The needs to identify, understand, assess as well as evaluate BPO industries mainly towards recognizing of such training and development. The one objective is to integrate cases and literature studies that adhere to training development of BPO industry as the research is vital in order for Oman's BPO presence is of effective stature in terms of training and development. Other initial objectives will deal to BPO as noted and discussed by various researches in form of secondary resources that leads to main research methodology and that is, case study utilization approach of certain BPO industries being known about for Oman industries to follow and have it as an ideal reference. In global workplace, there was tremendous growth in business processing outsourcing (BPO). Many industries are establishing effective centers, back offices and other offshore enterprises in developing countries in an attempt to reduce costs. The research focuses on training development area of BPO industry, business establishments' training domains. The outlining of training development faced in offshore outsources destinations, investigate some of the reasons for breakdowns in communication. The identification of managerial challenges and opportunities faced by business process outsourcing (BPO) firms in Oman by means of interviewing 25 executives in lower, middle as well as upper management in a total of at least 3 BPO industry. Content analysis of the responses will be revealed upon human resource training and development related challenges as a critical issue to tackle into. The application of SWOT analysis will be covered for future training opportunities linking to knowledge process outsourcing. Another secondary data presenting in global research agencies and Oman's national trade association, will be supporting outcomes. BPO changes to address challenges as well as to exploit training development opportunities will be explored in research.
The purpose of research is to examine the factors that drive firm's decision to invest in training in Oman's business process outsourcing (BPO) sector, research aims to consider much-neglected area and often cite the need to consider external factors, especially needs of the organization's clients in firm's decision to train. The research will employ case study research strategy using semi structured interviews, organization based documents and some non participant observation. Employee turnover, competitive strategy, client specifications and quality management systems were important factors in shaping the nature and extent of training development. The temporal dimension of process was significant in influencing volume of training. The study will be finding out if learning and development were inextricably intertwined with its operations management, as against BPO's HR infrastructure. HRD research adopt inward looking approach, the study offers fresh insights by adopting an outward-looking approach and considers the impact of an organization's clients on provision of training. The study's distinctive contributions are in identifying the influence that client specification, employee turnover, temporal and geographical dimension of processes have on provision of training and, in analyzing the critical and unexplored link between firm's market orientation, learning orientation, and quality management systems, in shaping the nature and extent of training provision. Research extends the current theory building debates and provides insights for practitioners and education policy makers about training decision making in BPO firms.
Some service provider firm in an outsourcing relationship is distinct from typical firm because it is not stand alone organization and fits somewhere in between the value chain of its client's business. Thus, conventional factors like wages, capital, rent, energy consumption cannot appropriately determine a Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firm's productivity. Aside, academic research is silent on the factors that influence the performance of BPO firm even though the issue is pertinent from the perspective of the host country, the sourcing firm, the global outsourcing industry and of course the service provider firm. In this research, there will be embarking on in order to explore the latter factors.
Research will be situated in human resources development literature and consider area and often cited need to consider external factors, especially the needs of an organization's customers/clients in firm's decision to train (Bing et al., 2003; Short, 2006) Through case study methodology, there examine factors that drive firm's decision to invest in training in Oman's information technology enabled services sector as well as BPO. Thus, Smith (2000) has "argued that phenomenon of enterprise training is too complex to be explicated by survey methodologies". Aside, research on enterprise training needs alternative research strategies such as case study research to uncover the complex interactions in training decision-making, especially when the phenomenon and the context cannot be separated. Qualitative case study methodology is one such strategy that can yield valuable insights about the phenomenon by allowing it to be studied in its natural settings (Yin, 2003) External factors, such as clients' needs, are particularly important given the distinct features of business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, such as the high level of interdependence between a service provider and the client firm, and the dynamic nature of its business environment (Banerjee, 2004). In addition to the factors identified in the extant literature that explain a firm's decision to invest in training (Smith et al., 2004), the distinctive contribution is in identifying the influence of a firm's market orientation, learning orientation and quality management systems on the nature and extent of training in firms in BPO sector. There provides novel insights into reasons for variation in training by considering a temporal dimension of an organization's process or project life cycle, its competitive strategy and the interactions between various organizational capabilities. The rest of research is organized as follows first, brief discussion of structure of Oman's BPO sector. Second, reviewing the literature relating to drivers of training in industries as there primarily informs objectives of research. Third, presenting methodology employing rationale of research study. Fourth, presenting ample analysis and findings concluding research implications.
References
Banerjee, P. (2004), The Indian Software Industry: Business Strategy and Dynamic Co-ordination, Palgrave-Macmillan, New Delhi
Bing, J.W., Kehrhahn, M., Short, D.C. (2003), "Challenges to the field of human resources development", Advances in Developing Human Resources, Vol. 5 No.3, pp.342-51
Short, D. (2006), "The gap between research and practice in HRD: a summary of the discussion 1995-2005", Proceedings of the 2006 International Academy of HRD Conference, AHRD, Bowling Green, OH, Vol. 2006
Smith, A. (2000), "Casing the joint: case study methodology in VET research at the organizational level", Australian and New Zealand Journal of Vocational Education Research, Vol. 8 No.1, pp.73-91
Smith, A., Oczkowksi, E., Macklin, R., Noble, C. (2004), "The impact of organizational change on the nature and extent of training in Australian enterprises", International Journal of Training and Development, Vol. 7 No.1, pp.94-110
Yin, R.K. (2003), Case Study Research: Design and Methods, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA
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