Job Descriptions: Why You Need to Update Now*

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Sheri Heller: description so job posting our job ad is really where you’re selling the position if you put a job description for an HR generalist on indeed.

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Sheri Heller: or any again any of the other job boards, I know what an HR generalist does you don’t need to tell me all the little functions, but what you want to tell me as a prospective candidate.

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Sheri Heller: is why I want to come work for you why why this job might be a good fit for me and why your company might be a good fit for me so think of it as a selling tool.

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Sheri Heller: And you’ll also want to make sure that you are talking about the qualifications and skills required, which may not be included in a job description.

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Sheri Heller: And then you also in your job, as you really want to focus on the company culture, make sure there’s contact information they should they know where the position is based, especially if you’re a multi state employer.

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Sheri Heller: versus a job description which really is an internal document and it’s set up to identify those essential job functions and responsibilities.

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Sheri Heller: Again, it does go over qualifications and skills that are required, but it also will go a little beyond that talking about working conditions and physical demands.

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Sheri Heller: And things of that nature, so it really is Those are two separate job, excuse me two separate items the job add a posting versus the job description.

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Sheri Heller: Then we move on to improve performance management, and here we use the job descriptions, first and foremost to clearly communicate performance expectations to our employees.

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Sheri Heller: monitor their performance based on those expectations.

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Sheri Heller: Address performance issues as they arise, a create a performance Improvement Plan, or what we love to call it a pip.

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Sheri Heller: To improve those performance issues and then, finally, we use those job descriptions when preparing performance appraisals so anytime you are looking to evaluate somebody’s performance.

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Sheri Heller: it’s it’s just a great tool to go back to so you’re always making sure you’re not comparing an individual to other individuals doing the same job that you’re comparing them to the job description.

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Sheri Heller: Then we start the whole process again that’s how job performance management goes it’s very cyclical so often managers think of performance management is just doing the appraisals, but, as you can see from this graphic It really is an ongoing process.

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Sheri Heller: of next week us job descriptions in training and development and it helps us to identify training needs develop a plan for training.

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Sheri Heller: Sometimes it’s for career planning, so if you have an individual who is in a lower level position and wants to move up a job description can really help identify those training needs in order to help that person advance.

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Sheri Heller: And then we can also use it to create individual development plans or IDP for those individuals who are again looking to move up.

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Sheri Heller: And then we also use it for compensation decisions so when we’re developing compensation plans determined trying to determine how much we’re going to pay people.

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Sheri Heller: salary benchmarking determining merit and market increases.

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Sheri Heller: With, especially now, where so many states like Massachusetts many states have pay equity laws.

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Sheri Heller: in place, and when you’re looking at pay equity laws and you look at a group of people were doing essentially maybe the same function so let’s say you’re an accounting firm.

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Sheri Heller: And you have different levels of accountants, so they may, as far as their job description is concerned advisors titles are concerned may all seem to have the same job.

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Sheri Heller: But when there are big pages fairies what we do find oftentimes is that those pay disparities are usually because an individual is performing tasks or functions that are.

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Sheri Heller: beyond their original job description, so that means maybe we need to add a new level, so we might have a accountant level number one in a company level number two and we need to different job descriptions for that so that’s where COMP decisions might come into play.

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Sheri Heller: And then finally legal compliance with job descriptions, it can also help you in determining whether a position is exempt or non exempt under the fair Labor standards act of the FSA.

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Sheri Heller: which will avoid it can help you avoid discrimination claims under various employment laws such as title seven or the DEA and it’s also good can be used in determining accommodations under the Ada which we’ll talk a little bit more about.

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Sheri Heller: right there anyway job description so let’s take a moment to talk about the importance of job descriptions when dealing with Ada accommodations.

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Sheri Heller: The Ada makes it unlawful to discriminate in employment, against a qualified individual with a disability, so the act applies to all employers with 15 plus employees, but even if you have fewer than 15 employees most states have anti discrimination laws that may apply.

