Before she could even take the national board examinations, my nurse sister was pretty insistent in her request to work in a call center instead of doing voluntary work as a nurse in a clinic or a hospital. Her intentions were to improve her spoken English (or to stay in trend since call center jobs in the country are hot nowadays, or just to be with her friends maybe!) but our intentions were for her to get a direct and actual experience in her chosen field of endeavor, that is, nursing. After passing the board exams, she again tried to mesmerize us using her enticing online smiles and giggles (courtesy of the smileys!) as well as her persistent plea to be in the area she’d like to venture in. 

Honestly, I have nothing against telemarketing or working in a call center. I myself used to work for 2 years as a telemarketer. It was fun and I learned a lot and grew up as a mature and more responsible person. The experience was really astonishing as it really made me feel more comfortable speaking with anyone—with no discrimination—from the gatekeepers (security guards, secretaries, or personal assistants), office staff, supervisors, junior and senior managers, to the CEOs, CFOs, COOs, Chairmen, Presidents, and Directors of the Board of numerous international companies. With this kind of experience, how would you not like it, enjoy it? And more importantly, the net pay was good! 

Call center business, or say, telemarketing is a very powerful multi-billion dollar direct marketing vehicle, which offers total flexibility in terms of timing since calling hours are very much adjustable. The call scripts or sales pitches can also be tailor-made or changed at any moment’s notice. Despite the many positive attributes of telemarketing, however, there have been negative associations of it with various scams and frauds, such as pyramid schemes, and with deceptively overpriced products and services conducted by fraudulent telemarketing companies (also called as “boiler rooms”). It has also been highly criticized as an unethical business practice due to high-pressure sales techniques during unsolicited calls and often considered an annoyance, especially when they occur during the dinner hour, early in the morning, or late in the evening, or even when the party is driving.

Although there are many fly-by-night firms doing these kinds of business, yet, not all telemarketing services are bad or doing bad deals. One good example is a call center service arm for an airline company where I recently got to speak to one Filipino call center representative concerning my ticket purchase. Call center and telemarketing businesses may vary in some ways and in the application of the services, yet, both basically conduct the business in very similar ways.

And even so, this is not what we want for our nurse sister to do. It’s not that we don’t want her to improve or experience other fields of work, but it can divert her attention and will further delay her ultimate plans of providing health care services to the sick and needy of the service, and/or working as a nurse somewhere she dreamed and still dreams to be. The bottom line is that, no job-hopping, go straight to the point, sis!