What is a Good Job Description?

We didn’t get the perfect candidate. We got two.

It took around 45 days.

Two years later, the successes continue to exceed original expectations.

It all began with the need to post a job description.

But we agreed on something completely different. 

Instead of focusing on standard HR or Supervisor-driven task lists for someone to complete, we decided on posting a mission for someone to accept.

Instead of posting a job description, we posted a future.

Instead of listing things that had to be done, we described outcomes that made a person successful in the role.

Instead of trying to capture all the activities that were required to be completed, we detailed a customer-centric environment that is to be nurtured.

Instead of creating the need for a supervisor to check off boxes at 30, 60, or 90 day intervals, we created a documented pathway that the candidate would keep and measure their success along the way. 

Because the job description was instead a mission, it was the foundation for the culture for matching the growth of the candidates to the growth of the business.

Understanding that we were all still on the path to success was verified with an answer to one question at the one-year mark. Are there any gaps between what was promised in our description and the life you have here today?

The answer was a pair of resounding no’s.

A truly effective description is one third outcome, one third process, and one third pat on the back. 

❶ Mission: Begin with the “Why” 

❷ Accountability: Customer driven outcomes including employee freedoms and decision boundaries.

❸ Confirmation: Measures of success that an employee can clearly measure performance in relation to mission.

As AI’s muscles continue to grow we send it to do more and more of our heavy lifting.

Because of their relatively standard approaches, job descriptions are an easy destination to point to. However, whether created by flesh or by silicone, the challenge with creating “good” (better described as effective) job descriptions stays the same. Will the candidate who answers this ad be successful?

Since businesses continue to cite finding and keeping people as their greatest challenge, there can be no better expectation for the next candidate, whether attracted by pen or from cloud, if we keep offering our candidates the same types of jobs and descriptions. 

I’ve seen better, long-term successes in attracting and keeping the right people when we offered them a future, a mission to accept, and pathway with which they can measure their progress.