My Summer at an Indian Call Center

Son

This is an interesting read of how call centres work in India. I have personally have experience of setting these up in a variety of countries such as USA, Canada, uk, Poland, Egypt, Malaysia, India, Sri Lanka, Philippines etc etc. this behaviour that the author describes is quite common across the world. It's not just in India. 

The kids who get here and work are starting their careers. And they have an hunger, son, which is sort of humbling to see. The job is sort of thankless, to sort out your phone issues, to sell you insurance or time share holidays or or or. But these things keep on happening. 

With the increase in globalisation and connectivity, we don't see the man who is delivering our services and that is a bit of a shame as we lose touch with an important part of the value chain. But as a person interested in economics and management, remember that these people are the face of the companies to our customers. Never forget them and pay extra special attention to them, they are very very important. 

Love

Baba

My Summer at an Indian Call Center
http://m.motherjones.com/politics/2011/05/indian-call-center-americanization

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My Summer at an Indian Call Center

Lessons learned: Americans are hotheads, Australians are drunks—and never say where you’re calling from. Read the story everyone’s talking about.

By Andrew Marantz on Tue. July 5, 2011 2:00 AM PDT

“We were asked to hate everything Indian,” said 26-year-old Arnab (shown in his Delhi flat). Photographs: Sanjit Das/Panos

I stand flush against the window of a Toyota showroom, trying to stay in a shrinking sliver of shade. We’re on the cusp of midday, which, in Delhi in June, lasts most of the day and drives everyone into a languid torpor. I am waiting for a company cab, now an hour and a half late, to drive me across town to a call center, where an Indian “culture trainer” will teach me how to act Australian.

A uniformed guard next to me dozes on a stool, his rifle slumped in his lap. Behind the showroom window, which would be clear if two boys would stop rubbing it down with rags, a dozen red sedans glisten on a waxy white floor. On the dirt shoulder of the road, children hold hands as they walk to school.

Call centers don’t trust Indian infrastructure, as well they shouldn’t, so the company cab—typically a white Toyota Qualis—has become a standard industry perk. This morning a class of 24 new hires, myself included, will be ferried from all corners of the city to the offices of a small firm named Delhi Call Centre. For three weeks, a culture trainer will teach us conversational skills, Australian pop culture, and the terms of the mobile-phone contracts we’ll be peddling. Those of us who pass the training course will graduate to the calling floor. Our first job at DCC will be to interrupt Australians at dinner and ask them to switch phone providers. In the Delhi area alone, maybe 100,000 call-center agents make their living selling vitamins to Britons or helping Americans troubleshoot their printers. I am almost certainly the only one who acquired his conversational skills accidentally—by being born in the United States.

My phone vibrates. By the time I get it to my ear, a husky male voice is shouting in Hinglish, a rapid-fire blend of Hindi and English. “Meet at Toyota showroom!” I shout back.

“Fine sir, 20 minutes,” he replies.

I know “20 minutes” is a Hinglish phrase meaning “30 minutes,” so I call back after 40. A woman answers this time. “No problem, sir,” she says, “20 minutes only.” A sweat-and-sunblock solution drips down my forehead and stings my eyes. Behind me, the boys continue toweling the glass. The streaks they create blur into the streaks they wipe away.

More progress at SIFE

The chaps at LSE SIFE are quite ambitious, I love that. This trading game project is really catching fire. They went and sold it to a Malaysian University SIFE unit and they are spreading the word there. More about that later as my hopes to help them in Malaysia needs a bit of digging first.

Second, am going to go speak to the new SIFE recruits and get them all excited motivated. Plus if things work out, I will run investment classes for the volunteers. Teach these undergraduate students how to invest. I wonder if I can replicate what I did with Kannu with them?

Third, there seems to be very good progress with the Transformation Trust and extending the trading game to other schools in London. Watch this space.

The lady who introduced me to the Transformation Trust, Annie Natarajan, has managed to rope me into another initiative. lol, as a member of their advisory board. That’s also quite exciting, to help schools across the world to share best practises. I just got involved briefly in the initial proposals and Annie tells me that we have already got the first donation. Well done. The pilot will be touching some schools in India, Kenya and Brazil. Cant wait to get motoring on that.

Fourth, SIFE Nottingham is working on a pilot project with IT4CH with Pat. They are also pretty aggressive, they are trying to work to getting more donations of computers into our storage offices which we can then sell to get funds to purchase equipment for hospital schools and poor sick children at home.

