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Apart from foolproof contracts and defined metrics, maintaining high performance and strategic alignment with business process outsourcing (BPO) teams demands investment in people. Upskilling the BPO team is necessary to boost performance, deepen collaboration, and ensure that external talent contributes meaningfully to your goals.
This article outlines results-driven strategies for upskilling your outsourced staff. We’ll also teach you how to empower your extended team to keep them competent, motivated, and aligned with your desired outcomes.
5 practical Ways to Upskill Your Outsourced Team
BPO teams are usually the backbone of customer service, back-office operations, and other critical business functions. Despite their integral role, they’re frequently left out of upskilling initiatives, leading to performance gaps, inconsistent quality, and a disconnect between internal objectives and external execution.
A robust learning and development (L&D) program increases productivity by 52%. When applied to outsourced talent, the benefits multiply. Training can improve service consistency, reduce error rates, and strengthen partner loyalty. Moreover, research shows that companies that invest in upskilling programs see a 20% improvement in performance. Consider these strategies for upskilling your outsourced staff:
1. Define clear skill development goals
Upskilling starts with clear, well-defined employee development goals. Your upskilling goals offer direction, purpose, and alignment for BPO teams that might be directly involved with daily operations.
Start by identifying the skills that directly affect your core business goals. It could be reducing customer handling time, improving data accuracy, or enhancing product knowledge. For example, if customer satisfaction (CSAT) is your top priority, focus on communication skills, product training, and empathy-building.
You can use insights from quality assurance evaluations, team leads, client feedback, and self-assessments to inform goal-setting. This approach reveals where development is necessary and encourages buy-in from the third-party team.
What’s the role of BPO in this step? You can engage the external partner in this process since they often have insights and data that are unavailable in-house. Examples include cross-industry benchmarks, training success rates, or emerging skill requirements.
2. Customize training programs to fit BPO roles
A one-size-fits-all approach to training programs is ineffective because BPO teams work with different systems, limited context, and varying levels of internal resources. Customize it by defining the outsourced role, including the actual tasks, expected outcomes, and decision-making level involved.
Next, break down the job into key competencies and map specific employee skills for each to build a relevant and targeted training path. For example, if the task involves answering customer inquiries, the required skills are communication and product knowledge. If your BPO agents handle escalation, they need decision-making and empathy.
You can also design short, focused training modules that you can combine based on the roles’ needs. This provides flexibility for different BPO partners, shifts, or even individuals at different skill levels. Role-specific training examples:
- Tier 1 support: systems navigation, basic troubleshooting
- Tier 2 support: advanced diagnostics, customer de-escalation
- Team leads: coaching skills, QA interpretation, performance metrics
Don’t simply teach what to do; teach why it matters. Embed your values, brand voice, and customer philosophy into the learning experience.
3. Implement cross-team mentorship and shadowing programs
Another strategy for upskilling your outsourced staff is mentorship and job shadowing programs. They create real-time learning experiences that accelerate growth, strengthen BPO relationships, and embed external employees more deeply into your company.
Pair external staff with internal mentors or experienced peers based on role similarity, skills gaps, or communication styles. State the program’s purpose, whether to learn a specific process or tool, improve soft skills, or understand brand tone. Then, develop a plan detailing what BPO employees need to learn, how often to meet, and what success looks like.
Allow the third-party staff to observe how your internal team works when handling customer interactions, solving problems under pressure, and navigating internal systems and tools. Use screen shares, call recordings, and live sessions to expedite learning.
Set a good training interval to avoid overwhelming the employee. For example, begin with two to three weekly sessions focusing on a topic or task. At the end of the program, let internal team members watch BPO employees perform their roles to reinforce learning and acquire new skills and ideas.
4. Co-create long-term development plans with your BPO partner
Share your goal of training your external employees early so you and your provider can align on long-term development plans that support skill growth and performance improvement. Sync your business priorities with the BPO’s workforce development objectives by asking key questions such as:
- What capabilities need to be developed in the next 6–12 months?
- How do these align with evolving product or customer needs?
- Which roles are likely to shift or expand?
Use the answers to define shared skill-building targets tied to performance key performance indicators (KPIs). Then, co-create a development framework that outlines clear skill levels, role-specific learning paths, and core versus advanced competencies.
Structure this as a roadmap of skills each role should develop in specific intervals. For example, a new customer support agent should progress from basic system navigation to advanced de-escalation techniques within a year.
Track progress by setting defined milestones and checkpoints, such as completed training modules, earned certifications, or measurable performance improvements. Review them quarterly with your BPO management team.
Make development a shared investment by providing tools, product expertise, or training content while your BPO partner handles scheduling and delivery.
5. Measure skill growth and link it to performance
Upskilling BPO employees is a continuous process, and tracking progress helps you see what strategies work and what don’t. The first step is benchmarking the employee’s performance using qualitative and quantitative data, such as QA scores, productivity metrics, soft skill assessments, and manager evaluations. Then, you must tie learning outcomes directly to KPIs.
For example, after product training, BPO agents should have fewer knowledge-based escalations. Communication workshops should increase customer satisfaction, and system or process training should improve handling time or reduce errors. If you’re using a learning management system (LMS), some software lets you track:
- Module completion rates
- Assessment scores
- Time spent on learning
- Certification or badge achievements
Without an LMS, use learning scorecards to track training attended, mentorship or shadowing participation, and post-training performance data. You can test the staff’s knowledge immediately after training with quizzes or simulations and again 30 to 60 days later to check retention and application.
Rather than relying on isolated data points, track trends over time to evaluate real skill growth. Compare pre- and post-training QA scores, monitor performance across multiple months, and gather consistent supervisor and peer feedback.
The bottom line
The strategies for upskilling your outsourced staff are a long-term investment in the adaptability of your external workforce. When you and your BPO partner approach skill development as a shared responsibility, you can unlock greater agility and high-quality service.
By embedding learning into daily workflows and fostering a culture of continuous improvement, you create a capable, committed workforce that drives sustainable business growth.
Are you looking for a BPO company that can align with your development goals? Let’s connect.
