For as long as any of us can remember, companies have been using the same old job descriptions — they list all the required skills that are necessary to complete a particular job at a company. However, a job description can be, and is, a critical tool in the hiring process.
It’s the tool created by HR in combination with the hiring manager (hopefully) which the recruiter uses to seek out the best-suited individuals. This tool is used as the criteria to delineate between multiple applicants to determine the “best fit.” But let me ask you: Does the traditional job description honestly determine the “best fit,” or does it simply determine the best set of skills?
Job Description Pros and Cons
Below are some of the positive aspects of using a traditional job description:
- Serves as a description of responsibilities that’s agreed upon between the employer and applicant.
- Serves as a benchmark for compensation structuring across the industry.
- Sets up an expectation of outcomes based on the agreed-upon skill set of the applicant.
- Serves as an organizational and team development tool for the hiring manager.
I don’t want to diminish the positive aspects of the job descriptions. But with that said, I do want to highlight its weaknesses.
Below are some of the traditional job description’s weaknesses:
- Highlighting a certain number of years of experience needed limits the potential pool of candidates. It eliminates the people who have high potential to move far within the organization, who have light experience, and career changers.
- Many bullet points listed on a job description usually can’t be quantified as a performance objective or a measure of success.
- If the job description isn’t written by both HR and the hiring manager, it’s a worthless document that will hurt both parties in the long run. With simply HR writing it, key aspects of the position will be left out — and with just the hiring manager writing it, it will be incoherent to the reader and massively long because hiring managers aren’t trained to write job descriptions.
- It doesn’t describe the long-term goals and objectives of the position.
As we can see, there are pros and cons. I’d like to share with you some of my thoughts on how the job description can evolve and transform into something better.
Ideas for Improvement
- Job descriptions should be written collaboratively with the candidate. We should hire the person first, and then (together) write a job description we both agree on. It’s the recruiter’s job to find the right person to present to the hiring manager. They can source this person by having strategic conversations with the hiring manager.
- Job descriptions need to be polished and edited. Job descriptions are often written by a multitude of people in a feeble attempt at collusion, resulting in the final product looking like patched-up jeans. This is because everyone wants their piece displayed, yet no one edits the job description into one cohesive document.
- Job descriptions should be updated as the position evolves. Too often we relate the job description to our annual evaluation, but the annual evaluation should be a living document that grows with you as you gain new experiences. A job description becomes outdated after you’re hired if it isn’t updated once since.
- Job descriptions should describe culture fit. The way they’re written now, they read like a robotic list of responsibilities instead of focusing on the long-term projects and cultural fit of the applicant.
- Job descriptions should filter for emotional intelligence. Survey after survey has shown the majority of people don’t succeed in their first 18 months on a job — not because of technical competence, but because of coachability and emotional intelligence (EI). (Please see Mark Murphy’s book Hiring for Attitude for more on this.) This means job description are filtering people for technical competence, but not for coachability and EI.
Now, I understand the job description is only one tool in the toolbox, but why does that mean we should accept this mediocre tool? The hammer was just a hammer up until a few years ago, when they invented anti-vibration hammers with magnets built into them along with ergonomically designed grips.
It’s time to upgrade our tool… or time to at least have the conversation about upgrading the tool. (Tweet this thought.) It has come to the point where it goes beyond damaging the company; it’s now hurting the applicants and their career paths.
The Ultimate Solution
You may ask: What is your solution, then?
Well, I already shared a few of my thoughts above on how we can revamp job descriptions. Overall, I feel that we should start thinking in terms of projects, long-term objectives and personality/culture fit.
First and foremost, HR must work in conjunction with the assigned recruiter and hiring manager. They must facilitate a conversation between both parties and design a meaningful document or guide the recruiter can use to source applicants (active and passive). A traditional job description does one thing well, and that is attracting active job seekers. Ultimately, it’s the recruiter’s job to sell the job seeker on the position and company.
Once the recruiter has identified viable candidates, the hiring manager should interview them to determine their long-term viability. This should be done by determining their learning agility, coachability and emotional intelligence. This kind of conversation can be started by using personality profiles created by websites such as www.jobevolve.com.
Upon successfully hiring the correct individual, within their first week, HR should facilitate a conversation between them and the hiring manager and, together, write a goals and objectives plan so they can be properly evaluated by the end of the year.
These are all just ideas — nothing more, nothing less. However, the conversation needs to start with HR. Not only are these traditional job descriptions holding HR back from enhancing the company culture from an HR perspective, but they’re also holding back potential and future employees of the company. Investing in employees does not start when candidates becomes employees; it starts when a hiring manager decides to create an opening on their team.
It all reminds me of the age-old conversation between the CFO and CEO:
CFO: What happens if we invest in developing our people and then they leave us?
CEO: What happens if we don’t, and they stay?
Employers and hiring managers, do you agree that job descriptions could use a revamp? Share your thoughts in the comments!
Marc DeBoer is the founder of A Better Interview. After spending many years as a corporate recruiter and headhunter, he decided to take that knowledge to the general public. A Better Interview, LLC was established to help guide people through the job search process in addition to providing interview coaching. Go to www.abetterinterview.com for their blog!
Image: Flickr