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Sheri Heller: So it’s really important to have those job descriptions so that under the Ada an individual with a disability, so an individual with a disability under the Ad has to be qualified to perform the essential functions of the job.

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Sheri Heller: With or without an accommodation So where do we go to find those essential functions of the job, the job description so it’s important to have those identified, excuse me in your job description.

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Sheri Heller: One site, we want to bring your attention to in dealing with reasonable accommodations under the Ada which can be very, very tricky is the job accommodations network or Jan.

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Sheri Heller: This is a department of Labor sponsored resource for guidance on workplace accommodations and disability employment issues.

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Sheri Heller: Jana also provides free consulting services for all employers, regardless of size so really, really handy handy tool, especially again now, with in the age of kuvan.

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Sheri Heller: where you have employees who have different health issues that might prevent them say from coming back into the office and you’re trying to figure out do you need to accommodate them and what is a reasonable accommodation God is a tremendous resource to tap into.

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Sheri Heller: And with that i’m going to turn it over to amanda stardust building our job description.

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Bridge Amanda: Great Thank you sorry good afternoon everyone.

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Bridge Amanda: As sorry mentioned job descriptions are important for a lot of different reasons, so let’s talk about developing and right writing them.

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Bridge Amanda: When starting a job description we usually begin with the position title, especially for online recruiting purposes it’s important to make sure.

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Bridge Amanda: that the position title is clear and concise you want to try to avoid any internal lingo that only you and your employees can kind of relate to.

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Bridge Amanda: You want to resist any kind of creative titles, you know, such as accounting ninja or even you know happiness advocate um you also want to make sure that there are no gender or age implications in the job title or the job description.

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Bridge Amanda: And you want to make sure that the title itself is self explanatory for recruitment purposes, so, for example, internally, you may refer to a sales advocate as a brand Ambassador brand ambassador.

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Bridge Amanda: or a customer service representative as a guest advocate, but these titles may not come up in job search engines when you’re looking to recruit candidates.

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Bridge Amanda: Next we’re going to review the steps in writing a job description, these are going to include doing a job analysis determining core functions identifying essential duties and determining the frequency of those duties and functions.

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Bridge Amanda: It is also important to determine the requirements of the position, such as experience and education, as well as physical environmental or special demands of the job, such as travel or even heavy lifting.

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Bridge Amanda: These are important for many different reasons, for example, fitness for duty if an employee is returning to work from an injury we’ll finish up by writing the position summary.

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Bridge Amanda: If this is the first time you’re creating a job description for an existing position and job analysis can help determine the core functions in the essential duties of the job.

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Bridge Amanda: Job analysis might include interviewing and we’re observing the individuals who are currently doing that job or having please complete activity logs or even job description questionnaires that will help you determine that information that you’re looking for.

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Bridge Amanda: There are also a lot of online resources available as well, such as the occupational outlook handbook O H or O net online and will provide you with these resources at the end of the presentation.

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Bridge Amanda: Next, will need to determine the core functions of the position, this is not a list of all the required tasks, but rather grouping these tasks into 48 major functions of the job.

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Bridge Amanda: In general, you want to use one to five words for each function when we’ve identified the core functions, then we wanted to identify and determine the percentage of each function in relation to the total job so let’s take a look at an example of what I mean.

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Bridge Amanda: Our example job description is for a warehouse supervisor, as you can see we’ve lumped all the various tasks of a warehouse supervisor into four core functions and listed the percentage of each function in relation to that job.

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Bridge Amanda: So this position will coordinate and oversee all warehouse logistics 40% supervise and direct warehouse staff 30%.

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Bridge Amanda: track and account for all incoming and outgoing products 20% and maintain safety maintain standards of safety and security 10% of the time so we’re grouping these from you know kind of importance in the higher percentages first.

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Bridge Amanda: Okay, so next we’re going to determine the duties for each of these functions and identifying the duties we’re going to answer all the questions of kind of what how.

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Bridge Amanda: And why, in relation to each of these core functions.

