Introducing Benjamin Breeland – the Blog Resume (part 2)

Another benefit of the blog is that one gets to review and edit the original post. I reviewed my first post and noticed that I talked about the listen, learn, lead, and lecture part of my objective but provided no discussion on the “while doing some good for his customers, his company, and himself”. While I think most get it; I decided to provide a short explanation here as well.

I want to do more than earn a living – I want to do some good. I truly want to change the world of those I meet. In business, I want to help my company, my peers, my customer, and myself to do better. This requires a focused commitment to each member of the team. It also requires asking hard questions and providing straight answers that best meets the needs of all. Finally, it requires passion and an ability to listen first, learn, lead, and lecture. It is a belief that there is no challenge too great to do some good. Again, I ask, would you hire me? Would you challenge me? I am ready to do some good!

Introducing Benjamin Breeland – the Blog Resume

This week I started the search for a new opportunity. I read somewhere that resumes were outdated and one should (or could) use a blog to introduce oneself to potential employers. Therefore, I decided to start my blog resume. Most resumes start with an objective statement. Here is my objective and an explanation – since this is a blog, I get the chance to explain myself.

Career Objective
Ben Breeland seeks an opportunity to listen, learn, lead, and lecture while doing some good for his customers, his company, and himself.

Explanation
In the past 15+ years, I worked to provide technology solutions to companies. I considered myself an excellent IT consultant. I learned to listen to the customer, my sales team, and to corporate direction. I learned what I needed to do to satisfy the customer, the sales team, and my company. I led the customer to a solution that addressed the customer’s needs, that the sales team could sell, and that our company could support. I then provided additional consulting to address any questions and lectured (talked) all parties on the solution and its benefits to all. My customers purchased millions of dollars of software from the companies I helped.

I used the listen, learn, lead, and lecture concept throughout my career. It works well for presales but also works well when one manages others. A critical part of management is the feedback loop. When I managed a project or team, I started with a lecture or description of the tasks needed to meet certain objectives. I listened to the team and learned what worked and what did not work and led them to a direction that resulted in project success or improvement. The listen, learn, lead, and lecture provides me with a grounding for whatever I need to do – presales, consulting, managing, or completing tasks.

I think my objective alone is enough to secure a new job. What do you think? Would you hire me? Well more on my blog resume later – time to send some traditional resumes and make some calls.

From presales to sustainment – where the customer IS always right

A presales consultant has a clear goal – do what is necessary so that the sales pro closes the business. These tasks include gathering requirements, demonstrating solutions, and answering questions. There is a start, middle, and end to this process. Well it is not this way in sustainment. The customer (no longer a prospect) purchased the software and now wants to use it to accomplish the business goals discussed in the presales process. What if there were no goals? What if the customer bought the solution and wanted to find some problems for the solution to address? What would you do? I suggest whatever the customer asks – if you wish to keep your job and the contract. In a sustainment, the customer IS always right!

The customer is always right!

The customer IS always right! Unfortunately, this is NOT a customer – yet! As a consultant tasked with pleasing an aggressive sales team and understanding requirements from perspective customers, one often hears from the sales team that the customer is always right. What is often missing to the sales team is that the perspective customer is NOT yet a customer. Until one identifies requirements and arranges a payment or contract for certain deliverables, the perspective customer is a prospect. During this time, it is the task of the consultant to ensure a clear understanding of the identified requirements and the potential deliverables. This way the team ensures that the statement, “the customer is always right”, is reasonable and true for the customer, consultant, and sales.

An enterprise architect, clear requirements, and business objectives help – The desire to do some good remains. To do some good, one must meet the requirements of the recipient. Understanding and gathering these requirements is perhaps the greatest challenge faced by the enterprise management software vendor. In more than ten years as an enterprise management consultant, the ability to measure good delivered to any customers does not exist. The reason for this is the lack of deliverable business objectives. The lack of clear business objectives reflects the poor leadership within the enterprise management software companies and within the organizations looking to use these tools. Perhaps an enterprise architect is the answer!

Storage is cheap…not free

A customer asked a consultant, “How much storage is needed for that management solution?” The consultant responded, “Storage is cheap…the solution will collect performance information, error logs, and other information and store it in the database….” This is a common statement. However, it suggests that the enterprise management solution will not do any good. A good enterprise management solution helps to reduce resources. If the client purchased and allocated storage to each department based on an annual budget, there are no resources for new storage requirements. While storage may be cheap, it is not free. An Enterprise Management solution must provide clear requirements to do some good.

Dashboards for outsourcers
Is the dashboard (enterprise management software) important when one chooses to take a taxi, bus, or hired car? Absolutely! Just because one chooses to outsource a business objective (get Mr. Jones to work each day by 8 am), the operator requires the same information (speed, fuel levels, temperature, etc) to ensure timely completion of the objective. It is imperative that the business looking to outsource ensure that the chosen provider has the ability to maintain service levels. It does the business no good to outsource the business process and arrive late for work. To do some good, the provider must meet service level objectives.