©image:
PhotoXpress
The balance, however, is negative. By the end of 2009, there were 1,000 less jobs in the call center industry than in its golden age, 2006.
Most of them depend on U.S. customers, and the economic crisis in the northern country triggered the closure of many, especially the small ones which served one or two customers.
Beyond any ups and downs in the industry, its main problem remains the same: lack of qualified personnel.
An article in Prensa.com included comments by Joseph Fidanque, president of Star Contact, who employs 2,500 workers. He argued that “the industry has reached a saturation point, especially for the lack of personnel with excellent English skills”. “The industry could be four times bigger if there were more qualified individuals”.
Source: Prensa.com
More on this topic
March 2012
The battle rages between companies to procure staff with the necessary skills, especially proficiency in a second language, for their call centers.
The call center industry in Panama, which employs 12,000 people in total, has three major competitors: Dell, Sitel and Star Contact, companies with several thousand employees in a market where the supply of bilingual human resources is reaching its maximum.
May 2009
In Panama, as in the whole region, the obstacle to higher growth is the lack of qualified personnel.
The wage of a worker in a call center is three times the minimum wage on average, and it can be five times the minimum wage in some countries in the region.
The problem is the shortage of personnel with the necessary English language proficiency, which prevents the industry from growing at a faster rate than the current one.
December 2008
Star Contact, a call center that provides outsourcing services, inaugurated the Juan Diaz 2 center yesterday.
The company, which currently employs 2,600 workers at the five call centers that it operates in Panama, has invested $50 million in infrastructure and equipment since it was setup in 1998, reported company president, Joseph Fidanque III.
August 2008
The company, which is dedicated to Business process outsourcing (BPO), has plans to start operating at the end of 2008, and to hire 500 people.
The service center, which will provide customer care, sales and technical support in both Spanish and English, will be installed in Managua and should open during the fourth quarter of 2008.
español
