Job Descriptions

Every company in America demands a job description...just not a well written one (or one that's been copy edited). It drives me bat-shit crazy when I read a bad one.

What makes them bad? Too specific (will need to be re-written next year when Software 2008 comes out), too vague ("Needs good people skills"), too much prose (it's not a book report, you don't need to hit a word quota), I could go on and on.

Be concise, say what the skills the person has to have, make sure when you post it you'll get some applicants (not too narrow) but not too many applicants (there's that vague thing again). This isn't rocket science.

Here, we have the additional guidance that the Commonwealth puts on us, and we need to put specific things to measure in there for our appraisals at the end of the year. Don't put things in that can't be measured.

Today I was asked to read over a new job description for a CMS administrator:

theAlphaJohn: oh christ
theAlphaJohn: im reading this new [job description]. now it's a WCMS not just a CMS
Will: what the fuck is the W for?
Will: Wicked
Will: Wang
Will: Whack
theAlphaJohn: Web
Will: ...
Will: wow
theAlphaJohn: A. Knowledge, skill and abilities:
- Strong communication (written and verbal), analytical, and organization skills (R)
- Working knowledge of Adobe, PHP, HTML, UNIX/Apache, principles and techniques of web design (R)
theAlphaJohn: Adobe is a brand, not a skill
Will: hahahahaha
Will: it's a language
Will: duh
theAlphaJohn: why Unix/Apache? Why not just Apache?
theAlphaJohn: "techniques of web design" like that can be measured
theAlphaJohn: it might as well say "mad web skillz, science-droppin', and jive foolery"
Will: yes
Will: hahahaha
Will: jive foolery
theAlphaJohn: "A bachelor’s degree in CIS, IT, or other related area preferred. Appropriate experience may be considered in lieu of a degree."
theAlphaJohn: (1) fucking spell out the degree name
theAlphaJohn: (2) does a WCMS admin really need to be a CS nerd? cause if you took two semesters of assembly language and lisp, do you really want to work with coldfusion and html?
Will: yeah
theAlphaJohn: 3 flavors of useless