BPO INDUSTRY DYING A NATURAL DEATH!

At last the death is coming for the BPO Industry.......! Riding the waves all these yearsthe point of acid test is here! And surviving it and be the thing what it was/had been before the test came is almost impossible! Its well stated that we can not avoid the Unavoidable!All these years the BPO industry has been taking things for granted. Almost all the people working in the industry took it for granted. Everyone thought of the industry as some sort of a bush, thistle, shrub, grass or an unknown plant which is there and will be there forever even though nothing is done to grow it! They confidently believed that its not even importantto think that its there!

The so called authorities who have been commenting on the industry in positive tones for eons - what are these authorities for other than commenting continuously on something?! - continue trumpeting over the greatness on the things in the industry! They keep saying about somethingthat they think are the most important things about the industry! Everyone conveniently forgetswhat this industry basically is and why it came to India in such a BIG WAY! Even those who are there in the BPO industry and those who think they lead the society and nation think aboutthis "Panacea" for the root decaying deadly decease called 'Joblessness or Unemployment' as another 'Somehow Grown' shrub or plant which if seen is ok or else dont mind.

People who even dont know this plant which is a panacea, fish very powerful microscopesout of their deep pockets as a juggler does and point out to the public the microscopic organismsliving on the surface of its leaves as something 'Very Dangerous' and declare that these microorganisms were the 'Real Reason' for the extinction of the 'Good Old Flesh Eating Dinosours!'Media spread this news of 'very dangerous organisms existing on the surface of its leaves' all over the nation and people develop a new phobia named by the experts who found out these'Deadly Organisms' as 'BPO Phobia'. The much respected and knowledgeble teachers of all the colleges and universities stand together to spread this 'piece of information' about 'the organisms'and they with other thought leaders and social strategists with the help of media declare this plant an evil!

Hundreds of thousands of people earn their livelihood from this industry; but they all forgot that it is efficiency, quality and the like things which are the most important things which should be maintained at any cost!They completly forgot the basic rule "Give Quality(work) & Take Quality(remunaration)! The personnel who were in the responsible positions of recruiting quality people did underhand dealings to recruitsub-standard people into the positions of responsibility & quality.They compromised everything the BPO Industry stood for!The HR People of a lot of BPO Companies thrived due to this illicit relationship with the outside recruitment peopleand hundreds of poor quality, inefficiant and qualityless people were recruited to man the positionswhich should have been manned by those who 'Knew Things' or at the least knew '1+1=2!!!'

In the years of BPO Sunrise, when no other country was able to give what India did for it's customers,it was well assumed that anything would sink in unnoticed and without questions being asked! But, seeing this huge opportunity, other countries started preparations and they started to train their peopleto give the quality the foreign companies expect and need from Quality BPO Services! As years went by, those countries, armed with the quality built over the years, started to take away small chunks in the begining and later large pieces from the cake India for a long time tasted alone - all these years our Indian HRs getting perks for recruiting the wrong & poor quality people, who performed pathetically, into the industry!

Now, the things have come to a full circle; what India once stood for - quality, competive prices, efficiency etc. - other countries are offering, as the Indian BPO Industry wade through the quagmire of inefficiency,poor pricing and extreme lack of quality it has created for itself, taking all these years! Hundreds of jobs are lost; existing processes vanish into thin air; new processes come only by tricles! Yet, 'the people in the know' continue their stupor and 'the Quality HR People' in the companies do their best to continuetheir stupid practises to Upgrade Inefficiency & Incompetence! Let us all stand by the dying industry & hope the malady - which is a very large part of the present day BPO Industry itself! - disappear, somehow!!!

We Got To Stand Together!

When the terrorists struck Bombay he was not aware of that; he was thinking about the Hartal which was going to be celebrated
in his God's Own Country! He was thinking about the chances of another couple of Hartals, the National Festival of the Keralites!
But, when he got the newspaper next morning, he new some terrorists had holed up in some hotels in Bombay and they had killed
more than 100 people and injured more than 300 people.

