Six Mistakes to Avoid in Job Descriptions

Just consider, for a while, the resources and time your company spends on marketing their products and attracting ideal customers. Ask yourself, how much does your company spent on writing the descriptions of your products and services, web pages and such? The amount of time, capital and other resources spent on perfecting these descriptions are high (as they should be, no doubt).

However, little thought is given to the job descriptions. The reason for this is simple: majority of the companies take their employees for granted. If they pay half as much attention to their potential employees than they do to their potential customers, it would ensure that only competent people become the part of their company. As a result, work quality would surely improve.

Therefore, it is important to know what mistakes you are making when writing a Job Description, and avoid them at all cost. Let us discuss some of the most common mistakes.

Six Mistakes to Avoid When Posting Job Descriptions

• Reusing the Same Job Descriptions
• Leaving Out Important Info From Job Description
• Drafting Job Description with SIngle Input
• Making Grammar and Formatting Mistakes
• Not Differentiating Between Desired and Required Skills
• Not Filtering Job Descriptions for Mistakes of Legal Issues

Reusing the Same Job Descriptions

Like any other thing in life, positions also tend to evolve as time passes. Reusing the same job description year after year is bound to attract candidates who are not perfect for the job. Make sure you write a new job description for the job sporadically, if not every time.

Need help writing a new posting? Check out The Secrets to Writing the Perfect Job Description.

Leaving Out Important Info from Job Description

Just mentioning the essential job functions for a position and leaving at that is not good enough for a good job description. A job description should include summary of the position, qualifications required, responsibilities, critical abilities, physical requirements (if any), and the working conditions provided at your office.

You also want to include workplace attributes your job seekers want. Check out What Do Job Candidates Want? to learn what excites today's job seekers.

Drafting Job Description with Single Input

Sometimes, job descriptions are drafted with only input from existing employees. This is a bad practice that often leaves out vital aspects of the job. Human resource personnel and managers should also provide input in describing a certain position, as their perspective is important to the process. Try and follow a particular pattern when you’re writing a description, and keep the outlets available for CV templates in mind. This would help you cover each and every aspect needed.

Multiple inputs are always best. Scorecards are another recruiting feature that can make the hiring process more collaborative.

Making Grammar and Formatting Mistakes

As said earlier, the job description represents your organization. So any spellings and grammar mistakes or bad formatting will portray a negative image of your company to your potential employees. Save yourself from the embarrassment, and proofread your job descriptions.

Rethinking what you thought you knew about job postings can also help your descriptions stand out.

Not Differentiating Between Desired and Required Skills

Often Hiring Managers desire that an employee at certain position have a qualification or skill they would like the candidate to have, but it is not necessary for the position. Making the distinction between required and desired skills is essential to lure in candidates from the right skill area that is required for the job. When failing to do so, it results in eliminating certain candidates that might have been perfect for the job but didn’t apply because they didn’t have the said qualification or skill. It is a good practice to specifically mention the Minimum qualification and skill set needed for position.

The HiringThing Guide to Increasing Your Applicant Traffic can help you reimagine what skills are required and what's just arbitrary. 

Not Filtering Job Description for Mistakes or Legal Issues

Once the job description is complete, it is only smart to run it by both the legal and human resource departments in the company to look for any mistakes or legal issues that your job description may contain. It is very important that you do this before you send it for print or publishing it online. If you fail to do so, you can be at the risk of one of the costliest mistakes you may ever commit in your career. Many hiring managers have run into such troubles for posting something they shouldn’t have, in job descriptions, which got them stuck in legal issues, thus risking their career.

Once you get those descriptions down, Seven Steps to Selecting the Right Job Board can help you strategize where to post. 

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