Fifth, SIFE Nottingham has decided to do a project in Sri Lanka. Here’s the blurb on the email that they sent:

A group of 13 SIFE Nottingham students returned from Sri Lanka 4 weeks ago. To summarise our project, Future for Jaffna is a charitable organisation established under a trust deed. We aim to empower widows of the civil war in North Sri Lanka to create their own businesses, ranging from food processing to sewing and tailoring businesses. The ultimate aim is to establish a community and entrepreneurial/business centre in Jaffna, where the widows can sell their products, and where people can receive help in setting up their own business. Finally, we are looking into an environmental sub-project, mobilising rural communities through the production of biofuels.
We are partnering with a local charity, CORD Sri Lanka who monitor livelihood projects with widows. Their widows receive funding via a rigid scheme from the Bank of Ceylon; we do have more specific details on this scheme.
We require funding for the business start-ups for Future for Jaffna to be successful. This may be via a local bank, offering an independent finance scheme, or through raising funds through sponsorship and donations, and setting up a microfinance scheme. A key objective for us is to raise £5,000, at which point we will meet the £5,000 income requirement for registration by the Charity Commission, opening the floodgates to funding opportunities.

So I have got them hooked up with some of my colleagues in Sri Lanka. I think this should be a good thing to help push forward. Still under discussion on how exactly the firm can help them but broadly, i think we could provide advisory services to these poor ladies. I didn't know we were the only international firm operating there. Good stuff, makes me proud to work for such a nice firm.

I love September, after the hiatus of the Summer, its good to get back in track.

The Indian Schindler

We all have heard about the Schindler List, a movie which talks about Oskar Schindler who saves thousands of Jews from the concentration camps. But not many people know the history of India taking in refugees. The land has a very long history of welcoming persecuted people from other lands and giving them succour. Think back about the Parsi’s or the Zoroastrians who fled the fanatical Muslim invaders who had invaded Iran. They settled in India and are now one of the most advanced components of Indian society. The second example are the Tibetans who with Dalai Lama, escaped from Tibet and settled in India. The next example is that of the Sri Lankan Tamils who escaped the civil war in Sri Lanka and then settled back in Tamil Nadu. Another example are the Bengalis who escaped the genocide and persecution of the Pakistani’s and settled in India. India also offered Palestinian and Afghanistan leaders a safe place and many leaders and their family know India as a safe place to live and raise their kids. Hamid Karzai, the current Afghan President studied and lives in India for a long period of time.

But I did not know about Sassoons. The Sassoon family and the Prime Minister of Cochin state (now Kerala) offered to harbour Jewish Refugees. So at a time that USA and UK were actively stopping the relief of Jews who were desperately trying to escape the Nazi’s, a small corner of India was welcoming them with open arms. Here are some references. Incidentally, some Indian Jews in North East India are claiming to be Jews and are emigrating to Israel. Now that the Church, bloody hypocritically, is whining about losing adherents. When the shoe is on the other foot and all that.

Anyway, found this quite interesting about how India welcomed refugees.

Some refugees are more equal than others

So we have the United Nations, supposedly the saviour of all the refugees all over the world, being upset with the Sri Lankans about the Tamil Refugee Camp. It says that it cannot indefinitely fund the refugee camp. On the other hand, the UNRWA camps have been running merrily for 60 years now. Whether the fault lies with the donor countries or with that giant bureaucracy called as United Nations is an argument for another time, but no doubt that some refugees are more worthy of help compared to others, no? Mind you, some people like keeping the Palestinians as refugees, but that’s another argument.

Also see this data table, quite an interesting way of looking at how refugee populations have shifted and moved around.

nice equality there, old chap.

Sri Lanka and the left

And good question. I quote:

Credit to Andy Newman of Socialist Unity for stating the obvious:

Recent report of war casualties in Sri Llanka suggest that the scale of killing is now much worse than we saw in Gaza at the beginning of this year.

To which the commenter logan responds:

I was on a bus yesterday, late afternoon, going past the HofP and saw large numbers of Tamils, but no banners from the left. If this is worse than Gaza why isn’t there a mass mobilisation?

Now you see why the Gaza/Israeli/Palestinian support leaves me cold and them open to accusations to anti-Semitism? Its not just the left. No British teacher association protests, nobody from the journalists association moaning, no lawyer associations pounding the desks. Nothing. Result? Clear and open anti Semitism. The various Muslim Association protests are also the same because more Muslims are killed in Sudan and nary a peep, but that is pretty obvious and the fact that they want to stand up when others kill them and sit when their own kill their own is understandable, they are religiously driven. But nothing explains the behaviour of the British political establishment other than pure and simple Anti Semitism.

Also see the comments, fascinating to see the guys trying to defend this indefensible position.

Actual video of a female suicide bomber!

Holy Moly!

Check out this video!

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!

Actual video of a female suicide bomber!

