US-based philanthropic organisation Rockefeller Foundation has provided South African business process outsourcing (BPO) and contact centre industry association Business Process Enabling South Africa (BPeSA) with a $500 000 grant to assist in the establishment of a national body.

The new body would replicate the business model used by regional body BPeSA Western Cape. The funding would be used to focus on developing the national BPO landscape to increase awareness and adoption of impact sourcing within the sector to connect high-potential youth who would not otherwise have access to employment.

This business delivery model provides quality and cost at parity with traditional BPO, with optimised enhancements, such as a qualified, trained, untapped talent pool, and skills sets to meet client needs and lower attrition rates, while increasing corresponding levels of employee engagement.

As a result, it was expected that businesses within the sector would increasingly adopt inclusive hiring as part of their core business practice and that the talent pool for the sector would increase and become more diversified, providing employment to youth who would otherwise have limited access to jobs.

The grant would coincide with the appointment of a new national BPeSA CEO who would take over from interim CEO Gareth Pritchard, with Pritchard reverting back to his role as BPeSA Western Cape CEO.

“Over the last two years, our organisation has filled a joint role of both a regional and national body. As a result of the support from Rockefeller Foundation, we are now in a position to grow our national footprint and strengthen the ability of BPeSA to serve as a catalyst for large-scale job creation among South Africa’s talented and qualified youth.

“We have been fortunate enough to have worked with Rockefeller Foundation before on a gamification project that focused on skills development for the BPO sector and are looking forward to building on this great relationship with them,” Pritchard said.

Further, Rockefeller Foundation Africa regional office MD Mamadou Biteye noted that the BPO sector was an ideal channel to assist the foundation in creating large-scale employment.

The grant to BPeSA is part of Rockefeller Foundation’s Digital Jobs Africa initiative, which aims to impact one-million lives in six countries in Africa, by catalysing sustainable information and communications technology-enabled employment opportunities and skills training for high-potential, but disadvantaged African youth, thereby generating social and economic opportunities for those employed, their families and communities.

The industry in South Africa currently employed over 210 000 people and was one of the biggest sources of employment. Over 25 000 of these jobs serviced the international market, which has more than doubled since 2010.

“There is a huge opportunity for South Africa, especially if we are able to grow our international footprint. [The] Philippines, with which we share a number of similarities, [has] over one-million people employed in [the] BPO space. If we can develop similar structures at a national level there is no reason why we can’t experience similar levels of success here and still improve lives,” Pritchard noted.