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Bridge Amanda: And also list the duties, we need to identify which duties are essential and that’s what sherry really talked about you know where do you find those essential duties when referring to the Ada it’s going to be in this job description.

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Bridge Amanda: So this is definitely important when you’re dealing with any kind of accommodation requests on and so to really identify those essential duties are very important.

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Bridge Amanda: So when we’re identifying them, it can be challenging things to consider to include is or to how to build them is is the duty is the task necessary to perform the job, do you have to do that in order to perform this job.

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Bridge Amanda: How frequently is this performed or how much time is spent performing that task can the task be right redesigned or performed in another manner, so you know, does the employee have to come into the Office can this position be remote.

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Bridge Amanda: Is there someone that can take on a part of that function to make an accommodation.

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Bridge Amanda: And can the tasks be reassigned to another employees, so if it’s a lifting requirement is there, someone that can assist with that um you know if the employee is injured or if there’s an accommodation that needs to be made.

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Bridge Amanda: So going forward, we are going to look at our warehouse supervisor example again so here are some of the essential duties of this particular job.

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Bridge Amanda: They supervise forklift and pallet jack operations, they complete accident reports and OSHA logs the ensure safety equipment is used consistently they conduct regular safety trainings at weekly meetings as needed.

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Bridge Amanda: So for each duty, we also need to determine how frequently the task is done so, is it done every day, is it done once a week or even once a month on, and so you just really want to kind of think about that and building the job description and identify that as well.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so we’ve gathered a lot of information, so far, but we’re going to want to identify.

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Bridge Amanda: The position requirements, and these are things such as skills, knowledge and abilities and education than any certifications that are required, you should all tied be tied directly back to the duties to be performed so once you kind of wrap it all up we’re going to tie it back.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so back to our example here are some position requirements that we talked about just.

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Bridge Amanda: We need a minimum of three years of on hand hands on warehouse and logistics supervisor management so three years of that kind of experience.

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Bridge Amanda: They have to have a valid driver’s license they have to have training in powered industrial truck operation, and they have to have completed the forklift train the trainer and be certified in that.

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Bridge Amanda: job descriptions should always include physical environmental and or special demands of the job, even if it’s an office type position, sometimes people have to pick up.

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Bridge Amanda: packages of paper or packages that are delivered that you know could weigh up to 10 or 15 pounds.

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Bridge Amanda: i’m lifting a specific number of pounds that you want to include standing or sitting for a prolonged period of time, so you know if you’re talking about your office position or the front desk or the receptionist.

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Bridge Amanda: Know primary they’re primarily their main job is to be sitting for long periods of time even you know climbing ladders, so if the position requires you to climb a ladder things of that nature, you really want to include in the physical demands.

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Bridge Amanda: Then we’re going to take a look at environmental demands, so this can include weather conditions, you think of your outside workers that.

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Bridge Amanda: You know, are landscapers or things like that that are you know they’re exposed to high heat conditions or cold weather.

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Bridge Amanda: Any kind of hazardous materials that employees might come in contact with or even noises so you know, sometimes jackhammering or loud noises you want to note that in there as well.

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Bridge Amanda: You also want to cover any kind of special demands such as an overnight shift that the job requires or even travel away from home or even on call as part of that position.

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Bridge Amanda: So, here are some of the physical and environmental demands of a warehouse exam of the warehouse supervisor and the example that we’re doing so, it requires requires frequent bending squatting stooping reaching and carrying of items throughout the workday.

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Bridge Amanda: You need to have the ability to work in a constant state of alertness for safety manner and noise level levels can vary, at times, and can be loud.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so we’re we’re getting there we’re now moving on to the position summary so writing this is a brief description of the purpose of the position.

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Bridge Amanda: And an overview of the positions mean responsibilities this summary should be short and to the point and it should be about one to three sentences maximum.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so back to this example.

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Bridge Amanda: The warehouse supervisor supervises and coordinates all warehouse teams and functions, including shipping receiving order packing picking inventory control inbound QA and relabeling so this would be what we would consider a brief description of that specific warehouse supervisor example.