He eagerly devoured what was written about the terrorists and sighed heavily reading there were no Malayalee Casualties,
which was specified by the local daily. He read about the boat which came from the Porbunder Harbour, Hotel Taj, Oberoi,
CRT, Nariman House(with no mention about why Nariman House got attacked, as somebody wanted to cover the reason
behind the attack on it) and some other places. He re read to confirm that there were no Malayalee casualties; he had been
doing this 'Confirmation' ever since Iraq invaded Quwait, when the local dailies faught with one another to 'Inform' people that
there were no Malayalee casualties! In those days, he even thought how accurately Iraquees make the Malayalees move away
from the places they were going to bomb, and how concerned the Iraquees were about the Malayalees; at the least it seemed so,
by the reportage of the Malayalam Dailies, which regularly competed to Inform that there were No Malayalee Casualties, day in and day out!

The next day he read the newspaper to find out that there were Malayalee casualties. Someone died in Taj hotel in the massacre
was a Malayalee, from another district. He thought, "There are no casualties from Our District"; and read on the gruesome methods
adapted by the terrorists, in the killing of the hapless and innocent victims. When he read The NewYork Times he understood that
the persons (If they can be called persons at all) who did this heinous act were an "Audacious Group of Gunmen" and they were just "Militants fighting for the disputed land of Kashmir". He failed to understand why, when the terror strikes America it is Terrorism and when the same happens in India it becomes Militancy and the cold blooded terrorists become "A Group of Audacious Gunmen"!

The very next day the newspaper informed him that one of the Malayalees died in the Bombay Terror Attack was from his own district; he read about the unlucky fellow's life history and about his family; he thought no one from His Own Village was there......A thought of relief passed through his mind......He continued to read that India had been listed in the top 20 dangerous places to visit by 'One of the Most Intelligent and Sane U.K news papers'; he failed to recollect wheather this same Sane Newspaper listed America,when it had its own 9/11 and U.K, when the Irish Terror reigned Briton in the seventies and eighties, among the top twenty dangerous places to visit.

When the next day arrived, the newspaper informed that there was another Malayalee in the casualty list and he was from His Own Village;he was almost shocked to read the familiar name of the man from his village; he remembered some of those incidents of past where the martyred man was involved and a couple of occasions when he met him, in person; but he had a relieving thought that none of His Own Family Memebers had become a casualty and No Relative has been lost in the act of terror....

What he and all the people who read newspapers and gathered pieces of information, from each and every nook and corner of India,
who sighed with relief as they learned no one of their close relatives or family members were casualties of the Bombay terror attack,forget is each and every innocent person killed by those heartless terrorists are "Somebody Else' Close Relative or Someone Else' Family Member" and more than 150 precious and very much loved lives had been extinguished in a reckless act of terror.It is time each and every Indian stand, in every sense, very close to the bereaved families, who had lost what each of those families had considered the dearest in their lives. It is time, we all Indians think and act in the best interest of the Nation and become the boundless oceans of empathy towards those who had lost what they had cherished and loved best in thier lives! Let us all keep the memories of all those precious lives lost in the heinous act of terrorism, in our hearts, and stand above all the cast and creed and politics and be the brothers and sisters to those families who are deep in the oceans of grief.......Let Us Be The True Indians......Once & For All...!

A Stitch In Time..........!

When the Fed said it could not bail out Lehman Brothers, the Collaspe had not started in USA! The Fed made Lehman Brothers fail by NOT bailing them out by giving the required financial aid/package! Then started the Saga of Master Failures! Fed had no choice but to back the failing
ones with billions of dollars of financial aid! If the Fed had acted in time to back up and bail out Lehman Brothers the FALL could have been averted or it would have been mild and bearable! Instead the Fed maintained foolish silence and let Lehman Brothers fail and lose the credibility
of the American Financial system, which fell like a pack of cards after the failure of one of the American Financial System's poster boys-Lehman Brothers!

Its said that people learn or should learn from their mistakes! But, it seems the Fed has not learnt what they should have learnt by now - "A stitch in time saves nine!" After all this turmoil in the financial markets and the worst ever situation after the Great Drepression, the Fed is adament on NOT giving any backing to the sinking auto industry, with the poster boy of American Auto Industry, GM, crying aloud for financial aid! The Fed is sitting tight proclaiming the liqidity crunch and quating the so called prophetic projections of the so called financial experts! What the Fed deliberately forgets is it is these same so called visionaries caused the turbulant times of the present and these same sort of miscalculated /strongley biased projections and statistics proved to be the cause of the financial debacle of the present day American Financial System!

