Every recruiter wants to attract a pool of the best candidates to their company once they advertise a job opening. This isn’t very easy but can be achieved through a good job description. Yes, your well-written job description could turn this dream into reality. Sometimes in a bid to make the job advert exciting, recruiters get carried away and use meaningless words, set expectations which are not related to the job or generally write descriptions which are hard to understand. These four tips can guide any recruiter on writing the best description:
1. Use simple words
Avoid buzzwords like “maven”, “extraordinaire”, “guru” at all costs. They sound very cliché and may rub top candidates the wrong way or even scare off many candidates. Let your description state that you are looking for a “Communications Specialist,” instead of a “Communications Maven”, a “Construction Manager” not a” Construction Guru”. Simplicity rules at the end of the day.
2. Set realistic expectations
It is quite common especially in the tech industry for candidates not to match experience in their respective fields. For instance, the computer programming language “Swift” was launched in 2015. It would therefore be unrealistic for a recruiter to demand for “five years experience in using Swift from an IT specialist.” Talk to someone who’s already worked in that position in your company or in different organization to help you.
3. Be specific
Ensure that the roles, daily responsibilities and tasks, years of work experience are clear. Make the information specific enough to get the candidates attention at a glance. This will help prevent situations where job listings for different positions or from different organizations look similar. Top candidates rarely apply for generic job listings. Uniqueness is your friend.
4. Consider highlighting incentives
It’s much easier to capture candidates’ attention by showcasing the benefits they will get from working with you. Is it the transportation benefits, health insurance and flexible working hours? Note however that this can backfire; by exposing the benefits, you risk getting all sorts of applicants (mostly the ones you don’t need) which may make your sorting experience a nightmare
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