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Bridge Amanda: So, since no job description is all inclusive, we always want to add something that’s kind of a catch all so saying something like nothing this job description.

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Bridge Amanda: restricts the rate of management to assign or reassigned duties and responsibilities to this job at any time, or you know other duties as assigned anything that can really kind of allow the employer to add things as needed or as the job evolves.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so Finally, the job description should also include lines for signatures so.

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Bridge Amanda: You know, if applicable, an HR person to sign off on it, the manager or supervisor and the employee.

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Bridge Amanda: And it’s a good practice to keep a signed copy of the job description on file for reference, and you know we talked about performance management.

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Bridge Amanda: And also any kind of Ada accommodations This is also something that can be done electronically and stored electronically if if that’s how you.

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Bridge Amanda: If that’s how your infrastructure works in handles these things so to allow the employee to electronically acknowledged that they have received and approve their job description.

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Bridge Amanda: Alright, so thank you for sticking with us i’m now going to pass it right back to sherry and we’re going to talk about some of the great resources we brought up in in addition to the job accommodation network or ashjian.

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Sheri Heller: helps if I unmute myself doesn’t it.

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Sheri Heller: Thanks amanda okay so i’m amanda mentioned these at the beginning, but i’m on net online is a department of Labor sponsored website, which will give you all sorts of.

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Sheri Heller: Resources for.

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Sheri Heller: detail job descriptions, it provides detailed job descriptions of the world of work for use by job seekers workforce development HR professionals students, researchers and more.

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Sheri Heller: Give me years ago when we used to go to the read this used to be kept at the reference desk For those of you remember the reference desk at the library.

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Sheri Heller: And then there’s also the occupational outlook handbook or the oh, and the O H, and that can help you find career information on duties, education, training, pay and the outlook for hundreds of occupations, but both of these resources also give you great fodder for building your job descriptions.

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Sheri Heller: All right, so let’s tackle some of the questions that have come in, so when do we give out a job description so it’s a great question so one when it’s always a good practice.

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Sheri Heller: To give out that job description added interview so to make sure that the candidate is aware of all of the functions because, again, ideally we’re not putting all of these.

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Sheri Heller: requirements in art ad because our ad our job posting is there to try and in sell the position.

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Sheri Heller: But then we got to get down to the nitty gritty things like working conditions and physical demands and all of that, so you really want to make sure that you give that out at a at a job interview.

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Sheri Heller: And then, once somebody accepts the position it’s also a good practice to have them sign off that they’ve received a copy of their job description and then keep that in there that sign copy in the employee file.

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Bridge Amanda: that’s great Thank you sorry um I also just got another question, in which is how do you tie this to performance and you know if you are going to write up an employee, how would you relate that to the job description.

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Sheri Heller: that’s a great question, so this is this is where job descriptions again come in handy when when you say when you’re.

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Sheri Heller: saying to somebody that they are not performing up to par they’re having performance issues.

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Sheri Heller: You want to be able to again look back at that job description to see make sure that those responsibilities that you’re identifying are highlighted in the job description and that way you can.

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Sheri Heller: that’s the best way to hold them accountable and again because we’ve got that sign job description on file.

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Bridge Amanda: yeah perfect i’m now to turn it a little bit to return to work and job descriptions on.

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Bridge Amanda: You know how How would you help an employee in an accommodation, you know, based on the essential function, so you know if their requirement is to come back to work, you know what could be a reasonable accommodation, based on some sort of disability due to the covert pandemic.

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Sheri Heller: That, and this is going to be really tricky and it’s going to get even trickier as as time moves on, because we really don’t know the the long term effects.

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Sheri Heller: Of of for people who have contracted coven 19.

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Sheri Heller: So it’s definitely going to be very tricky so what you want to make sure as again we’ve got those essential functions of the job listed on the job description I call those the non negotiable, these are the things that I mean if you are if you’re a weight person.

