Canadian based consulting company looking to hire - not sure where to start

Contact the governmental Export and Investment Department (CEI-RD). The director is Eddy Martinez. They are big promoters of call centers and would be able to guide you to get started. I would come down and meet with him. He could also assist you in visiting other call centers in the DR.

We published this brief on 13 May 2008 on the boom in telecom support centers in the DR.

More call centers in DR
The Center for Exports and Investment (CEI-RD) says that 57 call centers are currently operating in the DR. Eddy Martinez of CEI-RD feels that there is potential for the number of call centers to double in the next two years. He says that approximately 25,000 Dominicans are employed in call centers and forecasts that by 2014, as many as 200,000 could be employed in this sector. Martinez said that the DR has been the Latin American leader in attracting call center business. Other world leaders are the Philippines, India, Germany and Ireland. He said that these business are entry-level jobs for young Dominicans, and wages are around RD$20,000 for agents.
The CEI-RD recently signed an agreement with the Contact Center Institute of the Americas (CCI) to train more Dominicans for these jobs. INFOTEP will be the local training counterpart.


CEI-RD | Centro de Exportaci?n e Inversi?n de la Rep?blica Dominicana

See this link for some information on wages at the call centers. http://www.dr1.com/forums/employment/75435-call-center-jobs.html

Also note you can post employment opportunities in the Dominican Republic for free in the Employment Forum.

I think you'll have problems finding the caliber of people you need from the DR who speak good enough english.

adrianb said:

I think you'll have problems finding the caliber of people you need from the DR who speak good enough english.

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Unless they hire gringos/gringas.
Otherwise, I agree.
That would be a hard combo to find amongst the Dominicans, and if you did find Dominicans with those capacities, they would likely have higher scale jobs/salaries.

I know many of the consultants in the DR. Although the quality of the individuals as people is high, their business skills overall is not. There are also 'funnies' with accounting in the DR and the consultants by definition learn this and apply and implement these methods. It is hard enough to manage a best practice implementation in the DR itself. I cannot see that DR consultants will do well on the phone consulting for another country without real on the ground experience in that country.

If you go exactly by the implementation manual, they can do it. If you vary from the manual, you're in trouble. Technically you need all the bells and whistles to get it right - a proper design environment.

Again I've met some of the finest and brightest people in this industry in the DR but their training does not prepare them for a multi-national consultancy.

I've sent you a PM.

The pay scale will depend a great deal on what is expected of the employees! Will you provide an office or will they work from home? Is it all online or by phone?

How to find good candidates - again depends on specifically what you are looking for.

Remember an accounting designation here will be very different from one there!

I still think you will wind up unhappy with the caliber of the people you can find. I predict this won't work as you hoped, however I would love to hear your results in 6 months and be proven wrong.

An accounting designation in the DR is NOT the same as in Canada. And as far as supporting Oracle, I'm afraid you are not likely to find any Dominicans with the knowledge to be able to do this at all. Finding Dominicans tihat can think conceptually enough to provide telephone or verbal support would be a stretch.

This is not to speak ill of Dominicans as there are very many who are very intelligent, however there are huge cultural and educational differences that would prohibit you being able to staff your enterprise with enough with the skillset with the sophistication you require.

Also, if you intend to have them trained in Canada, that is extremely difficult as getting any kind of visa for a Dominican to go into Canada even for a week or two, is almost impossible and so far there is a waiting list of more than a year and a half for processing of even spousal visas, let alone any other kind of visitor's visa.

Sorry, but knowing accounting packages and systems as I do, I'm afraid you are going to have to drastically re-think your vision.

You can always broaden the search to include young Dominicans living in the US and Canada. From our experience, there may be many that would be interested in relocating to the DR, or are planning on doing so, if they could find adequate first time jobs.

there could also be interest from the expat community if the money was good enough.,

Despite all the words from all the folks in the game and not in the game .. I know young consultants who went to the US and are making a fine living in the consultancy profession there - accounting, manufacturing other disciplines. One young lady specifically who did not want to leave as she was doing fine in the DR but felt she had to, specifically to broaden her skill set. She got hired by a large consultancy and is now doing great. There are more folks like her in the DR. Consultants that make the decision to leave and not those that have to leave or leave in desperation.

