Davao-based e-academy blazes trail in BPO skills development

A popular business and tourism school in Davao City is blazing a new trail in business process outsourcing (BPO).

The Joji Ilagan Bian (JIB) Foundation College of Business and Tourism, which has been around since 1980, has branched out into the BPO industry by putting up the JIB e-Academy and Solutions, a language school by day and a call center by night.

"Housed in our newly-constructed building, the language school turns into a bustling 120-seat call center by midnight, providing foreign clients with integrated CRS (customer relationship solutions and services)," said businesswoman, educator and civic leader Joji Ilagan Bian, president of both the foundation and the e-academy.

"But at the break of day, this full-fledged call center returns to being a language school where English is as cool as ‘ICE’, our acronym for immersion, comprehension, and expression," Bian added.

ICE represents the school’s unique methodology in teaching the English language to elementary, high school and college students, and in providing competent training to aspiring call center representatives and medical transcriptionists.

Aside from grammar and vocabulary, the language curriculum includes an accent modification course with training modules created by JIB e-Academy’s pool of foreign and local consultants. The course is backed up with a US technology-based interactive software that guides a student in word pronunciation through the computer, which is equipped with voice and data.

On the other hand, the call center curriculum provides comprehensive training in customer handling, which includes selling strategies, inbound servicing, aptitude and attitude, values and ethics, confidence building and character development, and complete command of the spoken and written English language. It is the only call center school in the Philippines that operates as an actual call center from 12 midnight to 12 noon.

All of JIB’s call center representatives came from this school, which had partnered with other call centers for manpower supply.

"In fact, 70 percent of our 435 graduates since we started last June are already employed," Bian said. "And we make sure that our graduating students can pass any call center employment examination, or we don’t graduate them. That’s why we want to ensure 100 percent competence of our graduates… because we provide jobs as part of the package."

The "e" in JIB e-Academy stands, not only for electronic or English, but more so for education, employment, and entrepreneurship.

The JIB e-Academy offers three call center curriculums – the two to three months finishing course that yields a professional certificate, the six-month diploma course, and the two-year associate course in call center management.

"We went to become a model institution for English language and call center education and operation," Bian stressed.

With the success of its unique operations, JIB e-Academy will soon open a branch along A. Rodriguez Avenue (C-5) in Libis, Quezon City.

Perhaps, this time the ‘e’ also stands for "expansion."