BPO industry pushes need for recruitment agencies

MANILA, Philippines – The business process outsourcing (BPO) industry in the Philippines is driving the demand for third-party executive search services in the country, local human resource solutions provider ExcelAsia said. In a statement, the company said its client base for executive search services has expanded from five to 30 companies in 12 months. A recent international survey by the Association of Executive Search Consultants (AESC) confirmed high demand across industries for senior financial, human resource, and professional services executives in Asia Pacific. Forty-four percent of search consultants participating in the survey reported strong demand for chief financial officers and human resource executives while 38 percent indicated demand for professional services executives. In the Philippines, the BPO industry is the principal source of demand. The industry has tripled in size every three years since 2001 and is projected to generate revenues of $13 billion in 2010, representing a 10-percentshare of the global BPO market, according to the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPA/P). “Executive search has become a real need because BPO businesses have excellent opportunities for expansion both locally and globally," ExcelAsia president Rita Trillo-Ugarte said. “Although these companies have their own in-house recruitment teams, increasing client demand for services expansion has put additional operations pressure on these teams. That’s one reason they are outsourcing the strategic task of top-level executive search." The majority of ExcelAsia’s executive search clients come from the BPO industry, said Cyrus Adre, ExcelAsia executive search director for corporate accounts. “We can safely say that industry-wide, our BPO clients have a sizable 50-percent share and the remaining 50 percent of our clients are distributed among the manufacturing, electronics, pharmaceutical, and finance industries," Adre said. Manila-headquartered ExcelAsia provides human resources solutions to more than 30 multinational companies in the Philippines. It also has offices in Cebu, Bacolod and Alabang. It has trained and deployed over 16,000 Filipino jobseekers.GMANews.TV