Resources for IT Managers

1. Rely on Dusty Job Descriptions

Positions evolve over time. Duties get updated to reflect corporate strategies, technology evolves, and language itself changes.

While it’s a best practice to keep a record of current and past job descriptions, make a habit of carefully reading the most recent JD when preparing to fill a position. Check every sentence and line as carefully as an accountant preparing a tax return. Meet with the colleagues and/or team who will work most closely with the new hire. If he or she will interact with other important constituents, consult them, too. Use these contributions to help ensure essential functions are current, not obsolete.

Keeping job descriptions current should be a strategy, not a one-off duty that someone takes on only when a position needs filling. Up-to-date descriptions can also be helpful during performance reviews, as well as when evaluating salaries and benefits.

2. Use Vanilla Language

How many resumes do you pass on because they are full of vague language and non-specific accomplishments?

Now check the job description of the position you hope to fill next month. Does it ask for someone who requires minimal supervision? Or, mention a team player is needed instead? Perhaps it wants someone who can communicate clearly with C-level executives?

Terms like “minimal supervision,” “team player,” and “communicate clearly” make their way into many a job description (and even more resumes). Think about them for a minute, though. They’re completely vague. They do little to address the specific skills or experience needed in a position. And they’ll do less to help you screen candidates.

Replace generic language in job descriptions with terms that are specific to the job. You’ll be better equipped to identify good candidates, and will likely generate more interest among them.

For instance, you might replace “minimal supervision” with “must demonstrate a history of solving mission-critical problems independently.”

Erase “team player” and give a sense of the team instead — who, and how, and with what frequency the candidate will be expected to interact with. Your revised job description might then say, “will collaborate with developers and quality assurance team daily.”

State that a position must “Brief CIO each week, and provide information needed for quarterly presentations to the Board of Directors,” and you’ll surely weed out candidates who’ve walked past a C-level suite, but never entered its doors.

Successful job descriptions always state a position’s essential functions and required skills precisely, while at the same time doing so in terms that a layperson can understand. Be sure, too, that job descriptions specify the outcomes expected of the person who will fill the role.

Finally, make sure your organization’s job descriptions follow a standardized format. Though each position description should be original (and interesting!), the formats should be similar. This will reinforce your company’s branding, and also make it easier to write job descriptions for new positions and update older ones.

3. Ignore Best Practices for Online Content

A story stating that goldfish have longer attention spans (at nine seconds) than humans (a mere 8 seconds) made quite a splash in the news in 2014. Though scientists have called this “fact” into doubt, there’s little question that readers are more impatient than ever.

Given the benefit of a doubt, the best candidates screen through job postings as quickly — if not more so — as you screen resumes. They’ll likely give each post 30 seconds of their time before jumping to learn about the next opportunity.

How can you get potential candidates to slow down long enough to read your job descriptions?

Incorporate standards for writing and formatting online content to make your job descriptions more readable — and potentially viral. Use these suggestions when writing or reworking your job descriptions.

• Write a killer title. This might seem contrary to tradition; after all, if you’re looking for a software developer, then isn’t the title of your job description simply “Software Developer”? It is if you don’t want your company to stand out and attract great talent! What you type in the “Job Title” field doesn’t have to match the title of whomever you ultimately decide to bring onboard. So get creative. Who wouldn’t click the Apply button for the opportunity to “Write the Code that Defends Against a Global Pandemic”?
• Tell a story. Break away from dull lists of requirements, and recast job descriptions as if they were advertisements. The product the ad is selling? This position, with your company. (P.S. – You can list any dull requirements at the end of the ad, once you’ve intrigued candidates with the many reasons they should apply for this job.)
• Make it easy on the eye. Readers quickly lose interest when confronted with a large block of copy. Use headers to break up the text. Keep paragraphs short, and use bulleted or numbered lists when appropriate.
• Use keywords. Throughout the job description, use keywords (and variants) related to the position’s essential skills. Think of the terms your ideal candidate might type into a search engine, and be sure to include them.
• Include a video. Well-produced videos often help pages rank higher in search engine results — search engines favor them because people love video content! Your job description will get more attention if it includes a link to a video about your company, preferably showing the hiring manager and team at work.
• Go social. Your description should include links to your company’s pages on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other social media sites so candidates can reach out via popular online networks, get a better feel for your corporate culture, and share your job description with their networks of friends.
• Call me. Whenever possible, include specific, not generic, contact information. In-demand candidates don’t want to click a link that says careers@yourcompany.com.

4. Rely on Spell Check

You can count on spell check for words (at least most of the time). But when writing a job description, don’t expect your word processor to do background research. Knowing all about a position, its industry, and any related jargon is your job.

Double-check the spelling of every specific programming tool, app, and language mentioned in the job description. Don’t just google or wiki them…get proof from an official site (a company’s home page, or a site well known in the industry) to confirm proper spelling, spacing, and capitalization.

Which is correct: SharePoint, Sharepoint, or sharepoint? Find out!

PeopleSoft, People Soft, or Peoplesoft? Go look it up.

If you don’t, and your job description misuses a common IT acronym or misspells a product or company name, tech-savvy candidates — the ones you want the most — will certainly notice the error. It’s likely that your company will suffer for it, and the best candidates will look for work elsewhere, at a place that understands the work they do.

Create a custom dictionary in your word processor, and this task will become easier over time. But double-check those acronyms anyway!

5. Go Rogue

A final note to all hiring managers charged with writing job descriptions: Please clear all descriptions for compliance — i.e., run them past someone in human resources or legal — before posting anything online or advertising a position in print. Not doing so could result in the costliest mistake of your career.