BPO partners with UWI Open Campus

Itelbpo and the University of the West Indies Open Campus (UWIOC) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the purpose of building capacity in the Jamaican business process outsourcing (BPO) industry.

This MoU reflects both parties' commitment to the offering of short courses through UWIOC and the itelbpo Smart Academy, hosted at the itelbpo site in Montego Bay, St James, as a means to address a human resource imbalance that currently exists within the BPO industry between persons in middle-management and senior-management roles.

The first of the course offerings was a 10-week supervisory management course, held from February to April with participation by team members from several of itelbpo's clients operating in the travel, telecoms and utilities industries, as well as other fields.

Currently, the Jamaican BPO industry has a strong cadre of persons at the level of middle management. There is, however, an acute shortage of professionals able to effectively occupy senior-management roles. This shortage has resulted in many companies hiring international expats to fill these posts.

Itelbpo has launched its Smart Academy and intends to help fill this gap by assisting with the growth and development of employees. In accordance with the MOU, the UWI will assist itelbpo to plan, develop and deliver programmes and courses for its employees to access training, education and information through UWIOC.

UWIOC will also lend support to itelbpo by providing the technology required to deliver the programme and courses through the UWIOC Montego Bay site and its Computing and Technology Services Unit.