The Service Delivery Master Standards (SDMS – Release 1.0, then) was pressed into global circulation in 2006 after it completed its grueling 4-year international validation exercise. A week after it was flagged off for commissioning as the credentialing base for the BSDQ® series of certifications by the BPO Enterprise Certification Council, one senior executive of a leading multinational BPO emailed a telling, but honest congratulatory note to us. It was long, but the most interesting line was “… Finally, after two decades of existence, we’ll get to wear our own, exquisitely cut suit, and not a hurriedly-altered stuff of a dear neighbor…”

This weather-beaten and highly accomplished professional expressed exactly what BCI was painstakingly attempting to achieve – to create a set of Service Delivery quality standards that were exactly suited for the BPO industry. Hence, even in its first version, the SDMS – Release 1.0, none of the 18 “Capability spheres” or parameters, were a take-off from some quality-management manual.

Today, two revisions later, the SDMS – Release 1.2, is gradually catching on as a preferred standard and over the last one year, we have received more than three dozen requests for proposals (RFPs) from BPOs across the world, including those from India, China, Egypt and Philippines for implementation of SDMS and getting BSDQ® Certified.

In a simpler perspective, SDMS has given BPO companies a sharp set of tools to resize and polish their operations and improve business across the board. Outsourcing managers worldwide are increasingly looking for vendors and BPO service providers that display the capabilities of handling large volumes of business-critical processes in ever narrowing industry verticals at lowering marginal costs. This marks a giant twist to the whole game of outsourcing. For a BPO Vendor, this means a paradigm shift in no uncertain terms, if it wants to retain current clients and add new ones. Hence, the need is to prove capabilities to deliver across verticals all the while retaining the same levels of functional delivery standards on ever lowering costs. The SDMS helps BPOs accomplish exactly that. It spells standards for BPOs across all service-critical attributes and makes it easier for them to optimize processes and practices along well-proven lines.    

Though very young, the SDMS has gone under the scalpel twice already and emerged a fitter, leaner body of service delivery standards – SDMS – Release 1.2. Take a look at the changes…

To know more about how SDMS Release 1.2 can revolutionize your BPO’s service delivery capabilities, organization, please write to: sdms@bpocertifications.com