Filipino scholars abroad: Come home, pretty please!

An earlier blog talked about how, according to a Global Services and Tholons’ study, the Philippines presently ranks second among the world’s top 5 offshore nations. Also at the 6th Annual National Outsourcing Association Awards in the United Kingdom last week, we were presented with “Offshoring Destination of the Year”– for the second time in just three years. To at least maintain that, we need to face a few realities:

We need more people. We need to step up on skills and infrastructure. We have competition.

In the offshoring sector, we have the edge on English-language contact center services at the moment but we can’t rest on our laurels. The tight labor market cannot be addressed by increasing the population count through “obvious” means, of course. And the labor pool problem is not merely confined to the outsourcing industry.

So what to do, what to do? Well, people not leaving the country is a start. There are very real opportunities here, especially in outsourcing. Contrary to popular notion, once more for emphasis, the outsourcing industry is more than just call centers. This industry can accommodate artists, designers, writers, engineers, masters-degree holders and– would you believe?– lawyers and doctors.

There is also one other way that can remedy the labor shortage AND the demand for the development of higher-tier IT skills and infrastructure: Filipinos who have gone abroad for further studies can come home even for just a few years and share what they know with their country. Even if they eventually do leave again, if we have a constant stream of Filipino scholars coming home each year, that will still make a big difference. The country will benefit from having experts in our midst rather than engaging the expertise of expats on every other major project. It won’t be easy, of course. We can’t possibly match what these scholars and experts can earn in the US and in Europe. But if incentives for them can be earnestly worked out, it’s a feasible plan. They can be offered positions and compensation commensurate to the knowledge and experience they’ve gained overseas, and otherwise offered to expats.

We can also appeal to their sense of country. That is the hardest thing to do because hundreds of years of colonization and the American-Dream influence have bred in us that “abroad” means success and that the world is our oyster. It does really go back to upbringing and education, doesn’t it? Even if this ideal takes years to come to fruition, it’s worth a shot. Parents, instill in your kids a love for country– accentuate the positive, talk about our heroes even– it’s cool! Teachers, do your best to educate proudly so that from that level, your students, who often put greater stock on your word than that of their parents, can get the sense that noble acts such as teaching (and staying here) are not passé. Public officials, er, (at the very least) do your job? Constant, constant, constant travel need not be part of your itinerary while you hold office. Learn to use Telepresence and stay put. Scholars, do study abroad then come home even for a bit and teach us what you know. It’s not the due you have to pay but rather it’s giving back to your roots. As for the rest of us, find what you’re good at so you can do it as if your life depends on it because really it does.

Paul Rivera, my boss here at Open Access Marketing is a Filipino-American who studied at UCLA-Berkeley. He quite lives out of his suitcase shuttling back and forth between Manila and California. Come next month, he’s leaving family and friends to stay in the Philippines for a year, possibly two. Sure, it’s convenient for him to lessen the jet lag, but it’s a big thing that he thinks staying here is a good idea. With him here, we can go full blast with our KPO(Knowledge Process Outsourcing) program which is another path the more skilled among us can take. Let’s not underestimate the power of the ripple effect. Imagine if you have Filipinos who have gone to MIT in the US come home to work. Others who are here will take that to mean that if these intelligent Filipinos take the Philippines seriously enough to come home for, then she’s definitely worth staying for. No need for a baby boom, thank you very much.