English is one of the official languages of India, and there are a large number of people in the big cities and towns of India who are fluent in the English language. Today, the call centers employ a large number of students and youth from cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad and Bangalore. Delhi is a major BPO hub of India, and the call centers provide employment to nearly a million people in India.
The United States and India are located on opposite sides of the globe, and there is a large time difference between the two countries. Call centers operate overnight, so people doing BPO jobs invariably need to work through the night and sleep during the day. People who work in the BPO industry, especially call center employees, live in a world of their own, and because they are employees of American companies, they try to be as American as possible.
Call center employees drop their Indian names like ‘Ravindra’ and adopt conventional names like ‘Ron’. They take a long course in American history and spend months trying to master an American accent. Most well-educated Indians speak British English, but a British accent is not acceptable to American companies, and Indians working for BPO companies struggle to speak like an American. They read American news, try to understand American sports, and follow the lives of Hollywood celebrities. This training helps them build a relationship with American consumers.
Indian corporate culture is very different from that of American companies: the elderly are generally respected in India, and employees of Indian companies rarely call their superiors by their first names. But once you join a BPO company, you are part of an American company. So, the lowest employee in a BPO company addresses his boss by his first name, and in most cases, the name is an Americanized version of the Indian name.
Most BPO companies do not insist on wearing formal dresses, so most employees wear jeans to the office. Employees of BPO firms are well paid (by Indian standards) and spend their money on American products: Coca-Cola, McDonalds hamburgers or KFC chickens, Levis jeans, Dell laptops and iPhone mobile phones. Also, since they technically work for American companies, they don’t have public holidays for Indian festivals, but they do get a day off whenever a US public holiday is announced.
BPO jobs pay well, but they take a toll on the body and mind. As a call center employee in India, you’re an American at night, but you’re an Indian with a headache when the sun comes up.
