Growing job opportunities in BPM sector

Arupjyoti Gogoi 

The Business Process Management sector is headed towards rapid growth over the next decade. Transformation and new services are expected to reset the Business Process Management landscape globally, with business models increasingly blending integrated technology optimised services.  With a revenue of $26 Billion in FY 2015, the Indian BPM industry has made a significant contribution to the country's economy. Today, BPM contributes nearly one-fourth of IT and ITeS exports. India commands a 36 per cent share of the global BPM market. Currently, around 500 companies in India offer BPM services in over 78 countries, in more than 35 languages. New growth areas are emerging in Asia Pacific and the domestic market, besides the established western markets.

How has BPM sector evolved over the past few years in India?

A lot has changed over the years and the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry has evolved into a totally new avatar known as business process management (BPM). India’s BPM industry has become the nerve center of an increasingly interdependent global economy. Today, it provides end-to-end services like consulting, business transformation and optimisation to global corporations. The themes that rules the industry today are domain expertise, process re-engineering, analytics, high-end technology and innovation. The industry is now exploring new areas of growth across industry verticals, service lines, geographies, pricing models and delivery approaches. 

How is the job market for BPM industry in India at present? 

Currently the Indian BPM industry employs close to one million people directly and nearly three million indirectly. The BPM industry presents an excellent opportunity for the young Indian workforce, to learn, grow and excel in their careers. Indian BPM players have global careers to hone, that too across industries. Every player has opportunities for learning and development, and has high standards of inclusivity. BPM players are also high on harnessing talent across developed and emerging cities, including tier 2 and tier 3 cities. 

BPM players have created a conducive  work environment for women employees with initiatives to attract, retain and nurture women employees for leadership roles. Around 35 per cent of the BPM workforce comprises women. 

Do you see any scarcity of right talent pool in the industry? If yes, how the industry should work towards bridging this skill gap? 

A: Today, getting the right pool is a challenge that almost all the industries are facing. However, the gap in our industry is in getting specialists because BPM today has moved to delivering higher value services. The industry has transformed dramatically with its focus on domain expertise (understanding every other industry inside out - for instance, expertise in banking, manufacturing, healthcare, etc) and investing in SMAC-led technologies and robotics. 

We have a large number of specialised talent - doctorates, lawyers, doctors, CAs/CPAs, MBAs, linguists and others - entering the industry. The demand for such specialists will only be on the rise. Most industry players have very robust programmes to train fresh graduates. For instance, WNS has domain universities (specialising in specific domains, for example travel) in different areas to create specialists from generalists. The challenge we are focused on is re-skilling of internal resources used to old models while adding new age business thinkers and talent. 

Nasscom through the Sector Skills Council in collaboration with BPM industry players has done commendable work in this area by creating curriculum and testing frameworks. It has also introduced qualification packs, which is a 120-hour course content that can be embedded or added on to the traditional course already being taught in the universities. 

How do you see the job market in BPM industry over the next five years? 

With the world moving towards digital and domain specialisation, the BPM industry will only grow stronger. 

The Indian BPM industry is looking to capitalise on the positive business environment and touch $50 Billion in revenues by 2020. So you can well imagine the job opportunities. In the near future, we will see more and more BPM companies creating job opportunities in the tier 3 and tier 4 cities.