I wrote to four consultants today and made them aware of this thread. Not one of them was very keen to look at it. Good people are good anywhere, in any country.

Accounting is just a matter of getting used to standard practice. On the accounting side it would take about six months of on-the-job good mentoring. (I mean mentoring). It is not a question of learning the tool. The folks are experienced and they will learn the tool. It is a question of learning the business environment in order for the customer to have trust in the consultant and for the consultant to be able to display local knowledge. It is not a question of ability, it is a question of education and exposure to a different country and different rules with less 'bending' ability - with added a few additional rules. Recruit well, train well and you will have good consultants. Expose them to different business environments and you will have excellent consultants.

To recruit, you will have to steal from other consultancies. I would estimate that there are about 200 trained application consultants (large aps) and of this 100, approximately 50 technical in whichever language the app requires. Much consulting training in the DR is done on the job. Consultants spend their off time back in the office learning much more than what I ever saw in the US or other first world countries. There are 3 consultancies that you can steal from. Two of them deal in Microsoft Dynamics suites (Baan specifically) and one is still dealing with legacy products. There is only one consultant that deals with SAP and no consulting services for Oracle Apps - not even legacy Peoplesoft apps. Planner cannot help you. (Sorry Planner - I know you mean well but this is very specific).

There are a few folks that deal with open source suites but I do not know them and cannot talk about them.

But really, consider that if you're going to have to put in 6 months on the job to my estimation to acclimate consultants to another business climate, would you not do better in the US or Canada itself? A few of the with-it Canadian software companies are actively recruiting in the US as a few people there are out of work.

There are not many people on the board that understand the large consulting implementation sphere.

CEI-RD is a partner in Contact Center Institute Las Americas to train staff for call centers. For more information, write to info@ccidr.com or call 809 738 3060. Their programs include call center performance metrics, call center workforce management, call center agent skills training, train the trainer, supervisor training and much more.

You should try to find a local consulting firm to team up with!

Hi,

I would like to discuss this opportunity. We have our software development center in Pune, India. I am based in Toronto. Call me at +1.416.907.4371

Thanks

rcadman said:

We're a consulting firm based out of Toronto. We implement prepacked software from Oracle. We'd like to hire a few people in the DR and start an 'near shore' type operation. This operation would be for the development and support of our clients back in Canada. We are looking for candidates that can are fluent in business English and have an accounting designation and/or business background. Candidates should also have experience and/or exposure to IT since the products are somewhat technical.

Questions:
i. Where should we start our search for the correct candidates?
ii. What are the salary expectations (range is fine)
iii. What's the best method of interviewing a series of potential candidates across a couple of days? We'd need a location and someone to coordinate the logistics for the interviewees.

Thank you.

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Oracle Consultant

I am a US citizen looking to relocate to the DR. I have 14 years of Intellectual Property experience, which includes reviewing the technical aspects of inventions. If you're interested in exploring an expat as a possible person for this position, I'd be interested in talking with you.

Marilyn

Would you be interested in hiring Americans to work in the DR? I have a strong business background with the US Navy and did a short stint with a Red Hat Enterprise Linux provider.

Dolores said:

You can always broaden the search to include young Dominicans living in the US and Canada. From our experience, there may be many that would be interested in relocating to the DR, or are planning on doing so, if they could find adequate first time jobs.

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This is a one of the smartest quotes here . I'm one of those Dominicans that are here in D.R already looking for a good jobs and i'm also a U.S Citizen .
For those interested , please send me emails and i'll try to talk .

Hey...

I'm an experienced IT professional with over 5 yrs of experience working for large law firms world wide I.E "Sidley Austin LLP"...I'm actually looking into getting employment in DR. I'm fluent in English, Spanish (i'm dominican), and Polish. Also, i'm very experienced with oracle based software - As i'm a programmer and have programmed in languages as dos, delphi, VB, activeX etc..I would like to consult with you...