Holy Moly!

Check out this video!


All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!

An unholy mixture brewing in Sri Lanka with links to London

An innocous news item caught my eye today morning. The Tamils are complaining that the Sri Lankans are tying up with the Iranians to push for Islamist separatism in the east of country. Now that's mindboggling, tamils against tamils against buddhists against islamists and then a London dimension to it.

But remember the accusations of London being Londonistan? Well, I wonder who gives approval for all these various ethnic conflicts to have a home in London? And why on earth is this continuing despite learning the dangers of pandering to people like this? Both Tamils and Islamists, kick them out.

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!!!

Faith and Reason collide - the Ram Setu in India

A funny one (with due apologies for people who do not know the current situation with Ram Setu in India, here, here and here and here is a bit of a background!)

A BRIDGE TOO FAR!
Lord surveyed the Ram Setu and said "Hanuman, how diligently and strenuously you and your vanara sena had built this ridge several centuries back. It is remarkable that it has withstood the ravages of the climatic and geographical changes over centuries. It is indeed an amazing feat especially   considering the fact that a bridge at Hyderabad built by Gammon using latest technology collapsed the other day even before they could stick the posters on its pillars."

Hanuman with all humility spoke "Jai Sri Ram, it is all because of your grace. We just scribbled your name on the bricks and threw them in the sea and they held. No steel from TISCO or cement from Ambuja  or ACC was ever used. But Lord, why rake up the old issue now."

Ram spoke "Well, Hanuman some people down there want to demolish the bridge and construct a canal. The contract involves lot of money and lot of money will be made. They will make money on demolition and make more money on construction. "

Hanuman humbly bowed down and said "Why not we go down and present our case ? "

Ram said "Times have changed since we were down there. They will ask us to submit age proof and we don't have either a birth certificate or school leaving certificate. We traveled mainly on foot and  some times in bullock carts and so we don't have a driving license either. As far as the address proof is concerned the fact that I was born at Ayodhya is itself under litigation for over half a century, If I go in a traditional attire with

bow and arrow, the ordinary folks may recognize me but Arjun Singh may take me to be some tribal and, at the most, offer a seat at IIT under the reserved category. Also, a God cannot walk in dressed in a three-piece suit and announce his arrival. It would make even the devotees suspicious. So it is dilemma so to say." "I can vouch for you by saying that I personally built the bridge."

"My dear, Anjani putra, it will not work. They will ask you to produce the lay-out plan, the project  details, including financial outlay and how the project cost was met and the completion certificate. Nothing is accepted without documentary evidence in India . You may cough but unless a doctor certifies it, you have no cough. A pensioner may present himself personally but the authorities do not take it as proof. He has to produce a life-certificate to prove that he is alive. It is that complicated."

"Lord can't understand these historians. Over the years you have given darshan once every hundred years to saints like Surdas, Tulsidas, Saint Thyagaraja, Jayadeva, Bhadrachala Ramdas and even Sant Tukaram and still they disbelieve your existence and say Ramayana is a myth. The only option, I see, is to re-enact Ramayana on earth and set the government records straight once for all."

Lord smiled "It isn't that easy today. Ravan is apprehensive that he may look like a saint in front of Karunanidhi. I also spoke to his mama Mareecha, who appeared as a golden deer to tempt Sita maiyya when I was in the forest and he said that he won't take a chance of stepping on earth as long as Salman Khan is around."

Technorati Tags: India , Secularism , Hinduism , Sri Lanka

'Why no memorial for the IPKF in India?' (Two decades of Indo-Sri Lanka accord)

'Why no memorial for the IPKF in India?' (Two decades of Indo-Sri Lanka accord) - Yahoo! India News

Leaving aside the politics of the situation, the main reason behind why there is no memorial to the IPKF in India is because that was the first time that Indian forces were defeated very publicly. But some lessons were learnt from that disaster and the indian anti insurgency training and results in the North East, Kashmir and Punjab reflects that. I believe that that people forgot how to fight in tropical jungles, and this was after Malaya, Vietnam, Laos, and the other examples in Central America.

It is also important for UN Peacekeeping and Peace enforcement missions to know how easily it is to slip from peacekeeping missions to peace-enforcement. And because peace keeping operations are so lightly equipped as well as tied up in knots with very specific rules of engagement, they find it extraordinarily difficult to switch and frequently fall over. But this operation was the classic everything went wrong operation. I would say that the only saving grace is that the Indian forces withdrew with 1155 casualties, a very expensive mistake. But it still didn't learn the lessons and had to relearn the lessons in Kargil. Also see here for a good overview.

Update: 29/July/2007: A heart rending story follows of the Kargil war.