Stress: BPO Industry Stress Factors

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Stress: Long Working Hours

Long working hours is the greatest cause of stress for Indian call center
agents, just ahead of work timing. 39.4% of the respondents surveyed endorsed
the fact. Along with salary, both these factors, no doubt, account for the high
rate of attrition in the industry. Long hours, in itself, is a combination of
work load, call volume and travel time.

Since most BPO players are still
primarily voice-based, the workload is tremendous; add to it the increasing call
volume, as more and more outsourcing continues to happen despite threats of
backlash, plus the time involved in traveling between home and office.

Any
average agent works for 11-12 hours per day-the number goes up to 14 in case
of companies that encourage overtime.

Stress: BPO Industry Stress Factors

Percentage employees who named these as the most important reasons for workplace stress. Multi-coded responses so total will be greater than 100%

The plight of the operational heads is
worse-they regularly clock 17-18 hours per day working their shift besides
staying back for customer conference calls.

Stress: Work Timing

The second biggest cause of stress for BPO employees is unique to the Indian
industry. Many in the industry, in fact, feel that this is the root cause for
most of the malaises afflicting Indian call centers. It is indeed an irony that
the raison d'être for the success of the industry is also turning out to be
its Achilles Heel. But, since, no doubt, the geographical time difference with
the US and the UK gives Indian industry one of its biggest advantages, a
possible solution to the problem is unlikely to be found in the near future.
Even the endorsement from 38.6% of the respondents seems to be somewhat tempered
by the fact that many of the respondents were either senior non-call floor
people, or those in the day shift. While pure-play call centers like Transworks
and EXL Services were most severely afflicted, barring eFunds and iSeva to some
extent, no one in the survey seems to have tackled the issue with any measure of
success.

Stress: Workload

Some would argue that even IT services employees are burdened with
tremendous workload, so why are BPO employees complaining? The real story lies
elsewhere. True, even IT services employees work for long and odd hours, but
these are interspersed with smoke breaks, coffee breaks or plain chatting with
colleagues. Unfortunately, this is not the case in call centers, where sometimes
agents do not even get toilet breaks. Sounds draconian? But that is the business
driven reality for the Indian call center industry. Absolute freshers get a
little respite, since the first few months on the job involves a lot of training
time. Like on several other factors, eFunds is in the least affected category,
either they are close to devising a mechanism to take care of the most common
stresses, or the attrition rate is so high that most of these factors are not
accounted for.

Stress: Repetitive Nature of Work

No surprises here-it is a commonly accepted fact that the monotony of the
same kind of work in call centers can indeed be very stressful. 37.1% of the
respondents re-iterate the same in the survey. The male freshers seem to the
group particularly affected. Again, solutions are not readily available, though
measures like hiring retired personnel or housewives might be of some succor,
since these groups with more experience tend to get frustrated the least. Some
others have also devised innovative measures, like periodic job rotation, though
not much can be expected out of these in a pure call center environment. That
explains why, even in eFunds, the company least affected with this affliction,
more than 14% complained about the stress caused by the repetitive nature of the
job. It is a bit surprising to see Motif'son the most affected list,
especially given that it is located in a smaller town like Ahmedabad. Received
wisdom, that small town employees in places with limited scope do not easily get
tired even of repetitive jobs, stands questioned.

Stress: Insufficient Holidays

While this was not amongst the top 10 causes of stress in last year's
survey, this year more than 36% of the respondents complained about it. Not too
surprising, considering that most of these employees have to work on all Indian
calendar holidays. True, they enjoy holidays like July 4th and Thanksgiving, but
that is scant solace for working 12-14 hour shifts even during the festive
seasons. Of all the companies surveyed, only eFunds seems to have escaped the
brunt of this problem. To add to the woes, many companies dangle the bait of
additional incentives for working on holidays-it is initially attractive to
the freshers, but as the attraction weans, more heartburn happens.

Stress: Pressure to Perform on Metrics

This is particularly galling for the first timers-working in an
environment where every single action needs to conform to a performance
measuring metrics. This looks unlikely to go away soon, since most call centers
are keen on different standards certifications. It's no fad, but, instead, an
absolute business necessity for most companies to follow these quantifiable
business metrics to attract customers. However, not many are keen to look at the
effect this has on their employees. More than 36% point to it as one of their
major grouses-the only silver lining here is that, with experience, the stress
level goes down, and more importantly, working on such quantifiable performance
parameters helps these people later in their careers. Companies like Sykes and
Transworks, which have been going for a number of certifications this year, seem
to be the most affected.

