Who is a Service Level Manager? Role, Responsibilities & Skills

In a competitive market, you find multiple businesses that offer products or services in the same category. What makes one better than the other is their service quality. If the quality of your service meets the customer requirements, you will sail through and experience exceptional business growth. Business owners understand the significance of delivering quality work and hire service level managers. They want them to work dedicatedly to ensuring zero gap between the quality required and the quality offered. The ones who get hired are often certified professionals with formal ITIL training and proficiency in project management and customer services. 

As the market competition is ever-increasing, there has been a significant rise in the opportunities for service level managers roles. If you come from a relevant educational background, possess the required skills, and have the zeal to stay put with the changing trends, you can expect to build a promising career as a service-level manager. In this article, I will discuss what is a service level manager and how you can plan a fruitful career in this industry. 

Who is the Service Level Manager?

A Service Level Manager has a vital role within a business. These professionals focus on maintaining the utmost product or service quality in the company and ensure that the delivered quality standards meet the customer's expectations. They analyze the current company operations and take note of the quality being delivered, focusing on areas that require utmost attention. Based on this information, they build strategies and set standards that everybody in the concerned teams should follow. A reliable and proficient service-level manager has hands-on expertise and often comes with ITIL certification training or other renowned certifications on their resume. It is fair to say that service level managers act as a bridge between business objectives, customer expectations, and operational capabilities. Furthermore, they plan collaborations, ensuring the services align with business goals and deliver value to stakeholders.

What Does A Service Level Manager Do?

It is significant to know the service level manager responsibilities if you are also planning to build a career in this domain. These professionals are responsible for ensuring that the services provided by a business meet the agreed-upon service levels and objectives. I have listed a few roles and responsibilities below for your clarity.

• The first and foremost responsibility is to collaborate with stakeholders to establish clear and measurable targets for service quality. The service level agreements they build build the foundation for monitoring and managing service levels.
• Regularly track service performance, keeping the SLAs in consideration. They may also use key performance indicators (KPIs) such as response time, uptime, and resolution rate.
• These experts act as primary contacts for customers for any service-related issues or inquiries they might have. They are responsible for communicating with the customers and providing them with efficient resolution.
• Another crucial aspect of the service level manager roles and responsibilities is to liaise with external vendors to ensure their services align with the organization's needs. It will involve contract negotiation, evaluation of performance, and management of relationships with different vendors. 

The roles and responsibilities of a service level manager are not limited to these. You will also have to work on risk management strategies and conduct continuous service reviews with the customers to ensure higher customer satisfaction levels.

Types of Service Level Managers

You can categorize the service level managers based on the nature of the services they manage and the industries in which they operate. I have listed different types of service level managers below to help you understand the categories better.

• IT Service Level Manager: These managers oversee IT services and ensure they meet the pre-defined SLAs with internal or external customers.
• Telecommunication Service Level Manager: You will find these managers in telecommunications companies. They focus on maintaining service quality and reliability for voice, data, and internet services.
• Vendor Service Level Manager: This category of managers works to build relationships with external vendors or suppliers to ensure they deliver services or products according to agreed-upon SLAs.
• Customer Service Level Manager: These managers are responsible for maintaining high levels of customer satisfaction. You can find them in any industry, ensuring customer service standards are met or exceeded.

Similarly, the service managers in any other stream would form another category, like cloud service level manager or outsourced service level manager.

Characteristics of an Effective Service Level Manager

As it is an in-demand and highly secure career option, there are countless candidates who are trying to build a career as service level managers. So, companies look for specific characteristics in the professionals they want to hire. Let me list a few to help you know what traits you need to build to grab the best job opportunities.

• Strong Communication Skills: A professional manager has excellent communication skills to ensure clear and concise information sharing amongst all the stakeholders.
• Analytical Abilities: These experts have strong analytical skills to identify trends, analyze data, measure performances, and perform multiple other tasks that help with decision-making.
• Problem-Solving Skills: The service level manager responsibilities include handling challenges like service disruptions. So, their problem-solving skills need to be highly efficient.
• Customer Prioritization: A service-level manager should always focus on customer satisfaction and know that prioritizing the customers is the key to business success.

Apart from this, these professionals should have efficient negotiation skills and the ability to adapt to any circumstances.

Qualifications and Required Skills of Service Level Manager

To kickstart your career as a service level manager, you should come from a specific educational background and possess certain skills. Some of the qualifications and skill requirements you should develop before planning your career in this industry are:

• Complete a bachelor’s degree in the relevant industry.
• Gain 2-3 years of work experience in the industry if you wish to start with an excellent job position.
• Work on developing strong communication skills, adaptability, and the ability to give attention to details.

