Bryan Ang
Hwee Leng Ng
Ryan Chan
Case Western Reserve University - Weatherhead School of Management
Ron Fry
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Agape-CP has innovated to position itself from being a basic call center towards being a multi-channel contact center employing diverse marginalised people and providing them with skills training (SDG #8 Decent Work, #10 Reduced Inequalities) to handle voice calls, email marketing and webchat interaction for its customers who require integrated marketing solutions (SDG #9 Industry Innovation).
Agape-CP has innovated to position itself from being a basic call center towards being a multi-channel contact center employing diverse marginalised people and providing them with skills training to handle voice calls, email marketing and webchat interaction for its customers who require integrated marketing solutions.
Based on Agape's success thus far, Anil and Joseph shared that they are currently preparing to set up an all-women, in-prison, contact center infrastructure (capacity for 120 customer service staff) with advanced computer telephony and CRM systems that would serve both targeted commercial and existing social purposes, following the success and confidence that the men, in-prison, call center has achieved.
Agape means “Unconditional Love” in Greek. Anil the founder strongly believes that regardless of background and marginality, everyone with the desire and talent should be given an equal opportunity to succeed, thus transforming their lives and those around them.
Anil served jail time before and got a job while in prison working in a call center where he worked his way up to the position of center manager. When he completed his jail term, equipped with this job knowledge, Anil “decided to do something in life that my daughters can be proud of as my redemption, and to give back to society,” by starting a call center business for inmates and fellow ex-convicts. “The true inspiration for my starting Agape-CP was divine instruction passed down that has helped me to overcome all the business odds given my background,” he shared.
Joseph See joined Agape-CP as CEO in 2018 after having experienced working with Agape-CP as its commercial customer, identifying with its values, and sharing in Anil’s passion and mission. He wanted to see “how we can make a difference for the marginalised people and empower them through employment to get out of the low cycles in their lives, for sustainability, beyond purely commercial profits, which requires a lot of heart that guides the head on what we want to achieve in life and give back.” Joseph continued, “I felt called to serve in this marketplace which is the most meaningful thing I have done in my whole life.”
Agape-CP provides productive employment opportunities to over 100 marginalised people currently (over 85 prison/ex inmates, 6 senior citizens, 3 people with disabilities, 3 single mothers and 1 stroke patient) who meet its contact center customers’ desire for local language speakers to effectively market their products/services.
“By 2020, the vision is we hope to impact about 400 lives (through training them and providing good jobs) by increasing our centers’ capacity and market catchment,” Joseph stated.
He went on to share, “We never know the power of the human heart and capacity to change through empowerment of dignified work – nothing can happen without a change of heart … we can be that (social) catalyst through the work platform we provide.”
Businesses that are marketing women products/service eg. beauty, women wellness and healthcare are looking for and would benefit from Agape-CP’s new contact center that is staffed by women contact agents who can understand and relate better with its femaole prospects/customers. This would contribute to Agape-CP’s current revenue growth and profitability.
To this end, Joseph offered an industry insight, “People tend to be more open to and patient with women contact agents and this creates a better marketing chance for commercial businesses.”
Agape-CP is helping to reduce unemployment which is stressful and diminishes self-esteem. Such stress in turn can destabilize family bonds with larger societal impact. Children of single mothers are at a higher risk of not living with their unemployed mother and such family instability can affect children's health and social development in the long term.
“We are learning constantly to re-define the marginalised group and their wider reach – this makes the work very meaningful for us every day … we know it is very purposeful … what is most important is our ability to touch more marginalised people through our work.” Joseph stated.
Anil added, “What matters in the end is that the person does not go back to prison … we want to create leaders among these people because then they become good fathers, good mothers, good siblings back home and (benefiting) society.”
Facts & Sources (Singapore Prison Service, Singapore Ministry of Social & Family Development):
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Agape Connecting People is an outsourced contact centre services company. Its communication specialists deliver multi-channel outsourcing call centre services to customers with cutting-edge interaction solutions.
The company employs the marginalised in society such as the disabled and ex-offenders, providing them skills and a job, and giving them equal opportunity to succeed and transform their lives.
