Berthaphil Industrial and Business Park, houses several BPO’s, call centers and other multi-national companies with highly skilled English speaking workers and employees. These companies can clearly attest the availability of large and cost-effective labor pool. Also, Metro Manila, only an hour's trip away, has an abundant pool of low-cost managerial and technical labor, including many individuals with up-to-the-minute information technology skills.
Trainable Workforce
The Philippines is generally acknowledged to have the most highly motivated and easily trainable labor force in Asia. Numerous studies and surveys have ranked the Filipino worker higher in procedures than his counterparts in other Asian countries, including China, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. A leading Hong Kong consulting firm gave Filipino workers the best overall score based on points for quality, cost, availability and turnover among workers in East Asia. Skilled and managerial level employees are widely considered the best in terms of wage costs and quality of any country in Asia. According to a September 1996 issue of the Economist, "Although India may provide the cheapest and most available labor, only the Philippines scores reasonably well in all categories." Several surveys noted that Filipino workers usually respond well to productivity goals and wage incentives for increasing their output.
High Literacy Rate
The Philippines has one of the highest literacy rates (93%) in Asia, and English is widely spoken and taught in schools across the country. Most workers are fluent in English to communicate with foreign managers and to allow the use of manuals and training materials without the time and expense of translation and to allow foreign experts to conduct training directly, without the use of translators. This allows considerable reduction in training time and cost, with increased training quality. The quality of Philippine secondary education is well regarded by foreign managers.