Soft Skills

Lessons for young BPO bosses

As BPO companies begin to leverage the stability and dependability of senior citizens by recruiting them for service functions, they need to sensitise the young bosses of these older employees, says Manjiri Gokhale Kalghatgi.

New age service companies want to hire the growing band of 50+ professionals who are raring to embark on the second innings of their working life. But ask the team leader in her early twenties who is assigned the task of mentoring “auntie” or the teenager who is asked to rush to “uncle’s” aid whenever he clicks the wrong button—are they ready for it?

Faced with high attrition rates due to a skilled but restless workforce ready to jump jobs at the slightest opportunity, BPO companies opened their doors to retired professionals and housewives. Advertisements for ‘alternate profiles,’ and attractive employee referral programmes inviting employees to bring in their parents gathered momentum. The right skills—a good command over the English language, diction, and a fair understanding of basic concepts of finance—were tested for. Having passed out with flying colours in the skills tests, an eager, sincere force of 50+ employees set off to work.

But there was trouble at the entry gate itself. They were made to wait in long queues alongside chattering teenagers, sit through training programmes designed for inexperienced youngsters, and thrown into a sea of jargon and a job that seemed like child’s play to the computer-savvy Generation Next.

Imagine the plight of the young manager used to getting work done from a bunch of perky but efficient youngsters. A typical work-shift (day or night) begins with the shift manager yelling out, “Log-in guys!”

The command ensures that even the most truant of the team members is suitably reprimanded into compliance. The team starts clicking away. Pappinder transforms into Paul, and Geetanjali’s Gujarati accent is shed for a Yankee twang. But auntie in the team is still looking lost. Beads of sweat form on her forehead. Frowning in deep concentration, she has attempted to log-in for the third time. She asks the boy seated next to her for help.

“You must’ve forgotten your password,” he snaps, his eyes glued to his screen. He’s recorded the highest utilisation on the floor for two consecutive months, and he is not about to miss the roll of honour at the next Rewards ceremony for some auntie next door.

“No, I haven’t forgotten my password. I wrote it down,” says the auntie, chec-king the meticulous notes in her writing pad. Finally, Mr Manager strides over to check what the problem is.

“The Caps Lock on your keyboard was on. Passwords are case sensitive in order to ensure the highest levels of security,” he explains. The auntie gives him a sheepish smile, promptly writing down in her notebook: ‘Caps Lock Should Not Be On.’ The manager walks away, resenting the extra effort he spends every evening on this resource.

A few rows away from this workstation, a retired college professor has a Do It Yourself book on Microsoft Excel open and is trying to teach himself to add figures in a worksheet.

“You don’t need all this,” quips his young lady boss. “We’ll give you something easier to do.” Just a few minutes more and the professor knows he would have been able to crack it. But in a world driven by resource utilisation figures and stringent productivity checks, there is no time for what his lady manager calls “Pointless R&D’s.” Fifty-plus is an age at which you expect to get unconditional respect from peers and

especially those young enough to be your children. But the reversal of roles and in-demand skill-sets have given a new dimension to the ‘alternate profile’ practice. But does this mean that BPO firms slacken targets and deadlines in order to factor in the lower performance of its older employees? Or should young managers be told to overlook errors that creep in when an older employee works?

A proactive effort on the part of companies to sensitise the young workforce could make all the difference. Even as companies invest in training young leaders as well as team members in areas like effective communication, leadership skills and time management, sensitisation training in diversity at the workplace will be welcome.

A team leader or a colleague dealing with an older team member need not be soft on the person in order to be sensitive because this will only result in antagonising other team members and isolating this person. However, patience with tasks that the young computer-savvy generation takes for granted, and just 10 minutes of extra guidance—before or after the work shift begins—could result in a greater degree of comfort.

In the long run, this senior is the team member who will never resent your authority and may turn out to be your most dependable and efficient resource.

Kalghatgi heads HR at Zensar BPO