Cost is Not the Only Factor for Call Center Operations in Middle East

Organizers behind an upcoming conference on call centers in the Middle East are detecting some key trends that are being found in the region’s call center market.

Dominick Keenaghan, president of Insights, said the market in the Middle East is seeing two types of new outsourcing service providers (OSPs). Many are local businesses without extensive experience. Also, there are regional offices of overseas firms in the market, which have experience in places other than the Middle East but don’t have experience in that region.

Keenaghan said that many of the regional organization promote the benefits of saving money, but he says there is more to consider with contact centers.

"The more successful relationships and the ones that endure are where a company lacks a particular competency that the Outsourcer can provide, e.g. outbound sales skills," stated, Keenaghan in a statement reported by Customer ME. "In these cases the outsourcer provides unique value in the arrangement and both parties benefit."

"Contracts that are solely cost driven often mean that the outsourcer doesn't necessarily recruit staff of a sufficiently high caliber and tends to run the operation by the numbers,” he added in the article. “Invariably as these numbers run up against normal human tendencies, this results in a stressful working environment, and subsequently high agent absence and attrition rates. None of this benefits the client's customers and the conclusion by many is that whatever is being saved through outsourcing is being more than lost through a combination of constant rehiring/staff training and, probably more importantly, through customer defections and brand destruction."

Outsourcing and call centers in the Middle East will be among the major topics discussed at the Middle East Call Center ’12 Conference (MECC). It will be held between June 4-7 at the Dubai International Convention and Exhibition Centre (DICEC). The Main Conference takes place June 5-6, concurrent with the MECC ’12 Exhibition. There are also workshops before and after the conference. Programs will focus on call center issues, technology and trends, such as improving performance and customer relations, according to a press release from Insights.

Some of the topics to be addressed during the conference relate to management, recommendations on outsourcing, technology, social media, benchmarking, consulting, training and industry trends. There will also be offers from vendors and opportunities for discounts. One conference track will focus on contact center outsourcing. It is targeted to regional organizations, according to AME Info. One keynote speech will be presented on “Social Media & the Contact Centre” on June 5 at 8.30 am.