How to create the ideal job description to hire the right candidate
Hiring the right team is one of the most important things for any company. Without a team, there is no company. Every company needs to hire continuously to offer best product and services to the customers. Let's look at the typical workflow of a recruiter:
- Source candidates.
- Interview candidates.
- On-board candidates (offer letters, reference check, etc.).
Sourcing is the very first prerequisite for hiring. Sourcing the best candidates start with the right job description. A wrongly represented job description will turn off the candidates to click on the "APPLY to this Job" button. It should give a sense of belonging for the position you're hiring. If you manage to create that touch with the candidate through your job description, then we won't be surprised if you have all A players in your team.
Check out the below job description. Looks like the recruiters were in so much hurry in getting a front-end developer that they didn't bother to put a description. They got away by just three statements, expecting that they would end up with a pool of talented applicants for the job. Seriously?!
And then we complain about the dearth of talent in the tech industry. The fact is that the good ones will simply ignore this job position and the ones you will get will not qualify for your position. It's a very serious job to make sure that you reflect what you look for a job. Consider the job description as a sales pitch to the candidates. An honest and appealing description would attract the cream of the technologists. It should reflect very clearly the following things:
Who are you?
Outline precisely the vision of your company and your product. As a recruiter, you need to articulate the company's vision in the job description; what you truly believe as a team, which market are you targeting, why it's an interesting problem, and what motivates you. Express your company's culture and what your company wishes to be. This shouldn't be long enough that the candidates lose interest in reading. It should be precise and shouldn't go beyond two to three sentences. This one is an ideal description of a company:
What are you looking for in the candidates?
The description needs to be crisp and clear and not just some buzz words. Learning a new technology is not a big deal, but getting the fundamentals right is important. So, crafting things you're looking within a candidate should be straight-forward. It starts with the years of experience required by the candidate for the position. The major technologies the candidate should be aware of. The specific tools you prefer the candidate had for this job. For instance, if you're looking to hire a front-end developer with the following skills:
- In-depth knowledge of Javascript.
- Hands-on experience to multiple Javascript libraries.
- The ability to hand-code HTML5 and CSS with ease.
- Must have experience with interacting with RESTful APIs
- Should have contributed to some open source projects.
- Should know GIT, Mercury etc.
- Some more.
What is in it for the candidates?
The point is you have to make an offer that the candidate cannot refuse (personal favourite from 'The Godfather') The equity, bonus packages, salary, free lunch and snacks/beverages, ergonomics chair, Apple products, best software, yearly retreats, movie nights, etc. List all the perks that you can offer the candidates realistically at this point in time when they join your company.
How do I get in touch for this job?
This is the candidate's "call to action" for this job. Email address, have to fill a form or have to solve some mystery to get the contact details. It should be clear and concise. I usually put some instructions like this Include your latest resume, Github, Stackoverflow profiles or any of your online work samples.
I strongly believe that a good enough job description supported by people behind the company can easily get you the right candidates for different positions. Recruiters need to spend some valuable time on the job description to get best candidates.
(Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of YourStory.)