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Sheri Heller: You know, waiting tables in a restaurant, you have to be able to stand and walk for a good portion of your day there’s just no.

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Bridge Amanda: way yeah.

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Sheri Heller: To wait on tables without that, as opposed to somebody let’s say works in a retail environment, who all of a sudden can’t stand for long periods, you might be able to accommodate them by putting a stool down you’ll for them to be able to sit down to work when they need to.

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Sheri Heller: yeah, but when it comes to code and some of the accommodations one thing to remember is that it has the.

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Sheri Heller: Ada only covers employees and their own serious health conditions, not those a family member, so if their home because they need, they need to work from home because they need to care for somebody.

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Sheri Heller: that’s a whole different topic that has nothing to do with the Ada or or really with the job description per se, but to make an accommodation, you need to look and see.

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Sheri Heller: As you recovering amanda earlier is are there, some of those functions that could be reassigned things that have to be done in the office so let’s say, for example, part of my job might need to be let’s say filing.

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Sheri Heller: And, and if i’m not able, if I have to work remotely because of health reasons and you’re accommodating me, maybe that piece of my job, can be farmed out to somebody else who is in the office.

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Sheri Heller: And and it’s a matter of in the job description being very clear just got done working through with one client recently who.

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Sheri Heller: had an employee who just had a baby and they are concerned because right now everybody’s working remotely which is fine, however they’ve noticed that every time they have been on meetings with her.

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Sheri Heller: The baby is there, you can hear the baby cooing crying you know these are challenges we’re all facing right now working remotely I mean i’m surprised that my dog isn’t snoring up a storm right now.

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Bridge Amanda: Nothing, absolutely yeah and um you know to play back to the presentation Jerry like to talk about those things that we need to consider when we’re developing those essential duties.

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Bridge Amanda: You know these are really great tools to ask yourself is this task, necessary to perform the job now how frequently is it performed and how much time is spent performing that task.

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Sheri Heller: candidate, but things to include in there, though amanda that we didn’t cover it here is that you want to also especially for.

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Sheri Heller: People who are possibly remote when do they need to be available right so.

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Sheri Heller: That your expectation is that they are available, they are available via you know via phone or email from nine to five, you know if that is when your business is being conducted and it’s not possible to work off hours.

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Sheri Heller: Then you want to be very clear about that you want to be clear that if it’s somebody who’s position is going to work remotely that we identify that they have to be able to set up where they will have.

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Sheri Heller: Limited distractions because that also is a little bit of an issue when.

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Sheri Heller: You know, working when working from home is just you know everything going on whether you’ve got construction going on outside your door or your Internet cuts out or you know all of those things, so you want to be very specific in.

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Sheri Heller: In job descriptions if, especially for remote workers to make sure they understand what is expected of them.

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Bridge Amanda: that’s a really great point, there is another question in here about how long, should the job description be so I know we talked about adding a lot of things in there, but you know what do you think sherry what’s a good length for a job description.

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Sheri Heller: Really, you know the job description you got to separate out you don’t want to get into the minutiae of the tasks, you want to sort of lump them in.

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Sheri Heller: So instead of giving a list for let’s say you have somebody a controller and account or somebody in accounting.

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Sheri Heller: You don’t need to necessarily list all the reports that they need to run every month, but you just need to list, something that says they need to be they need to.

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Sheri Heller: To run monthly reports so you know i’d say a page two at the most, but you really want to you don’t need to get into the the the actual how they’re going to do the job just the job functions that need to be accomplished not how they get accomplished does that make sense.

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Sheri Heller: Absolutely okay.

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Bridge Amanda: um another another one that came in was um when when you’re doing the job analysis, what are some of the questions that are on, you know that that employee questionnaire that they might fill out about the job duties that they’re doing currently.

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Sheri Heller: yeah that’s a great question too so on a job analysis, you want to really whether it’s through.

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Sheri Heller: an interview with it a person who’s already doing the job and and come in, or whether it’s a form you’ll have a survey that you’re going to give them to find out.

