachother in the bathrooms. We provided lousy service sometimes. I knew somebody who pretended that I was the supervisor so we didn't have to escalate calls and possibly get in trouble. We had a system to know if we were being monitored and we got away with a lot more. We were all also busy writing our resumes and praying to work for these new internet companies - AOL was hiring smart people who were stuck in cruddy jobs and paying a lot more money. Northern Virginia was booming with jobs that people had never heard of - "forum managers" and and some of us had skills enough to pursue them. The web industry was booming.
Well, now it seems the telecom industry has caught up with the internet. They have their own technology to improve relationships with customers and make more money for corporate America. They're employing people who need jobs -- and learning how to treat them well. Sure, the pay itsn't the greatest, but the rewards are sound. Telecommuting give people more time with their families, reduces CO2 emissions, and improves employee loyalty. Many people that work for companies like Alpine Access and LiveOps sing their praises. (And yes, others have some valid complaints...Such as the instability of getting paid per call, rather than per hour.)
Homeshoring is a real economic trend that our Presidential candidates should be embracing -- and creating ways to encourage. If larger companies continue to follow the trend, it will actually help our environment, help moms and dads spend time with their families, and give caregivers and the disabled some added relief. It keeps jobs in the US and puts money in people's pockets that don't always have the ability to make money.
