RACONTEURPH

Ingram Micro sees artificial intelligence as opportunity

In light of the growing presence of automation and artificial intelligence (AI) in today’s businesses, there has been an unpopular assumption that these technologies will bring negative effects on the work sector, such as unemployment.

On the contrary, many organizations in the country actually believe that these technologies will have a positive impact on jobs. Now celebrating its 10th anniversary in the country, Ingram Micro Philippines is seeing these technologies as opportunities and not as threats.

“In terms of digitalization, AI, and robotics, we look at these as opportunities,” said Sam White, HR Director at Ingram Micro Philippines. “We are trying our best to dispel fear and hesitation, because a lot of people perceive automation is equivalent to having no job.” Putting emphasis on the importance of human element behind these technologies, White rhetorically asked: “Who has to build automation? Who has to maintain automation? Who has to identify which processes need automation?”

“Starting last year, we’ve been having a robust strategy to reskill our workforce, making automation, digitalization, data literacy, and financial literacy part of our employees’ skill set, so that they can look for innovative ideas and take away the mundane part of the job and focus more on high context areas,” he added.

As part of its celebration and a way of thanking its partners and employees, Ingram Micro Philippines recently staged a concert titled Rock MNL in Makati City. The event featured luminaries of the local music scene such as This Band, The Ransom Collective, December Avenue, Parokya ni Edgar, and Ely Buendia.

While looking forward at the bright future, BPO industry veteran and Ingram Micro Philippines Managing Director Junar Amador can’t help but look back at the challenges and successes that the company achieved through the years.

“For everyone who is familiar with the BPO industry which started in the 90s, the primary goal was to take advantage of the lower labor cost in the Philippines,” said Amador. “Sooner we realized that we Filipinos can provide value-added service to the business than just doing transactional activities.”

“In every BPO startup in the Philippines, one of the challenges is really more of matching the competencies of the local labor pool with that of the United States. Also, the challenge then was how we can level up the performance of our staff in comparison with our counterparts in the world. We're still in the process of continuing to transform the quality and competency of our workforce,” he added.

From its small beginnings with just a handful of employees, Ingram Micro Philippines now has over 2,500 employees to date. A world leader in technology and IT supply chain services, its US-based parent company was founded back in 1979. Soon, its global network expanded exponentially, providing support through approximately 35,000 world-wide associates and serving more than 200,000 resellers in approximately 160 countries.

Its Manila office opened its doors in 2009 and has since risen to the occasion, becoming one of the most reputable and multi-awarded Shared Services companies in the country.

MAIN PHOTO: Ingram Micro Philippines HR Director Sam White, Director for GBS Digitalization and Applications Kanishka Sinha, Managing Director Junar Amador, Finance Services Director Cees Schepers, Finance Director Thomas Hasseneder, Controllership and Purchasing Senior Manager Jun Meneses, Legal Officer Atty. Jo Amoncio, Go-to Market Director Maan Ceville, and Service Delivery Excellence Director Dindo Gatan.