I visited a call center thread in PinoyExchange just today and it struck me to write about the whole deal or dilemma of "career growth" or lack thereof in the call center/BPO industry today. It struck me because not having career growth is a popular clamor amongst ourselves and it does make some think otherwise about there own career direction.
In terms of career growth or promotions, I definitely believe all things need to be in the right places before it happens. And before this happens, it takes a great effort and conviction to make it happen. Competition is hard and that's a given. With thousands of employees in our industry, not everyone will get a chance to be promoted at the same time. I will liken it to a good basketball team. With a certain number of talents within the team, not everyone will get the chance to be the franchise player. Some will have to be role players and such. It takes years to be considered a good coach as well as a trainer. Likewise in a call center setting, people will need to understand their role and make the effort to make sure they do a very good job to get noticed.
This leads me to the conclusion with my previous statement above that in order to get your turn at getting promoted, all things need to be in the right places at the right time. For me the things I'm referring to are two things that begin with the letter C. The first is
Chance and the second is
Conviction. For me, career growth is all about who does their job well consistently and sticks around long enough to get their chance at being promoted.
When I talk about chance, I meant people need to stick to what they do best and wait for an opportunity for promotion. I'd have to admit that the call center industry presents people with the fastest career growth across all industries. Sometimes we may see people in the VP level already but he's only below 30 y/o. But that opportunity may not be for everyone. The reality is people need to prove themselves. People need to be consistent at what they do and stick with their career goals until an opportunity comes along. This leads my to the second C which is Conviction.
While waiting for that chance, one must always stick to his conviction or career goals. The most important thing in this aspect is a person needs to make sure that he/she takes the necessary steps to achieve his goal. Being good at what you do
IS NOT enough. Please take note! A person needs to make sure his achievements are noticed and acknowledged by authorities so that he is recognized. Recognition and achievements are very big factors when it comes to promotions. Another thing I'd like to include here is the conviction for self-improvement. People must understand that promotion
is not granted based on merit alone. An important factor for promotion is the behavioral and decision-making capabilities of the candidate. A person needs to show his conviction towards his/her own career goals by taking the initiative of finding out what skills and capabilities he needs to acquire in order for them to get to the next level. Hard fact is nobody else will provide him this but him/herself.
I'd have to admit I've known some very sad stories of people spending years in the same position but not getting promoted despite the fact they have really made an effort to get promoted. As an example, I had this batch mate from PeopleSupport back in 2003. We started out both as an agent and it was our first time working in the call center industry. I left PS after 7 months and a few months after leaving I was already a TL somewhere else. We lost touch after I left. A few months after being a Team Leader, I became an Operations Manager leading my own in-house call center. Then, we met again in HSBC Christmas party last year. We got to talk for a little while to catch up on things then he told me he stuck and spent 3 years in PS as an agent! Within the 3 years, he sent and applied to higher posts several times but was not successful. I really pitied my batch-mate. He did all the right things and had all the right stuff but was not given the chance.
But in the back of my mind, I felt his predicament was his fault. He had all the things right but
he was not looking in the right places! All the stars may be aligned your way but if you are not exploring all your options, you may end up losing in the end.
So in conclusion, when it comes to promotions and career growth, people need to have 3 things right: Right timing (chance), Right stuff (capabilities) and be in the Right place (be in the right company that will give him a shot at promotion). Among these three, I think the second factor is the most underestimated and I really think people need to realize the important of having the right "stuff in order to get that promotion.
Please feel free to comment and let me know what you think. Thanks.
