Employees of Alpine Techno pose outside their office. A Telegraph picture

Jamshedpur, April 8: To meet the growing demand of jobs in the BPO sector, city-based software company Alpine Techno has started a training program for students.

The first call centre of the state, Alpine Techno is also the first company to provide training to students for free.

“There is a severe shortage of employees for the call centre industry and attrition is also very high. To hone talent for this sector, we have started the free training course,” said N.A. Khan, CEO of Alpine Techno that operates from the Software Technology Park Of India, Namkum, Ranchi.

Alpine Techno caters to mortgage firms in the USA.

The company also develops software products for its Indian and global clientele.

In the month-long course students are taught voice modulation, accent management, personality development and business content management.

The first batch comprising 10 students from Ranchi has just passed out in March, this year.

“It is not only a strict training for handling calls. We also teach them soft skills that will hone their semi-managerial abilities,” said Khan.

Now the company plans to visit colleges in Jamshedpur and other major cities in the state for campus recruitment. Talks are on with colleges for placements, soon.

Khan claims that the offer made by their company would attract many students even though multinationals in the industry like Infosys and Wipro have been approaching colleges here for their BPO placements.

“We know that the students have a wider choice today and we certainly do not claim to match the package of the biggies. But there will be advantages of working here as well,” said Khan.

The average employee at Alpine Techno gets around Rs 7,000 per month. Local graduates who stay here would have a higher potential for saving, reasoned Khan. This, he said, would seem as an attractive proposition to many students who would get good job exposure before they shift to bigger metros.

While Apline also accepts students who have finished Plus Two, the preference is for fresh graduates. After an evaluation at the end of the course, an agreement will be signed with those who complete the course for a compulsory work term of six months with the company.

Currently the company is a 48-seater call centre with about 65-70 employees.