Track: Occupational Safety and Health (OSH)

Abstract

The Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry in Asia remains to be optimistic in the past years. This is evident in the Philippines since the industry is hitting big due to its huge potential workforce that it caters. A large percentage of BPO workers are into telemarketing or call center sub-sector. The total number of persons employed in BPO industry was estimated at 576,000 of which nearly seven out of eight employees (88%) works in the call center sub-sector. Due to increasing demand of call center agents in the country, the reported occupational risks of agents are also apparent. According to recent data from PSA (2015), The BPO industry registered a total of 257 cases of occupational injuries. Most of the affected workers were employed in call centers (86.4% or 222 cases). Call center agents encounter daily stressors from work. Researches have shown that call center employees work in a distracting environment. They face high customer expectations and experience pressure to meet company standards. Thus, they experience stress as a result of the conflicting demands of the company, managers, co-workers, and customers (Ruyter, K., Wetzels, M., and Feinberg, R., 2001). Occupational risk factors have major effect on the stress level of workers. These risk factors affect the health, psychological and job performance of call centers agents. Previous researchers on occupational risk factors studied the effects of stress to job performance. However, the effect of occupational risk factors to the stress level based on the coping mechanism and work shift of agents were not yet considered in the study. Thus, this paper intends to identify significant risk factors affecting the agents’ overall performance in terms of health condition, psychological condition and job performance and measure the risk level associated with occupational stress of call center agents based on their coping mechanism and work shift. Data were gathered from 180 inbound call center agents who work in 3 shifts (opening, middle and closing). Results showed that for opening and closing shifts, occupational risk factors affecting the stress level of agents are irregular meal times, noise level, workplace temperature, workplace setup and social life disruption; while for middle shift, risk factors are workplace relationships, number of rest days, irregular mealtimes, social life disruptions and domestic life disruptions. Therefore, the identified risk factors affecting stress would serve as the basis for organizations in call center industry to develop stress management programs that would help improve call center agents’ overall performance and wellbeing.