PH’s Web-based Hiring Increased by 6% Last June; BPO Industry Still Facing Talent Shortage

Philippines’ web-based recruitment efforts have increased by 6% last June, as compared to the same period last year. Growth industries’ leverage is seen to catalyze the country’s booming economy.
As per Monster.com’s (Asia Pacific and the Middle East) managing director, Sanjay Modi, the country’s economy has gone through an upward trend for quite some time now, and is showing no signs of slowing down. As a matter of fact, Moody’s Investor rating is seeing the positive economic performance to continue in the coming months, mainly due to the country’s vigorous private consumption, and robust business process outsourcing (BPO) sector.
“Manufacturing, BPO and agricultural sectors are likely to be the key driving forces behind the Philippines’s booming economy, in line with the country’s nation reform plans,” Modi added.
As stated in Monster Employment Index (MEI)’s latest report, BPO and information technology-enabled services (BPO/ITES) sectors remain unstoppable and still considered as the country’s top employment provider for June this year, having 132 online job placements, 18% higher than the previous year’s.
While the figure is higher than that of the previous year, this is 12% lower compared to 30% YOY boost in this sector as per the May report.
Presently, BPO sector has a manpower of 1.2 million. Information Technology–Business Process Association of the Philippines (IT-BPAP) expects this figure to grow by 1.8 million by 2022.
Philippines is one of the world’s top outsourcing destination for call centers, graphic design, web and software development, and other business processes but is having a hard time to fill more technical and management jobs, and to some extent, entry level ones. Talent shortage isn’t news in the BPO market, the country has been dealing with this since 2013.
Despite having a lot of job openings, Lucena City-based business process outsourcing company, Coefficients, is struggling to have talents to fill their job posts. In an effort to fill the posts and serve the clients, the company started to relay the contracts to their NCR-based partners, one of which is Marseri, a Marikina-based startup.
Coefficients’ booming demand surpasses the supply of local qualified applicants. Factor in Quezon Province is still fairly new in the BPO landscape makes it understandable for Coefficients to find competent talents. The company is having so much success that clients turning over more work, most of which require certain skill sets that are not easy to find.
“What is stopping us from growing faster is that our skills and competences have to develop faster to meet the global demand,” former IT-Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) president, Jose Mari Mercado stated.
“You can’t just say you will hire a middle manager with five years of experience. There are very few people (like that). Definitely it is part of growing pains,” Mercado added.
As per the former President, the industry group along with the government and academic institutions is working to develop educational programs to produce competent graduates to meet the job demand. In addition, he stated that the government and industry are working to expand the employment pool by setting up more BPO centers outside Metro Manila, which now comprises 72% of all companies.
Philippines’ IT-BPO industry is looking good, and is going through an upward trajectory despite the socio-political issues going on and the war in the south. Investors remain optimistic and are confident that the country’s manpower can efficiently serve their business needs. It will only be a matter of time till the Philippines serve the investors’ demands and possibly become the world’s top outsourcing provider.