Stress: Health Issues

Last year, when 23% pointed to health hazards as a cause of stress, we
compared the call center industry with coal miners. This time the number has
gone up to 34.5%-maybe it's time to classify call centers as an extremely
hazardous job. We have also detailed the call center related ailments
separately. Not surprisingly, people in senior managerial positions with five
plus years of experience are less affected with these illnesses. That's
perhaps because they maintain a more regular work schedule and timing. Companies
like 24/7 and ICICI OneSource, which have grown spectacularly in a short frame
of time last year, seem to be most seriously affected.

Stress: Travel Time

Most call centers are located on the outskirts of cities, and therefore most
employees spend a long time traveling to and from their offices. Again, this is
unique to the Indian industry and cannot be easily wished away. Most Indian call
centers require large manpower influxes in order to scale up and grow, and to
support such huge workforces, they need lots of real estate. And exorbitant land
prices inside cities necessitate their movement to the outskirts. Therefore, it
is not surprising that companies like Motif, located in a smaller city like
Ahmedabad, are least affected by this factor.

Stress: Call Volume/Number of Calls

While the overall workload is quite high, call volume in itself is proving
to be a major cause for stress, afflicting 26.8% of our respondents. In most
call centers, there is hardly any respite between two calls-not only is this
disconcerting, but in the case of one abusive call immediately following
another, it can be psychologically disturbing too. In addition, most agents
accept these calls under an assumed identity: constantly maintaining a false
image amidst an influx of calls afflicts all agents — both experienced ones as
well as first timers.

Stress: Overtime

Though most companies encourage overtime with incentives, for most of the
respondents (25%), this is one stress they inflict upon themselves. Especially
the first timers, who, with the goal of making more money, willingly do
overtimes, but once they are into it, the stress factor starts showing up.
Overtime, in concert with long working hours and travel time, is turning out to
be a potent combination, causing call center-related stresses. Not surprisingly,
companies like eFunds, which have high capacity utilization, seem to be not at
all affected by the overtime issue, according to our survey.

Work-related Ailments Industry Data on Call Center Ailments

Percentage employees who named these as the most important reasons for work-related ailments they suffered from. Multi-coded responses so total will be greater than 100%

Sleeping Disorders

No prizes for guessing the most severe ailment afflicting people working in
Indian call centers. Since this is a unique Indian problem, again, no solution
appears in sight. Obviously this affects first timers more severely, as they
take time to acclimatize their biological clocks, but even experienced people or
managers are not able to completely escape from it. Some call centers are
looking at devising innovative mechanisms like flexible shifts with sleeping
arrangements in the office premises as possible solutions.

Digestive System Related Disorders

Working long and odd hours without any sleep, and eating food supplied by
external caterers everyday, has led to 41.9% of the respondents suffering from
digestive problems. Especially for the large number of girls working in the
industry, the problem is even more severe. sMany call centers are now taking
additional care to ensure their caterers supply hygienic food, besides
stipulating strict conditions to maintain the quality of the food they serve.

Depression

In last year's survey, this was not among the top disorders, but this year
it has climbed up the chart, affecting nearly one-fourth of the respondents. Not
surprising, since, as the industry matures, the initial glitz and glamour wears
away and the real problems come to the fore. Not only are there several health
related issues, but, on top of that, the gradual realization that there is
limited scope in developing a career owing to fewer growth opportunities is
increasing the frustration levels. Coupled with growing mental fatigue and
increasingly punishing physical environments, depression is the obvious end
result. Some call centers have now devised different stress management programs
mainly to counter depression.

Severe Stomach Related Problems

Continuing digestive problems lead to severe stomach disorders like
gastroenteritis, as endorsed by more than 24% of the respondents. Even doctors
in major cities agree-in recent times many of the patients with various
stomach ailments are from call centers.

Eyesight Problems

Globally call center industry employees are considered a high-risk group for
eye-related problems. While the quality of monitors might impact these
disorders, sitting continually without adequate breaks seems to be the truer
reason. The number of people affected seems to be on the rise-last year only
19% complained; this year it has gone up to 23%. At some point of time, this
problem might also afflict the IT services industry, but for the call center
industry, no remedy seems to be in sight.

Ear Problems

More than 16% of the respondents inform that they have hearing problems.
Again, no surprises here, since a call center job involves taking calls
throughout the shift, sitting with headphones. While quality of headphones does
make a difference, it would not be correct to completely wish the problem away
by thinking that changing headphones will solve it.

Rajneesh De