How often do you think about job descriptions? Probably not often, maybe only once every few years when you are looking for a new job. Job descriptions is something that I have given a lot of thought in the last few months, and it can be a significant marker in the health of your company.
Lots of employers think about job descriptions about as much as you do, only when hiring, which means that they can often be out of date. The responsibility to update these forms lies on HR, but why? A job description requires knowledge about recruiting, training, legal, and compliance, and all of these organizational parts are the responsibility of Human Resources. HR can oversee if the job role is consistent across departments and remains compliant with the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. Lastly, HR needs to be able to translate this information to layman’s terms so applicants can have an understanding of the job role. By not having up to date job descriptions, people applying for these positions may not apply due to the fact that they are unsure of what the position entails. Additionally, not having positions that are compliant with accessibility laws can leave your organization in a vulnerable position.
It is recommended to view these documents as living, changing, dynamic things that need to be updated as your organization shifts. While it is HR’s responsibility to monitor these changes, many people within the organization can be of assistance such as employees or managers. Employees know the scope and size of the job better than anyone else, and can give an idea on what is actually being done on a day-to-day basis. Managers are essential in knowing the job requirement for the position and how daily tasks align with organizational goals.
The goal of Human Resources is to facilitate the upkeep of these job descriptions, and investigate discrepancies between the job description and what the person in the job is currently doing. Some reasons for this difference could be an employee going above and beyond, and those additional skills may not be included in the description. Alternatively, the individual may perceive that their pay is not sufficient for the additional roles and skills they have taken on, and finding another position for them in the company might be beneficial . Knowing the employee workload may also help you recognize where work is unevenly distributed, potentially resulting in reworking job design. As you can see, keeping up to date on job descriptions isn’t just useful for hiring, but can give a greater understanding of how your organization is functioning as a whole. While this sounds simple in theory, great HR practice like this takes time, skill, and money, making it a lot more challenging than it seems. One way to overcome these challenges is making sure that it is a regular function of your human recourses department. This includes training new staff on upkeep, finding a regular time for updates such as during annual performance reviews, and proper budgeting to adequately compensate HR personnel for the additional time it takes to maintain these systems.
In my own personal experience looking for jobs, the job description makes a huge difference. For reference for you all, I work a lot of part time or seasonal jobs, right now I have four. The other day I decided to go online and look at human resources jobs to see what was out there. Admittedly I did not find much, but a lot of the ones that I did find appeared to be written with AI. AI can be a useful tool in some ways, particularly in editing something as significant and also tedious as a job description. However, as someone looking for a job, the description was so vague and filled with superfluous language that I had no idea what some of the jobs entailed. While the writing was polished, I could tell not a lot of thought went into the descriptions and that made me turn away from the posting. Using AI solves some of the challenges I mentioned above (time, skill, money) however I do not personally want to work in a position where no one cares enough about it to write a proper description. In comparison, the most recent job I applied for was to work as a Counselor Coordinator at a summer camp. This is a camp I have worked for before, and I am very excited to be working this position this summer, and I could tell the job description was given a lot of thought and very accurately reflected the job position, making me want to apply. As someone who is frequenting the job market, and also studying to work in human resources there are some of the things I am thinking about.
Job Worth Doing: Update Descriptions The basic job description is the foundation of nearly every HR function. Kathryn Tyler. January 1, 2013. https://canvas.oregonstate.edu/courses/2055828/files/118176559/download?download_frd=1