What is voice and accent training?

Voice and accent training is a growing avenue with BPO companies (Business Process Outsourcing). Also referred to as call centres, these companies exist in all sectors of business including banking, utilities, manufacturing, security, market research, pharmaceuticals, catalogue sales, credit collections and airline/hotel reservations etc.

A call centre is a service centre with telecom facilities, access to internet and wide database, which provide voice based or web-based information and support to customers in the country or abroad through trained personnel.

The types of services in this industry are -- Inbound and Outbound voice.

The call centre services can be 'inbound' where in calls are received from customers enquiring about a service or product that an organisation provides.

The call centre services can be 'outbound' where in calls are made to customers to sell products or collect information / money etc. Call centre services can also be 'specialised' where in calls are made from one company to another company.

The career avenues provided here is one of the best suited and growing options which even a fresher can opt for. It is a good option for senior secondary pass students or fresh college graduates as well as housewives and retired people.

Where can one get trained or where are these courses available?

A lot of reputed multinational companies offer training programmes on voice and accent, but such courses are generally given in-house, to employees who have been assessed as being right for the training. That is a candidate after being absorbed with the company can get trained in-house. Some of the noteb BPO companies are GE capital, Hero Mindmine, American Express, Wipro Spectramind, and IBM Daksh, etc.

There is no standard training period. It can be between two and 12 weeks depending on the project. Topics covered include accent training, listening skills, 'slang' training, accent neutralisation, telephone etiquette, telesales etiquette and cyber grammar, interaction skills, customer relationship, management skills and call centre terminology.

Continuous training at regular intervals including updating on the latest references and slang the callers are likely to use, is a must for growth in this field.

What are the eligibility criteria?

There are no specific educational qualifications required to be a voice and accent trainer.

The skills required vary depending on the project and the type of business that is being handled. However, some skills that come in handy when working with a BPO are:

• Good command over the English language.

• Computer literacy.

• Typing speed.

• Knowledge of consumer behaviour.

• Marketing skills (a certificate or diploma in marketing in case of 'outbound' telemarketing is preferable).

• Ability to enter and retrieve information quickly from databases.

• Ability to analyse problems.

What is the scope of this career?

A fresher could start a career in an international / domestic call centre as a call centre executive and earn a highly attractive pay package. Future opportunities include:

Customer Care Specialists (C.C.S.)

Customer Care Specialists respond to customer queries received through email, voice and chat by using CRM (customer relationship management) tools such as email & voice management systems, and chat applications. C.C.S. has to deliver high quality response with utmost speed so that each customer query is resolved in one contact.

Team Leaders

A team leader manages and develops a team of 10-25 C.C.S. and aids them in delivering exceptional customer service by ensuring that they achieve optimum output, quality and productivity standards.

Process trainer

A process trainer imparts process knowledge that is the technicalities of the process to a C.C.S. This helps in ensuring an efficient and quality response while taking calls.

Voice and accent trainers

A voice and accent trainer polishes the already present linguistic skills in a C.C.S. The trainer helps to improve communication skills, trains on the concept of listening and dealing with various customer types by using voice modulation, and other soft skills.

First hand account of this profession: a blind person’s perspective

Madhu Bala Sharma: an alumnus from Delhi Public School, a graduate in English from Delhi University is now a voice and accent trainer. This is her story.

 

Born and brought up in Delhi, Madhu Bala studied via the integrated education programme of National Association for the Blind.

The seeds for her to be transformed into a voice and accent trainer were planted at a company called GECIS, where she worked as a flexi-timer while she was graduating. After which she was fortunate to join a leading BPO company where she trains customer care executives on their voice and accent skills.

On being asked how she adapted to her workplace, she said: I orient myself to my work space as it adds to my confidence while facing a group of trainees.

 It also helps in forming a rapport with them because if I am able to move around without any hesitation and know my space well, then it will build a level of trust.

Also, JAWS (a screen reading software), goes a long way in enabling me to be at par with my other non-visually impaired colleagues. I can surf the intra-net and use the training material just like any other trainer.

Madhu Bala ensures that she has a Braille copy of the printed training material, given to all the trainees, so that she can keep track and be on the same page along with them.

However, she did mention that initially when her training started, she was a little uncomfortable with not being able to catch-up at lunch or other breaks with her colleagues (no fixed work-station in her field). She had to be with her trainees throughout. But as it is said, you turn your weaknesses into strengths; she too over came this by utilising the lunch time to get to know her batch even better. This in turn helped her devise techniques to help her trainees learn in an efficient way, which are famously known as person specific techniques. And, to meet up with colleagues, she found time post-shift and during team meetings, which offered the perfect platform to interact and mingle.

Another challenge Madhu Bala brought up was: to handle a group of around 15 highly energetic youngsters, to make them stay with her during the session, and to maintain the decorum. She emphatically said that while it was difficult it was not impossible. She offered the following route to transforming this situation:

• Empower everyone,

• Build the team spirit,

• Make them feel that there is no classroom scenario,

• Create a lot of positivism in the environment,

• Encourage one among them as your second eye: they can keep you aware of the responses of others in the group (to ensure decorum).

• She lightly pointed out that the last technique is what she enjoyed most during her school days: monitoring her fellow pupils. Madhu Bala feels working as a Voice and Accent trainer is a fun job for a person who loves to interact with people. Although she is herself a budding professional, she lists the following mantras for people who want to pursue this profession:

Mantra 1: As a voice and accent trainer, one should be comfortable with the language, including pronunciation, spellings, grammar, vocabulary and fluency in verbal English.

Mantra 2: One should also be at ease with people, and should be able to associate with them. Mantra 3: One also needs to be creative, to invent ways to keep up the energy levels during the training process.

Mantra 4: One should be familiar with human psychology to be able to work with trainees with varying levels of emotional maturity.

Madhu Bala Sharma is presently working with the call centre of a reputed MNC.