It is said that the president elect is strongly in for the financial backing of the auto industry and the White House is not in a mood to buy his idea of backing the failing auto industry. If the financial aid is withheld or not given in time, it is going to be another disaster coming to swallow the American Financial System, with whatever credibility the system has now, getting eroded by the minute! The collapse of the auto industry will defenitly go in a very big way to help the already recessioned economy sink deeper into the financial quagmire, with the light at the end of a very long tunnel getting dimmer and dimmer by the day! It is always better to save the parts first than saving the whole thing in such a situation where nobody knows where and what are the escape routes and when the rescue brings the real relief!

GREAT PREDICTIONS!!!

I say/predict what I think is correct based on the pieces of information I have at my disposal;he says/predicts what he thinks is the right thing from his data; she says/predictswhat she learned from the calculations she made based on collected facts.......Everybody should try their best to trumpet what they found out! And, sometimes,one of these findings/predictions, may become a reality of sorts by SHEER CHANCE!

Then, its the turn of the person predicted to claim victory aloud, with the support of the media!Then, all the GREAT PREDICTIONS one did, which never saw the light of day will be forgotten by all and the person who chance-predicted becomes the Oracle! This is how most of the statistitians, analysts & others predict things!

I heard, a fortune teller with a parrot, and no education, became a Great Oracle once, whom people from Wall Street to Cape Good Hope, followed madly for his predictionsas he was running his consultancy, just before the financial melt down in America! Now, the people are discussing wheather its the parrot who predicted wrong or the fortune teller!Somebody blamed it on the media & others on the fragile sentiments of people! Someone even dared to say that he was NOT A Fortune Teller but A Gambler From Las Vegas, who lost his shirt gambling! How dare he??! Anyway, PREDICTING CORRECTLY has become BIG BUSINESS these days!

Try practising predicting what will happen if rain comes when you are on the road, what will happen this day next year at 3.15pm, who will land on the Sun first, what will happen if mangoes are grown in an arid area, when will the news papersbe wiped out from the surface of the Earth completely, how many years it will takefor Man to spoil the great culture he has built taking millenia etc. Have a try!!!

THE PIMPS OF (DISTANCE) EDUCATION!

Thousands are decieved & tricked by 'the educational/education pimps' that people lose money, quality education, time, effort and even their future prospects or life due to these 'pimps' who are strongly and dedicatedly backed by the education institutions and universities all over India! These 'pimps' appear in the various shapes and forms of training centers of universities, contact persons who are the representatives of the educational institutions, contact centresof universities, distance education centres of universities etc. These 'education pimps'are present in various forms in the Indian society, some of them even in unrecognisable forms!

The common thread running through all these different forms of 'education pimps' of established and recognised universities and educational institutions is that they 'by hook or by crook' get your money by 'their well rehearsed and well practised pimping techniques' and spoil your education, career, time and even life,with the all understanding - sometime tacit- support of 'the well known universities & educational institutions' without ever being caught in the serious criminal act of destroying thousands of unassuming and unsuspecting persons' lives!

When it is education from regular educational institutions or colleges or Universities, we all know without our knowledge that what we get from the classes are nothing but the text book - thats the maximum! - explained in the limited and most of the times greatly outdated information that will fetch us nowhere. But, we have all been surviving- at least a large number of us - the gruelling examinations conducted by 'Our Great Educational Institutions', to our great surprise.The reason is very simple - its these same out dated teachers who teach us have been preparing all these out dated question papers based on the out dated subjects we have been taught by these very same out dated teachers and curricula! We live thinking what we learned is 'the knowledge' which is to be learned without ever being in the knowledge that whatever we have learned is out dated by at least a decade and we have been taught by the basically out dated theories of "Old is Gold" and "Ignorance is Bliss" etc, by the much out dated curricula & teachers!

