Interviewed and written by: Allanah Paragas
With Asia being one of the sought-out regions for shared services, the Philippines has continuously earned a well-placed spot as a destination for global outsourcing services.
The Philippine IT-BPM has come a long way after two decades—with shared service firms transitioning from its early years of being transactional to now Centers of Excellence with optimized delivery models led by intelligent automation and data-driven business analytics.
Regal Rexnord (formerly Regal Beloit) is a leading manufacturer of electric motors, electrical motion controls, power generation, and mechanical power transmission products. It is among the global firms that established its shared services with a Center of Excellence. Since its inception in 2004, Regal Rexnord Philippines has been one the most successful IT-BPM companies in the shared services sub-sector. It supports the four business divisions—Motion Control Solutions (MCS), Commercial, Industrial, and Climate.
Lorena Biclar, Country Head of Regal Rexnord Philippines, shared the story behind the company’s transformation, success, and plans after the merger between Regal Beloit’s Power Transmission business and Rexnord’s PMC business this October 2021.
Interview Transcript
How did you start your career and lead the way to where you are now with Regal Rexnord?
I started my career in 2004 as an individual contributor in a customer service role. Before working, in my days as a student, leading is innate in me. I actively participated in school activities and was part of the student council and other school organizations. So when I was a CSR, while I was not in a people management position, I unconsciously performed leadership tasks in our team. My first official leadership role was in customer service managing the International Customer Service team for Emerson Power Transmission. Since then, I moved to various leadership roles, including Training Lead, Customer Service Manager, and Operations Manager, before becoming the Country Leader for Regal Beloit Philippines in 2016. As the Country Head for Regal Rexnord Philippines, I am responsible for leading our Manila-based Center of Excellence. I am incredibly proud of my team. I work with the most passionate and driven associates who contribute daily to the success of the organization.
What is the culture of Regal Rexnord Philippines that contributes to your team’s success?
About 32% of our associates have tenure of between 10 and 15 years, while roughly 4% have more than 15 years of service. This data is an indication of the excellent retention rate we have in the organization. In addition, we recently completed Regal Rexnord Culture Survey that was implemented globally in the company. The Philippine operation had a 97% participation rate, and we rated above the norm in all categories. Again, this speaks of the culture and working conditions we offer to our associates.
Even while working from home during this pandemic, we remain committed to maintaining a dynamic and fun environment at work. For example, we have monthly virtual games organized by different teams to induce engagement. In addition, we continued with our annual events like Employee Service Awards, Teambuilding, Trick or Treat, and Year-end Celebration. In between, we celebrate other events, like International Women’s Day, Customer Care Week, and Regal Rexnord Anniversary. Recognition is vital to us, so we have a Rewards and Recognition Program to appreciate the excellent performance of our associates. The well-being of our team is also important to us. To show this, we continue to work from home, improve our healthcare coverage, and conduct mental health seminars. Because we care about the people, the people take care of the results for the business’s success.
What are the key initiatives your team is involved in that contribute to the digital transformation of Regal Rexnord?
Regal Rexnord Philippines is a Center of Excellence supporting functions that include Customer Care, Supply Chain, Finance, Information Technology, Digital Marketing, Engineering, Pricing, and Analytics.
Our team is highly engaged in improvement projects in these functions. Our Digital Marketing, IT, and Engineering teams are key contributors to Regal Rexnord’s digital strategic initiatives to enhance and align the customers’ digital experience. In the Supply Chain function, our global sourcing team led and completed a Kaizen event to create a centralized system and process in managing supplier profile data. Having one strategy leads to reduction or avoidance of error rate, audit non-compliance, and cybersecurity threat. Our Customer Care and Accounts Payable teams are involved in the ongoing evaluation and improvement efforts of our optical character recognition and customer relationship management tools. The purpose is to meet the increasing demands of our customers and internal users by adding value thru automation that impacts the overall customer experience. Our Pricing support in Manila expanded from only having seven specialists to a team of twenty-three associates. This team is actively engaged in the Motion Control Solutions business segment’s pricing optimization, process standardization, and other improvements projects.
We are also starting to expand in the data management and analytics function. The analysts act as subject matter experts for new processes, KPI’s, and data management. They help mine and analyze data from company databases to drive optimization and improvement of product development, marketing techniques, and business strategies. In addition, Regal Rexnord Philippines completed and passed the ISO 9001-2015 certification audit in October 2020 and the surveillance audit in July of 2021. We also have a dedicated training and quality team focused on the associates’ development, especially on technical skills training requirements.
Lastly, Regal Rexnord is driving a culture of continuous improvement throughout the organization. The team in the Philippines is actively participating in this effort. We continue to challenge ourselves to make things today better than yesterday.
The growth of Regal Beloit has been impressive. So what is next for Regal Rexnord in the next two years?
We are excited to grow our team in headcount and job responsibilities. We want to make a more significant impact on Regal Rexnord. Between 2020 and 2021, we increased our positions by 30%. The following two years look promising for the team in Manila, especially with the recently completed merger of Regal’s Power Transmission business and Rexnord’s PMC business. We look forward to expanding our support within the expanded MCS business and the rest of the Regal Rexnord divisions.
What makes the Philippines a competitive area in the shared services space? What can Filipino talents look forward to?
We are the best cost location and offer the best value to the business. Filipinos are high-caliber talents not only in the shared service space but in different industries. In 2020 when COVID-19 started, our team went through challenges of adapting to the “new normal.” But it was during that time that I felt even more blessed to lead this team. The resilience and positive attitude were admirable. We remained engaged and felt more driven to support the business. The Filipino talents can look forward to more career opportunities in the shared service sector.
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