MANILA, Philippines--Around 200 "near-hires" in Baguio City will receive free training courtesy of the government to improve their chances of landing jobs in the call center industry.
The free training is part of the government's "Training for Work" scholarship program, of which $350 million is allocated for business process outsourcing (BPO).
The Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT) has announced it will award training vouchers from the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) in Baguio later this week in time for Independence Day celebrations on June 12.
TESDA is administering the training program. The CICT is also working with industry group Business Process Association of the Philippines (BPAP) on this initiative.
TESDA disburses the training vouchers to its regional offices, which then turns over the training to BPAP-accredited training providers.
Near-hires refer to call center applicants, most of whom are recent college graduates, who came close but did not ultimately qualify for a position. By training them further, CICT is hoping to increase their chances of employment while generating a supply of workers for the still-growing industry. BPAP aims to increase the industry workforce to a million workers by 2010.
"But these applicants need to get past assessment exams and be certified as near-hires first by TESDA before they qualify for the program," said CICT commissioner Mon Ibrahim. TESDA's assessment exams include simulating a customer call that lasts for about seven minutes.
"Their [employment] chances get much better after the training," Ibrahim told INQUIRER.net in a phone interview Monday. Out of the near-hires trained by TESDA last year, more than 60 percent were absorbed by call centers.
"The training also allows these new graduates to assess their competency and whether they want to pursue a career in call centers or in other areas like software development," Ibrahim added.
Out of the P350-million budget, he said CICT plans to award training vouchers from 40, 000 to 70,000 beneficiaries nationwide.
