Why you have an SLA, Even if you Don#8217;t

Why you have an SLA, Even if you Don8217t Hello, your snarky Maren Hogan is back from vacation and ready to take on some seriously messed up practices in the HR and Marketing world. First up, heres why your SLA totally stinks. Whats that you say? You dont have a tafelgeschirr level agreement? I beg to differ. I submit that if you are a service provider (and you are, even if you are an internal corporate service provider) you have an implicit agreement to provide amazing serviceeven if you never signed anything stating as such.There are a plethora of reasons for this, but two things are at the very heart of this changing business principle.1) The consumerization of tech People want tech that costs less, is easier to use and doesnt bracket them into a corner when it comes to signing on (i.e. more than month-to-month schrift stuff). In simpler terms, they want the technology they use in their profess ional lives to be as easy as the tech they use in their personal lives. Dont blame me blame the iPod.2) The dissemination of information Maybe youve noticed its a whole lot easier to become an expert these days. You can be a marketing expert without a degree in marketing and a recruiting guru without graduating from high school (yes you can). This isnt a bad thing, but it is a true thing and a dramatic shift in the way people think about information, knowledge and the application of both.Because of the two aforementioned trends in the world of business, people have easy ways to see if you are living up to whatever you are paying for. I used to pay $10,000 for an email list and be thrilled when people said they liked the newsletter (they would call me up.on the phone). Today, I pay less than a third for a comparable list and I can see immediately using site analytics what my return on investment is. Guess what? If its bad, I expect (actually insist) on knowing the reasons why. I, and my clients want to know why they spent thousands of dollars on something nobody read.If my service provider offers no explanation and no plan for making it right, they have broken the unwritten service level agreement. I wont be using their service again and definitely not recommending them to my clients.The same rules apply to you, wherever you are. If you are a third-party recruiter and find yourself collecting hefty fees for candidates that dont stick around, my bet is you wont be doing so for long. If youre a corporate sourcer and you greenlight every applicant, your job isnt going to stay secure once your overworked HR department starts realizing how very unqualified your people actually are.This is where the service level agreement comes in. In todays business climate, true professionals have to realize that one exists and define it for themselves and then consistently live up to it, as if it were written in stone. Why?It raises you up. You may not be the very best at what yo u do, but if you commit to busting your hump to make it right, people will perceive you that way.It builds goodwill within your industry. For years, I sold media at an organization that had pretty great results. If ever someone seemed displeased or pointed out that we were not beating our competitors in a certain area, I offered free design advice, adjusted the sending times or built new ads and tested them to figure out what we were doing wrong. As a cog in the machine, it would have been simpler to shrug and tell them sorry, but I didnt and the company I worked for had a reputation for quality AND service because of that hard work.Its profitable. Straight up. You might lose a little money making things right in the beginning, but in the end, it will pay off in spades. I recently purchased a lead generation campaign for a client that did dismally across multiple channels. One vendor did everything in its power to fix the low numbers, while another just sent the results through week lyafter the invoice. Guess which company were still working with? Over the years, only companies that provide stellar service get business time after time.For my part, I am committed to creating reasonable KPIs for myself and my team and then researching what went wrong if we dont hit them. Then, I make it right. Its a pretty simple SLA, but it works out well in the end.

5 Questions About Resume Writing Job Seekers Often Ask

5 Questions About Resume Writing Job Seekers Often Ask5 Questions About Resume Writing Job Seekers Often AskIf you are embarking on a job search and gearing up to write your resume, you likely have lots of questions about what it should look like and what content it should contain. Professional resume writers are constantly bombarded by such queries, and here are some of the fruchtwein common questions and answers to make your task more fruitful.See Tips for Surviving a Career Transition.Is there a right length for a resume? Theres no one right answer. If you are a recent college graduate or have only had a brief career, its best to keep it to one page. If you are a mid-career professional, with multiple jobs and accomplishments, a two-page resume is a good rule of thumb. Senior-level executives, academics with many publications to list and other special cases often merit an additional page or even two.That said, throughout years in recruiting and later in the resume-writing world, t his author has never heard of a hiring authority who said, I wont consider so-and-so because his or her resume is too long or too short. Rather, whats of key importance is using the resume to highlight your education, skills, the professional challenges you faced in your work and how you turned them into accomplishments.How can I write my resume to avoid age discrimination? Age discrimination is rampant in America. However, there are three things that you can do on your resume to mitigate it, at least to a degree.First, dont lead at the top of your resume by claiming how long youve been doing something. For example, Salesman with 32 years of experience, clearly labels you as being in your 50s or beyond.Second, remember there is a big difference between a resume and a job application. Absolute honesty is required in both, but in a resume, there is no obligation on your part to list employment history for more than 10 to 15 years, or so wherever there may be a natural break due to a job transition. You can always conclude your professional experience section with a line like, Details of prior experience are available upon request.Third, you can omit the years you received college and advanced degrees, and many resume writers encourage people in their 50s and older to do so.There is some debate on this, however. Rarely do younger workers ever omit their graduation dates, and you therefore give the unspoken message, Im an older worker. This might work against you if you are in your early 50s and the employer jumps to the conclusion that you are in your late 50s or 60s, making you even more likely a target of early stage elimination due to age discrimination.See 25 Best Business Jobs for 2017.What are the unbreakable rules of writing a resume? Your resume must look professional. That means there can be no typographical or spelling errors. Your grammar should be impeccable. And your sentences must make sense. Generally speaking, the font for the body of the resume should be between 9 and 12 points in size. Avoid the word I at all costs, and never include a picture.These days, functional resumes are out of style, and you should have a clear chronological order of your professional history.Save a line for something meaningful by leaving off References available upon request. Everyone knows that theyll be requested at some point in the hiring process and that youll comply.There is a plethora of self-help resume writing books available from reputable professionals. Each author provides their own best advice, and it is worth getting two or three highly rated books to compare and evaluate the advice from different experts.Anyone who knows my field will know exactly what Ive done. Why isnt it enough to just list my job titles and responsibilities? Certain job titles imply consistent sets of responsibilities and expectations among a wide variety of companies, but most dont. You might be a director at a small or mid-size company with far less responsi bility than someone with a lesser title at a larger company.More important, however, is to explain to a potential employer how you specifically dealt with your responsibilities. Each worker is unique, and each person will go about a job somewhat differently and achieve different results. Dont ask to be lumped in with everyone else. Rather, provide the factual detail necessary to convey how and why you are heads above your competition.See 7 Excellent Sales and Marketing Jobs for 2017.Writing a resume seems like an insurmountable task. What should I do? If the task of writing your own resume seems daunting, think seriously about developing a collaborative relationship with a professional resume writer. Look for someone who is affiliated with professional organizations such as The National Resume Writers Association, Career Thought Leaders or Career Directors International.Each of these organizations offers professional development courses for career coaches and resume writers, as well as various certifications. With or without a certification, you can rest assured that these are the kinds of professionals who take their work seriously and are likely to be up to date with todays best practices.Happy hunting10 Ways to Perfect Your Personal Brand