If you qualify for these requirements, you can plan and explore the opportunities in this industry. 

Service Level Manager: Education, Training, and Certifications

To establish yourself as a successful service-level manager, you would have to work to get skilled enough to sail through the competition. Complete your fundamental educational requirement, which is a bachelor’s degree in the relevant industry. Furthermore, you can complete specialized training or certifications to develop essential service level manager skills and get hands-on experience working on relevant projects. Some certification courses that can help you excel in this industry are listed below. 

• Knowledgehut IT Service Management training
• Associate Service Executive (ASE)
• Certified Service Manager
• Certified Manager Certification (CM)

Explore and find the certification program that matches your career goals, and you can experience a significant rise in your professional career.

Service Level Manager Careers

The service level manager's roles and responsibilities vary for different business domains. I am listing a few popular career options that you can explore, depending on your interests. 

1. IT Service Level Manager

Responsibilities: These managers work in the IT sector, particularly coordinating with different teams to ensure their service quality meets the set standards of the SLAs.

Salary: The average salary of an IT service level manager is $91K (Source: ZipRecruiter)

2. Customer Service Level Manager

Responsibilities: As the name suggests, these managers work in the customer service section, ensuring a higher customer satisfaction level. They take regular customer feedback and act upon them to plan their business moves.

Salary: The average salary of a customer service level manager is $99K. (Source: ZipRecruiter)

3. Telecommunication Service Level Manager

Responsibilities: The service level manager's responsibilities in this industry involve monitoring the network performance. They address service interruptions and use best practices to improve the services. 

Salary: The average salary of a telecommunication Service Level Manager is $93K (Source: ZipRecruiter)

4. Service Level Manager Salary and Job Growth

The job market for a service level manager is promising, and you can expect it to stay the same for years to come! Maintaining quality is the key to standing out in the competition, and every business would do everything possible to meet the customer's requirements. Hence, you will find exponential growth in the job opportunities for service level managers. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, you can experience a growth of 9% from 2022 to 2032. (Source: bls.gov) 

Additionally, the salary packages these professionals get are promising around the world. The table below shows the list of countries that offer excellent salaries to service level managers.

Country	Salary
UK	£44,720
USA	$91K
India	INR 36 LPA
Australia	$118K
Canada	$69K

Source: Indeed 

Once you know the countries offering excellent opportunities, you might get inquisitive about the companies you should explore. To help you further, here is the list of companies you should definitely try to explore.

Company Name	Salary
Accenture	$152K
Deloitte	$161K
IBM	$131K
Barclays	$130K
Sightline Media Group	$85K
Apex Systems	$45K

Source: Glassdoor 

Job Satisfaction 

It is a challenging job, and you would have to keep the learning process going on to stay put in the competition and deliver value at work. So, you will have something new to learn every day! Moreover, the salary package, additional perks, and the career security this domain offers make it even more worthwhile. If you are inclined towards this industry, fulfill the basic eligibility, research what does service level managers do, and explore this promising industry. 

How to Become a Service-Level Manager?

By now, I have explained everything about what a service level manager is and what they do. Now, a question that I often get asked is how to become a service level manager. Here are a few steps to start a career in this industry and excel in it.

Step1: Educational Qualifications

Complete a bachelor's degree in the related domain. For example, if you wish to be an IT service level manager, you should complete a bachelor's degree in IT or computer science. 

Step2: Certifications/Trainings

Once you have completed the basic educational qualifications, the next step is to complete specialized training or certifications. You can find multiple options in the market to research and narrow the options that perfectly suit your requirements. Some of the popular choices are:

• IT Service Management training
• Service Level Management Complete Certification Course
• Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM)

Step3: Prepare for Interviews

Start preparing for the interviews after you gain enough confidence to explore the job market. Build an impressive resume and go through the sample interview questions to get an idea of what the interview will be like.

In these three simple steps, you can build a successful career as a service level manager. Make sure you follow your pace and strategize your professional journey to achieve maximum success.

Conclusion

The role of a Service Level Manager is pivotal in ensuring that organizations stand tall on their service quality commitments to customers. These experts are responsible for creating, implementing, and optimizing the SLAs (service level agreements) and ensuring the company operations comply with them. It is a promising job role with excellent salary packages and secured positions with additional perks. For enthusiasts interested in this domain, it is crucial to fulfill the educational requirements and develop the right skills that can help them deliver value at their work.

The skills required for success in this role encompass a blend of technical expertise, interpersonal acumen, and strategic thinking. Apart from this, you should work on developing effective communication and problem-solving skills to keep the stakeholders informed and handle any challenges with utmost ease. Understand that service level managers are the catalyst for an organization that contributes towards growth, so you should prepare well and leverage your expertise to experience overall business success.