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Digicon GES© Case Study

Bangladesh: Digicon Technologies

Leading Business Process Outsourcing Company in Bangladesh

Overview

Founded in 2010, Digicon Technologies Limited (Digicon or the “Company”) has earned a strong reputation as a leading Business Processing Outsourcing (BPO) service provider. The Company delivers turnkey solutions to all industries that outsource their customer care division and back-office support.

Digicon offers a breadth of voice-based services covering clients across multiple industries, including packages for inbound and outbound call-center facilities. In addition, the Company offers ready-to-go services that clients can deploy in a short period, such as:

  • Customer Help Desk Digicon provides help desk services by directly integrating with the client’s network and can address customer concerns by employing its own resources or engaging concerned departments
  • Back Office Support Includes account receivables, software development, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) services, infrastructure management, document management, data mining, database builds, data harvesting and direct mail campaign alerts
  • Billing and Coding Digicon also provides medical billing and coding services to physician chambers, hospitals and medical billing companies ensuring timely booking, billing and reimbursements while maintaining accuracy
  • Training Digicon offers a variety of training courses to corporate workforces focusing on contact centers, back-office and other knowledge-based domains of the BPO industry

Digicon’s client base includes leading telecommunication companies, multinational electronic companies, insurance, non-banking financial institutions and government institutions amongst others. The Company is also involved in different training projects with both government and private organizations. Most of Digicon’s government training projects are focused on developing the next generation of skilled employees for Bangladesh’s thriving ICT sector.

The Company is a training partner of the Bangladesh Association of Call Center and Outsourcing (BACCO) in which it is leading a dynamic initiative to train thousands of the country’s unemployed graduates/diploma holders aged 18-40 years in Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) skills including call center service, data entry, accounting, human resources, healthcare, legal processes, document management and IT services.

Digicon also arranges training programs for women, partnering with different government authorities. The programs foster women’s healthcare, women’s entrepreneurship and technical skills development.

Key Facts

Current Activities

  • More than 110 million of Bangladesh’s 160 million population is under the age of 35. Only 60 million of them are connected over the internet. They are not only using the internet for entertainment purposes, but also for creative and innovative tasks
  • Obstacles exist for educated women to become involved in traditional jobs due to social norms. However, the BPO sector has been attracting talented women as it offers an excellent working environment and general opportunity for them
  • The Skills for Employment Investment Program (SEIP) supports the Government of Bangladesh’s reforms in skills development as articulated in the National Skills Development Policy. SEIP enables a large proportion of the population to be employed
  • Access to free training facilities for educated women through SEIP has contributed to an increase in female participation in the BPO industry.
  • Around 2,000 people have enrolled in SEIP training programs with Digicon under four different courses with over 700 of them being female. Around 56% of the trained participants receiving direct job placement at Digicon and at other Bangladesh’s other BPO companies.

Digicon’s SEAF Gender Equality Score©

Bangladesh Gender Demographics

  • The employment size of Bangladesh is increasing over time and the percentage of women’s participation has increased more than that of men.
  • Bangladesh has seen an increase in literacy rate for both women (71%) and men (76%), with the divide narrowing over the past 5 years.
  • The benefits for women working in BPO include an increase in income, the ability to gain new and varied skills, an increased sense of empowerment and better healthcare, amongst others.
  • Different ICT and BPO training programs have been initiated by the Bangladeshi government to develop the technical skills of educated young people in the country, including some women’s economic empowerment initiatives.

Women’s Economic Empowerment Highlights of Digicon

Pay Equity

  • No major pay discrimination for the employees in Digicon, the compensation ratio of the female and male salaried employees is 92%. Additionally, the Company has a compensation policy which explicitly supports pay equity
  • SEAF WEE Team is working with the Company to establish employee surveys for benchmarking studies, with disaggregated data to further improve pay equity

Benefits & Professional Development

  • Addressing gender equality in the workplace by offering paid maternity leave and other postnatal benefits to women employees
  • Providing health insurance facilities that improve employee performance and increase productivity
  • Enabling women to reach their full potential by developing their capacity through different training programs
  • Providing phone allowance, subsidized food and daily transportation facilities that disproportionally benefit women employees

Workforce Participation

  • 39% female workforce participation
  • Finds the right talent for its workforce from its own training programs. Female workplace participation in Digicon is increasing through direct recruitment from the SEIP training programs
  • Digicon is in a good place for learning about the effectiveness of a work-life balance in attracting and retaining talent, particularly female employees. Different recreational and cultural events are arranged regularly for the employees as team building activities
  • Overall female turnover ratio is only 7.4%, comparatively less than that of men

Workplace Environment

  • Practicing roster basis duty (8 hours) to maintain the productivity and increase efficiency of its employees. For safety and health issues, female employees are not allowed to work the night shift in Digicon
  • Ensuring a safe workplace environment for women employees by establishing strict adherence to the sexual harassment policy
  • Offering flexibility in working arrangements and work timings which encourage Digicon’s female employees to join and stay longer. Moreover, employees are rewarded on a merit basis for timely deliveries
  • Also ensuring a safe place of work, where facilities are strictly monitored, and transportation is easily accessible

Leadership & Governance

  • Increasing cap table representation with 11% of shareholders being women, compared to the wider South Asian context where only an average of 18% of the firms have women among their principal owners
  • 14% C-Suite representation are women vs South Asia as a whole in which only 11% of firms have women as top managers
  • Increasing female ownership and leadership helps foster a culture that embraces diversity and rewards people based on their achievements and their potential capabilities
  • SEAF WEE team is working with the Company to help more women employees achieve their career development at top and mid-management levels

Women Powered Value Chains

  • Empowering women through freelance, IT and call center training services that are fully dedicated for educated women in rural areas of Bangladesh
  • Working actively to help increase female entrepreneurs in the Information and Telecommunication Technology (ICT) sector through the “She Power Project: Sustainable Development for Women through ICT” training program with the ICT division of the Bangladesh Government
  • Providing “Family Planning” training for women in collaboration with Directorate General of Family Planning (DGFP) that ensures the good health and well-being of women, particularly in remote areas of the country

Download this case study in pdf form here.

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