Business process outsourcing (BPO) Interview Preparation Guide

Business process outsourcing (BPO) is a subset of outsourcing that involves the contracting of the operations and responsibilities of specific business functions (or processes) to a third-party service provider. Originally, this was associated with manufacturing firms, such as Coca Cola that outsourced large segments of its supply chain.

The main advantage of BPO is the way in which it helps increase a company's flexibility. However, several sources have different ways in which they perceive organizational flexibility. In early 2000s BPO was all about cost efficiency, which allowed a certain level of flexibility at the time. Due to technological advances and changes in the industry (specifically the move to more service-based rather than product-based contracts), companies who choose to outsource their back-office increasingly look for time flexibility and direct quality control.

BPO stands for Business Process Outsourcing. When a company decides to outsource some of its non-core work processes to another company with expertise in it, it is called Business Process Outsourcing.

BPOs can majorly be divided into following categories based on the jobs they perform:

a.) Administrative Department
b.) Purchase Department
c.) Selling Department
d.) Call Centre
e.) Back Office

Homeshoring is the synonym of homesourcing. It means that outsourcing the work to from service industry to employees who can work from their home or workplace by appropriate means of telephone and Internet facilities. It refers to hiring independent employees and contractors without any bond. Sometimes it requires training of employees in office from time-to-time.

There is not a vast difference between nearshoring and offshoring. Nearshoring is derived from offshoring only, it means shifting or transferring the business in a neighboring country or a nearby region i.e. sometimes across the borders too, so that it can benefit both the parties in different aspects. Nearshoring means that the business has shifted work to a lower cost organization, but within its own region whereas offshoring involves shifting of business to a foreign or distant organization in order to reduce production costs.

Top 10 bpo companies in India are:
a. Genpact
b. WNS global
c. IBM Daksh
d. Aditya Birla Minacs Worldwide
e. TCS BPO
f. Wipro BPO
g. First source
h. Infosys BPO
i. HCl BPO
j. EXL Service Holdings

A team can be lead in the most efficient way by the following points:
a. Always stand for your team.
b. Always guide them without any personal interests.
c. Correct your team member’s flaws whenever required.
d. Always motivate your team in every aspect.
e. Never be bossy.

If the interviewer is asking this question then he wants you to give a genuine answer, which you will actually do if something like this happens. So be very realistic while answering this question.
You can say that “it was my mistake that I couldn’t complete my target this time but I’ll make sure that next time I complete my target exactly on time.

Voice based BPOs are those BPOs where you are required to talk to the customers. It may be for sales or support or service or anything else. The focus of business here is “Voice”.