Japanese co. offshores English teaching to India

NEW DELHI: The best way to learn a language is to speak it. But, if you live in Japan and are learning English, it could be difficult to find a lot of people with whom you can converse in English. Not to worry, Indian call-center execs are just a toll-free number away.

A large Japanese company has its employees call into India to improve their spoken English. The company has an English-learning program for its employees, wherein they contact agents at Immaculate, a Bangalore-based call center for assistance with their P's and Q's.

The Japanese employees call and practice their spoken English with agents at Immaculate's call center-talking to an anonymous person on the other end of the line gives them a sense of comfort. So, they don't feel inhibited to speak freely in a language they are uncomfortable in. They choose their own topics of discussion, which range from political and cultural issues to news.

In fact, it was a discussion on 'inhibitions of speaking in English' with the Japanese company in question, that won Immaculate this contract, says Sanjeev, CEO of Immaculate. The Japanese company was sending its employees to English-language training workshops, but found that they were not practising what they learnt during the training, possibly because of a fear of making mistakes in front of their colleagues. Hence the idea of a buddy system with unknown call-center agents, found favor.

Currently Immaculate has four such English-language 'trainers'. At present, around 30 people from the Japanese company have registered for the service.

This being a new program, and the first of its kind, the agents have not been through any formal training in Japanese language or culture. The agents are self learned, having picked up skills from audio and video clips on language issues in Japan and other training material. They are trained to lend a good ear and correct when necessary.

All this while you've known of Indian agents with Anglicized names who know when to roll their 'r's, but now there are agents who speak English the way Japanese do.

Global Outsourcing