Service Manager

**ROLE PURPOSE**

The Service Manager is accountable to the Manager: Service Management and performs the day-to-day operational and managerial tasks demanded by the process activities.
In general, the Service Manager has:

- Visibility at a management level within Vodacom Business and in the Customer environment
- Awareness of the Customer’s business priorities, objectives and business drivers
- Awareness of the role Vodacom Business plays in enabling the Customers business objectives to be met
- Customer service skills
- Awareness of what Vodacom Business can deliver to the customer, including the latest products and capabilities
- The ability to use, understand and interpret Vodacom Business processes, policies and procedures and to ensure adherence
- Good influencing skills and is a good negotiator, as he or she often does not have authority over staff working with his or her processes
- The competence, knowledge and information necessary to perform the role
- Must be an effective communicator
- Keep aware of changing business needs.
- Ensure that the current and future service requirements of customers are identified, understood, and raised with the Account Management team.
- Technical involvement in allocated customers’ issues and providing recommendations in conjunction with Technical Service Teams.
- Ensure that improvement initiatives identified in service reviews are documented as a SIP (Service Improvement Plans) and acted upon and progress reports are provided to customers on a weekly basis.
- Accommodate any existing Service Improvement Plans / Programs within the Service Management process.
- Solutions Implementation with a focus on major and recurring incidents and work closely with resources from different Business Units to determine root cause when a deeper unknown cause is suspected and requires investigation. Involving System Architects, Transmission Networks, Account Managers, Engineers & Specialists. Process re-engineering and work-flow improvement.
- POCs (Proof of Concepts) used to provide clients with tangible corroboration of proposed Changes.
- Coordination of projects to remedy and improve existing services to customers networks.
- Monthly, Quarterly and Annual reviews. This includes a detailed review of all services, SLA (Service Level Agreement) Reporting, billing issues and any relevant strategic issues.
- Ensuring that ITIL best practice is followed.
- Triggering any Service Improvement Initiatives.
- Functions as a point of escalation for Service Management Analysts.
- Escalation of SLA (Service Level Agreement) breaches to Manager Service Management.
- Reporting on all changes, specified per service, process, department and any other Key Performance Indicators that is agreed with the Customer.
- Recommending service improvements and initiates Service Improvement Programs.
- Expedite any major incidents logged by their customers to ensure that service is restored as quickly as possible.
- End-to-end responsibility for ensuring that all Service Level Agreements (SLA) and Operational Level Agreements (OLA) with the customer are met and levels of Service optimized.
- Ensuring that service reports are produced for each customer service and that breaches of SLA targets are highlighted, investigated and actions taken to prevent theirVisibility on a customer senior management level.
- Analyse and review Service Performance against the SLAs.
- Organise and maintain the regular Service Level review process with the Customer which covers:

- Review outstanding actions from previous reviews
- Review current performance
- Review Service Levels and Targets (where necessary)
- Agree appropriate actions to maintain / improve Service Levels
- Initiate any actions required to maintain or improve Service Levels and initiate Service Improvement Plans (SIPs) as required by the defined process
- Act as coordination point for any temporary changes to Service Levels required (i.e.: extra support hours required by the Customer, reduced Levels of Service over a period of maintenance required by the Service Provider, etc.)
- Attend Change Advisory Board meetings when appropriate.
- Identify improvement opportunities to make Service Management more effective and efficient.
- Ensure that the Service Level Management Key Performance Indicators are met for the assigned Customers.
- Ensure that the Service Management process operates effectively and efficiently
- Ensure that reports on Service Performance and Achievement to the Customer and Vodacom Business are produced, checked, and presented regularly and at an appropriate level.Monitor and manage the perception and expectation of the customers.

**QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE**
- The Service Level Manager should possess an ITIL Foundation Certificate and be moving forward to achieve the Practitioners Certificate for his or her specific process.
- A minimum of 3 to 5 years’ experience in an IT or Telecommunications environment is required.
- Proficiency in