In these regular educational institutions teaching is done by the whims and fancies of half baked teachers who never ever even think about 'Quality', 'Responsibility','Integrity', 'Future of Their Students', 'Dedication', 'Vision' etc. and do whatever they have been doing like machines, drawing good salaries when one month turnsto the other, never bothered of wheather they 'Teach' in the real sense or not!They teach what 'they think' is knowledge, never coming to the fact that the knowledge they think they are teaching 'Was Knowledge' at least a decade back, when they were students; but unfortunately they too didnt get 'the real knowledge or teaching'as what they got at that time was what 'Was Knowledge' a decade before their time!

These regular colleges, educational institutions and Universities have been conducting thousands of 'Outdated Exams' and publishing 'The Outdated Results', delaying the results most of the times to spoil whatever chances their pupils have learning and writing these outdated syllabus and exams! And the evaluation system of these 'Out dated Exams' is better left undescribed & evaluated, as in thousands of cases it depends on sheer luck wheather one's answer sheets get the attention of the all powerfull evaluator, who is himself out dated atleast by a decade!

Every year the 'Great News of Delayed Exams & Results' comes as regular as monsoon rains and lashes at/on every one's ear drums and sensitivity, to be forgotten the very next moment! Its heard that more students commit suicide around the exam time than the poor peasents doing the same due to abject poverty; but one thing is common to both of these cases; that is in both these cases 'The People In The Know' or 'Powers That Be' forget or ignore the very existance of these two things/tragedies/happenings and indulge in the very interesting game of 'Buck Passing' in no time! Atleast there should be some sort of games to while away time and reduce tension for the higher ups!

The Terrible Hotels of Thrissur - The Cultural Capital of Kerala!

The over priced, poorly serviced, hygienically low grade hotels of this 'Cultural Capital'
dot every lane and by lane of the city. The so called 100% literate people of the city
and those who 'Accidently' are trapped by the 'Name' of the hotels, devotedly gobble
up whatever that is served (which if we get in our own sweet homes even won't find
a way into the dog's plate!) very much unhygienically and sometimes arrogantly, paying
through their noses!

Every state and their districts has their own delicacies and specialities as far as food is
concerned. Every one cautiously and patiently preserves the things they got from
the by gone years and try to better what they had. But here, in this Cultural Capital,
the very opposite is happening! People least care about 'the tastes of Culture' that they
are supposed to have and cherish! They simply spoil what they should have cherished!

In some of the 'Famous Hotels' of the city the curries including 'Saambar', 'Aviyal', 'Kaalan',
'Oolan' etc. are prepared in such a tasteless and nauseating way that we wonder whether
they are directly out of some Nazi Camps trying to kill people by serving the most awkward
and unpalatable items! These 'insufferable' items are served in these 'Famous' hotels day
after day, week after week and month after month that when the regular eaters have
'the Real Curries' they ask "What These Great Curries Are Called?!" and "How These
Superb Dishes Are Prepared?!" and "Where These Fantastic Curries Are From?!"

In a good number of the 'Famous Hotels' of the city we find 'Royal Blood of the Elizabethan Era'
serving 'Ordinary People', where the 'Poor Customer' has to win over the attention of the supplier or bearer, if one wishes to make even some unpalatable and tasteless things reach one's stomach! The Royal Supplier will roam around in a chariot and if one attracts his attention after waiting a couple of hours patiently, he will offer you something that he wishes to serve but not the thing you found 'Doing Your Research on the Menu'! He will serve you as despicably as you are a leper and threateningly stare at you and grin if you wait for a second to think about what else you want! But when you somehow gobble the copper, iron and steel with the ISI mark, the nature of the 'Royal Highness' suddenly changes and he takes the form of a 'Royal Dog' that he get 'His Tip' in billions! And if the 'Poor Leper' doesn't pay or pay in thousands, then some 'Delicate Words' will be audible from the heavens in the voice of the 'Royal Highness' which no other human ear can hear!

