Davao IT-BPM labor force grows 12 percent

DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 18 October) – The labor force for the information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) sector is growing by around 12 percent from last year, an industry official said.

The IT-BPM labor force includes workers in call centers and business process outsourcing (BPO); information technology and software development; graphics, animation and game development; health information management; corporate IT; and, freelancers and home-based online workers.

Xavier Eric Manalastas, ICT Davao president, said the IT-BPM labor force is now approaching 85,000 individuals, about 12 percent higher from the 75,000 recorded in 2023.

He attributed the growing number of IT-BPM workers to the expansion or establishments of more BPO companies in the city.

Manalastas said they target to generate 150,000 BPO and virtual assistant workers in the city by 2028.

He added that there is an “abundance” of potential labor force in the city that BPO companies can train and eventually hire as their employees.

Manalastas emphasized that ICT Davao and the Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCCI) are continuously conducting training programs, lasting two to three months, to bridge technology gaps for fresh graduates and career changers who would want to work for the BPO sector.

What challenges the IT-BPM industry now, Manalastas added, is more of “resource allocation” in implementing training programs rather than a shortage of willing participants.

“There’s no shortage of people that will avail [the training] based on our experience. There’s no shortage of talent that can be trained,” Manalastas said in a press conference Wednesday morning, October 16.

DCCCI president Belle Anne Torres said the academe and the local IT-BPM industry must communicate continually and make sure their graduates are “able to come up with soft skills that are of international standards” — such as they must be on par with global standards in speaking and understanding foreign languages.

“I think the academe should also look into certification programs, wherein they have to make sure that their graduates are ready and are certified based on the requirements set by the industry,” Torres said.

Human resources personnel also noticed the labor force growth of the IT-BPM industry.

Jem Lopez, a hiring coordinator for a IT-BPM company, said many fresh graduates are applying for BP-ITM jobs even if some of them don’t have the qualifications.

“Let’s be real. Most of them, they just wanted to be in this industry for a good pay. But as the one who screens them, I could tell they are willing to know, but there is more that they need to know to qualify,” she told MindaNews.

“You can be the most fluent speaker, or the most confident person, but it all boils down to what you can give and contribute to improve the services or an advancement that your client works on, you must have that in your pocket already as you apply,” she added.

Toto Rendon, an information technology graduate and a team leader for another IT-BPM company, said the government should consider “integrating new technological advancements yearly so that the IT-BPM industry will not be left behind by the latest trends.”

“Maybe the legislators can convince the DICT (Department of Information and Communications Technology) and the universities to improve teaching IT and skills in doing BPO work. When I was hired four years ago, I was not even adept in advanced computer programming at that time. For me, when graduates or potential workers are not capable of doing ICT work, it could really affect their employment trajectory as a whole,” he told MindaNews in Cebuano. (Ian Carl Espinosa / MindaNews)