An article by Jonathan Green of the GreenJobs Network of Website 

Is a job description/specification suitable to use as a job posting/advertisement?

Although a job description/specification and a job posting/advertisement are very similar in nature - they are not the same. They are two separate documents. Failing to distinguish between the two can be problematic because the aim of each is different; a job posting/advertisement should entice candidates and a job description/specification should inform candidates. A job description/specification is a feeder into a job posting/advertisement. A job posting/advertisement is an external document that announces a job opening. It is based off the job description/specification but written in an engaging tone to attract job seekers. In addition to sharing abbreviated details from the job description/specification, it also adds:

• Breakdown of a typical workday or work week
• Employee perks
• Company description

It is where we define the content that can be translated into a job posting/advertisement for the external marketplace. It also helps define the screening and assessment criteria for prospective candidates.

What is a job posting/advertisement?

A job posting/advertisement is what you find on job boards or company career websites.

First and foremost, the function of a job posting/advertisement is as an external document used by hiring teams in recruiting efforts to attract the best candidates. This is likely to be the very first touchpoint with your company so it’s important to make a great impression. Put on your “marketing hat” and try to do everything possible to encourage the best candidates to apply. This is especially true for passive candidates – those candidates who are already employed but might be looking for a better opportunity (often the best candidates!). It is a holistic collection of the role, the qualifications, and what the company can offer in turn. Once an organisation has identified the need to bring talent into its workforce and the internal job description/specification has been created and approved, talent acquisition teams will use that job description/specification to create an external job posting/advertisement to market the position and attract top talent. 

A job posting/advertisement provides a summary of the requirements of a role, packaged together with the core and fringe benefits that your company offers. For example, long term career opportunities, prospects for promotion, ethical and transparent operations, charity affiliations, volunteering days, community support activities etc. 

A job posting/advertisement translates the essential elements of a job description/specification, with the objective being a re-scripted shorter, copy-written sales tool to attract the widest possible pool of appropriate candidates to sell the role and attract talent. It needs to market the organisation and the position in a positive way. It must grab a potential candidate’s interest to encourage them to find out more.

Your job posting/advertisement should not be an exhaustive list of job duties and functions for the role – that belongs in your job description/specification. It should include the job title as well as convey the requirements of the position to sell the company/position while setting the correct worker expectations. Depending on the seniority of the position you’re trying to fill, you should also include some of the key responsibilities, but without going into unnecessary details. Think about the topline skills they may need, as well as personal characteristics. Are they a good team player, and can they operate effectively when working from home? Do they thrive on pressure, and do they have ambition? Would they make a great leader? It should also include keywords that potential candidates will be searching for on public job boards. Include keywords they might know, or ways they might be describing a job they’re looking for. For example, “wind farm site supervisor”, “principal renewable energy planning consultant”, “senior eia project manager” etc.

What is the difference between a job posting/advertisement and a job description/specification?

The key differences between these are as follows:

Job posting/advertisement

• Use: external
• Type: advertisement
• Purpose: sell the job
• Info about: job, company, benefits
• Tone: upbeat & engaging
• Length: shorter

Job description/specification

• Use: internal
• Type: document
• Purpose: explain the job
• Info about: job
• Tone: formal
• Length: longer

What should you include in a job posting/advertisement?

The type of information that you should include in a job posting/advertisement is as follows:

• Job title
• Job location
• Salary and benefits
• Closing date for applications
• Company information
• Job summary / position overview
• Job responsibilities and duties
• Person specification
• Application process

Have you any tips that you can kindly share with me to help me design an effective job posting/advertisement?

Please find below a few tips that we hope you will find useful:

• Make your job title stand out - this is the most important part of your job posting as it is what grabs the initial attention of suitable candidates and ensures that you are making the right type of candidates in terms of their qualifications and experience aware of your career opportunity. A good policy to follow is to use a relevant and popular job category followed by a relevant and popular industry sector – for example – project manager (net zero transition strategy). Indeed, to make your job posting more noticeable and to ensure that you target the right type of candidate it can be a good idea not to use a job title on its own that is too generic but instead to put in brackets after the job title the green industry sector (s) that the role will be focused on. For example, instead of using a generic job title such as – analyst – call it – analyst (renewable energy) – or whatever green industry sector (s) is appropriate to your job posting/career opportunity.

• Use relevant and popular keywords in your job title and the content of your job posting that suitably qualified and experienced candidates will tend to use when searching for a suitable career opportunity online or which they will use to set up job alerts by email to be automatically notified by email when a suitable career opportunity first becomes available online. An excellent online tool to help with this process is google keyword planner which is a free keyword research tool where you can discover new keywords and see their estimated search volumes.

• Salary - as salary level is a good indicator of the career level/seniority of a particular role it is advisable to include it so that you get more relevant candidates being made aware of and applying to your career opportunity. If possible, please ensure that you have benchmarked the salary for your role to ensure that it is competitive with the current market rate for similar types of roles.

• Salary description - make your job posting stand out from the crowd and make it more attractive to potential candidates by highlighting the other benefits associated with this role.

• Advertise your job posting for as long as possible - where possible it is always advisable to have your job posting displayed for as long as possible as this will mean that you will receive more suitable applications and there is a greater chance of you finding the perfect candidate and also building your talent pool for future career opportunities that you have available.

• Make sure the candidate application journey makes sense - please ensure that your candidate application process makes sense to prospective candidates, that it is as easy as possible for them to follow and that you get the exact type of information (e.g., cv, cover letter, completed application form(s), candidate application information uploaded to your website/applicant tracking system etc) that you require from the candidate as part of your application process. Also please visit any of our websites and click the - apply now - button on some of the job postings that are currently being promoted on them to understand how our application process works from a candidate’s perspective and what they must do as part of that process so that the whole candidate application journey works as seamlessly as possible.

• A job posting/advertisement is not a job description/specification - please remember that they are not the same: they are two separate documents. Failing to distinguish between the two can be problematic because the aim of each is different; a job posting/advertisement should entice candidates and a job description/specification should inform candidates. A job description/specification is a feeder into a job posting/advertisement. A job posting/advertisement is an external document that announces a job opening and it is based on the job description/specification but written in an engaging tone to attract job seekers. First and foremost, the function of a job posting/advertisement is as an external document used by hiring teams in recruiting efforts to attract the best candidates.

• In a candidate driven market make it as easy as possible for high in demand candidates to contact you - as it is very much a candidate driven market at the moment we would advise where possible to include contact details in the content of your job posting such as a telephone number and email address of a suitable person within your organisation that potential candidates can get in touch with to find out more about the career opportunity and if it is the right fit for them before they begin their application process.