It is better 'Not' to talk of the hygienic factors in the hotels of 'The Cultural Capital'!
In a large number of hotels there is 'No Toilet Soap' to wash one's hands. In some hotels
they provide 'Dish Cleaning Powder' to wash one's hands with! And in almost all the hotels
where 'Luckily' we find toilet soap or washing powder, we see them 'Dangerously' placed
almost on the edge of the washing or better we call spitting sink that most of the spittle
the 'Mouth Washer of Hygiene' spits with all his or her might, standing erect, after
rinsing one's mouth with water after having food, gets sprayed on the soap or the powder!
And, at least a couple of times a day, the toilet soap finds a way to the bottom of the sink
by slipping away from the 'Hygienic Eater-Washer', which after a couple of minutes is
worshipfully taken out and placed on the same edge of the sink to be sprayed by the spittle again
and used by the next person to 'Hygienically wash his or her hands and faces!'

And when the bill comes one naturally doubts whether some 'extortionists' have changed their job and become hoteliers! They give less quantity and quality and charge exorbitant rates. They give chappattis, dosas, vadas, varieties of fried rice etc with a 'magnifying glass' that we understand they are enough and of the correct size and quantity! They boil rice, putting Arecanut & Sodium by Carbonate (NaHC03) in it that people eat less! They serve 'Prawn, Mushroom Fried Rice etc.' with prawn and mushroom rarely seen, and charge you a fortune! They serve you tasteless and nauseating food items, and charge you heavily! They serve out dated, rotten food items and charge 'an unsuspecting you' through your nose! The food inspectors 'Conduct Raids' and recover truck loads of rotten, old and degraded food items from the hotels, never to name the hotels and 'the same hotels continue the same old story!' Remember the welcome board to all these hotels reads 'Customer Is The King!' But the 'Poor Eaters' never think that 'The Raj' - where the kings ruled-is no more and kings are treated as beggars these days! And, beggars, as is heard, never had any right but to accept whatever that had been given!!!

Pls Note: Some of the above stated type of hotels function on Palace Road, near the Gold & Silk selling shops (where poor wedding parties are trapped!), behind or near Ragam Theatre (where poor people are trapped due to 'pseudo reputation'!), near the Railway Station (where poor travellers are trapped!), in the Swaraj Round/Circle (where poor people are trapped due to proximity!) etc.

Talking About Sania?!!

Indian tennis ace Sania leaves for Birmingham to play DFS Classic. She said
she is confident about performimg extremely well in the tournament! She said
she is in good form and expectes to improve her world standings.

Indian tennis star Sania withdrew from the Stutgartt Open due to injuries. Sources
in the know told that it will take another couple of weeks for her to come out of
the injuries and another couple of weeks to regain the form.

Indian tennis beauty Sania inaugurated a beauty treatment centre in Bangalore, with
hundreds of people storming the area to have a glimpse of the tennis beauty. She was
as charming and energetic as ever.She signed a couple of autograps as well.

Indian tennis queen Sania spent a couple of hours for shooting the advertisement
of the company she is the brand ambassador of, in a very humid and tiring environment
in Chennai. But, despite all this, she obliged her fans by signing a number of autographs.

Indian tennis sensation Sania told a press conference in Mumbai that she wishes
to be in the top twenty bracket this year and win some good tournaments. She continued
to say that she has the ability to even break into the top ten.

Indian tennis star Sania told she is thinking about quitting the game due to the poor
and bad publicity she gets. She even announced that if the sort of pressure she is
having continues, it will be curtains for her tennis career.

Indian tennis marvel Sania, on the sidelines of a photo shoot at New Delhi said
that the environment for the development of the game in India is not that much
suitable for its growth, compared to the environment existing in the developed countries.

Indian tennis hope Sania made an early exit from the French Open. It was a 6- 0, 6- 0
defeat in the first round against a qualifier from Ethiyopya. She also lost
in the doubles, in the qualifiying round. She said, her ankle injury is troubling her.

Indian tennis ace Sania said to this news paper that her dream is to become
a Grand Slam winner and break into the top ten of the world rankings. She said
at the least, she expects to breach into the top twenty, somehow.

I wonder what does Our Tennis Sensation do other than expressing her dreams
a couple of times a year to repeat them in the next year, doing the photo shoots
for the brands she represents, exiting in the qualifying rounds of even small scale
tournaments, talking at length about the hardships she has, endorsing more brands,
threatening to quit on each and every possibility, losing time/weeks/months in injuries,
and very rarely playing good quality tennis. Is it a player whom we listen to and talk of
or a marketeer who just go on talking and never play good quality tennis?!