How to edit a job description: H.R. text from Iron Mountain
Human resources-ese is a particularly painful dialect of English. A good example (LinkedIn account required) was just posted by human resources at Iron Mountain, a Boston-based records management company that I’m a big fan of.
Their posting for “Director, Marketing Communications & Programs for Iron Mountain North America” shows just how ingrained human resources-ese is: wordy, repetitive, with Dilbertesqe vocab. So for fun I’ve rewritten it in clear English. (Interesting however is how my version sounds less official—that’s how stuck we are with human resources-ese.)
Original Iron Mountatin paragraphs indented:
The Director, Marketing Communications & Programs for Iron Mountain North America is able to translate business goals and market insights into effective, efficient and integrated marketing communications strategy and programs that deliver measurable impact on revenue. This is a new position that will be expected to improve strong demand generation activities through marketing mix, lead management, analytics and resource management.
The Director, Marketing Communications & Programs, a new position, will run Iron Mountain North America’s integrated marketing communications programs.
Directing a team of 5 or more direct reports, you will team with marketing management, product marketing, sales (inside and outside); sales operations, vendors and others to positively change prospect’s perceptions and behaviors. You will create and manage a plan for multiple service lines and two key vertical to positively impact revenue, awareness and sales enablement. This individual will establish and/or incorporate processes that ensure campaigns and deliverables are managed appropriately, with responses and leads processed in accordance with requirements. You will also be accountable for measure and communicate program results and analyses to key constituents.
With a team of five direct reports, he or she will work with marketing management, inside and outside sales representatives, vendors, and others to measurably influence prospective customers to buy Iron Mountain products and services. This includes creating and executing marketing plans and reporting on their success.
This is a pivotal role in the success of Iron Mountain North America and will be fundamental to our success in transforming our company into a value-added information services business. It requires the presentation of value propositions and key messaging/communication points to target constituencies in ways that drive awareness/recognition, enhance quality and brand perception, ensure resonance, and increase conversion rates to action, thus shortening/easing the marketing and sales cycles.
(None of this needs to be included, really. In effect it states: “We are not currently a value-added information services business. We don’t currently communicate well to target constituencies, and our marketing and sales cycles are too long and difficult to manage.”)
Altogether Iron Mountain H.R. says what needs to be said but does so without elegance. Pet peeve or not, all corporate communications should be persuasive and legally sound, and writers of corporate communications do that by making their writing brief, direct, and clear: in short, easily readable.
