Remember the first time you had questions about your computer, and your customer service call was forwarded to India? Well, now it's your mortgage.
"Since opening this office in 2003, our Wall Street clientele has grown from zero to 50," says Scott McCartney, co-head of business development, knowledge services for the New York City office of Adventity, an Indian-based provider of knowledge process outsourcing for the financial industry. Called "KPO," this business trend differs from the average offshore call center in that it requires specialized—or "knowledge"—skills. KPO centers are used by investment banks with global reach, like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, Lehman Brothers, Credit Suisse, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase & Co., and UBS. The firms frequently outsource functions such as credit checks, numbers-crunching, and other financial research to back offices and service centers in India, Mexico, the Philippines, and, soon, to China and Eastern Europe.
Successful Meetings interviewed the top experts in Indian financial meetings. Here's a look at this fast-growing sector—and how U.S.-based planners can get in on the game.
Big-Time Growth
"The financial sector has been the frontrunner, along with IT, in business process outsourcing," says Manu Tandon, senior manager of marketing for Equinox Corporation, an Irvine, CA-based firm that specializes in business process outsourcing (BPO) call center services. "Today, more than half of the revenues in BPO come from the financial domain, which would include retail banking, insurance, financial services, mortgage, capital markets, asset management companies—the financial sector is definitely growing faster than any other vertical market." In India alone, the KPO industry is expected to grow 45 percent each year until 2010, according to NASSCOM (National Association of Software & Service Companies), which operates an annual international leadership forum that was held this past February in Mumbai and regularly attracts banking and financial organizations like Citigroup Global Services and NASDAQ as sponsors. "Especially on the KPO side, the financial sector would be the driver," Tandon concludes.
"Oh yes, big time," comments Siva Namasivayam, head of BPO - Americas for MphasiS, an EDS Company, which specializes in the world's leading retail banks. Last year, EDS, the TX-based pioneer in IT outsourcing, merged with MphasiS, a Bangalore-based BPO services company with 12,000 employees—11,000 of whom are based in India.
What's the Difference?
But corporate planners setting up stateside meetings for their executives may not recognize how KPO offshore meetings differ from business as usual. McCartney, who counts meeting planning as part of his job, says standard Adventity meetings comprise face-to-face strategic meetings and tele- and Web conferences that patch in clients and offshore centers: "We have a lot of meetings in New York and London. And if we're displaying a product like a Web-based database, we'll use WebEx to demonstrate functionality and use to the client. Mostly, it's conference calling, although some clients prefer to videoconference."
"Clients go through a proposal process," says Namasivayam. "They sometimes engage a consultant to evaluate the various service programs. They send out a proposal, and then there are budget meetings. These meetings are set up by the consultant or sometimes by the company, and they take place in the corporate offices of the client, or sometimes by phone." Tandon agrees: "Once a prospect shows interest, you take them to your destination and show them the facility, the IT infrastructure, and the people who will work on their process. It gives them a mix of on-site and offshore briefings."
If the site inspection took place in the U.S., one could simply take a plane and come back. But for an offshore KPO center? "People don't do business with India without visiting," says Namasivayam. "And they send delegations—sometimes going to multiple countries including India—on a two-week trip, where they do due diligence. And they expect to be taken care of."
Which, on the subcontinent, admits Namasivayam, is a challenge. "Usually, a group of six to 10 people have traveled for up to 20 hours [to a place where] hotels are always not available, because of the huge demand. And not just for one city—they go to multiple cities." Factor in ground transportation—and food: "Some people don't like spicy food," he notes. "They like continental food, American food. Diet is something that they worry about."
Other challenges, from the stateside perspective, might include coping with the absence of management—from the CEO level on down—during the inspection period. Nonetheless, Namasivayam believes that the KPO startup cycle may provide opportunities for planners, "if they can come up with the very specialized packaging necessary for this type of market."
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Training Through Channel Surfing
U.S.-based planners might also find themselves involved in setting up the cross-cultural training that helps both clients and contractors avoid embarrassing misunderstandings. According to Neil Payne, proprietor of U.K.-based trainer, Kwintessential, "A lot of banks and financial institutions are slowly outsourcing more of their functions, such as IT, accounting, etc." Currently, the financial sector accounts for 10 percent of Kwintessential's business, with India accounting for 15 percent overall. He adds, "Finance is probably the sector that will see a lot of growth in the next five years."
Adventity's Scott McCartney says his company's acculturization training is fairly standard: "One hundred percent of our employees speak English, but some of them come from regions where the accent is stronger. Our voice training includes 'accent neutralization' and 'nuances of language.' We also use some basic cultural training, such as 'what it's like to work on Wall Street.' "
When it comes to cross-cultural training, however, some of the most impactful programs for Indians come from . . . Hollywood. "A lot of our employees get exposed to Western culture through TV and media," says MphasiS' Siva Namasivayam. "Some cities, like Bangalore, are really cosmopolitan; a lot of foreigners live there." MphasiS and other KPO providers also organize cultural programs for visiting clients. "We provide dances and other cultural opportunities to open their awareness to India. [Clients] love to know more about the country and the people; some even visit local places where people live. For most of them, it's a new country, a new experience. They want to get a taste of it."
The cultural divide may be closing, but it's still there—at least where U.S. visitors are concerned. Steve Kropper, writing for Mortgage Banking magazine (June 2005), notes: "American visitors playfully might be shown 'where we park our elephants while we work.' "