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Sheri Heller: Again, what what the specific tasks are that they do, but also what percentage of their day or week is assigned to those tasks, so how frequently that they do them.

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Sheri Heller: And then possibly what might be required of them in order to get them done so, whether whether it’s a matter of.

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Sheri Heller: You know if they have to be doing reports, maybe it’s a matter of doing data entry, so you want to make sure that you’re you’re finding out what what what’s entailed in each of those tasks, so that will help you then also build better criteria for hiring as well.

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Bridge Amanda: So yeah.

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Sheri Heller: Because you know if it turns out that, in order to do this job somebody has to be proficient in excel and you’re not familiar with this job that they’re doing you need to be aware that excel is an important it’s an important tool.

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Bridge Amanda: Great so.

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Sheri Heller: One other question I saw come in, was in.

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Sheri Heller: Reference to when you should.

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Sheri Heller: How frequently should update your job descriptions and that really should be well first off if the position changes significantly always want to do that, then.

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Sheri Heller: But if at minimum you want to look at them annually, just to update and make sure that’s been no changes.

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Sheri Heller: To the position and again take a look at whether that whether those some of those job descriptions, if you have people all with the same job description let’s say.

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Sheri Heller: A daycare facility and everybody you all the teachers have the same job description, but you may have some teachers who are also responsible for training, maybe developing curriculum or things that.

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Sheri Heller: Other teachers are not the maybe we need to different job descriptions, in order to in order to.

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Sheri Heller: better and more clearly identify with being done.

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Bridge Amanda: Right i’m Mary just asked a question, if you have a new job role or a new role is it okay to put in the job description that it’s a new rule, and also the job description might change a bit is that okay.

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Sheri Heller: yeah I mean I don’t know that you need to put in that it’s a new role in the job description itself, it might be a good idea to put that in.

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Sheri Heller: into your job posting that this is a job that this is a new role.

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Sheri Heller: And because that does, I think you’ll put to your point Mary and the question, it does identify that this might change and morph a little bit because we’re not really sure what this role is going to end up being so that’s a really good question.

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Sheri Heller: All right, so I think.

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Sheri Heller: we’ve come to the end all right, well, thank you all for your questions i’m going to turn it back to amy to take us home.

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MP: Thank you, sherry and amanda for presenting today what a great program I love all the questions.

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MP: Thank you all again for attending the webinar we hope you came away with some helpful information about the importance of having.

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MP: accurate and updated job descriptions, especially as we navigate through the pandemic, I want to remind everyone that a link to the recording will be sent out later this afternoon, and if you have any further questions, please send them to marketing at MP that hr.com.

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Sheri Heller: You mean I can I address one other question that just came in.

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MP: Oh sure.

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Sheri Heller: i’m sorry they sent it into the chat so I didn’t see it.

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Sheri Heller: But it’s a really it’s a really awesome question so, for if everybody’s still on so how to reduce fear of coming back into an office unemployment, working from home.

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Sheri Heller: My game changers of four stage air purifier that filters out something again figure out what that is.

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Sheri Heller: which can catch anything larger blah blah blah, this is a key factor among other scientific issues yeah so here here’s The thing is that.

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Sheri Heller: You know in in bringing people back to the office, this is again really good time to start looking at your existing job descriptions making some changes, based on any functions that have changed because of this remote environment.

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Sheri Heller: And then also identifying for employees who you’re looking to come back, we were we’ve been having this conversation ourselves.

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Sheri Heller: Because we’re talking about us at MP, going back to the into the office, and one of the concerns of course is that we also want to know what the company is going to be doing to ensure that.

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Sheri Heller: You know that we’re working in a safe environment, so it definitely is a good way, not necessarily in the job description, but in bringing people back.

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Sheri Heller: to identify for them the efforts that you’re taking or making to ensure that it’s a good, safe work environment, so thank you for that question all right now i’m dunning.

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MP: Another great question.

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MP: Again Thank you everyone for attending look for that link to the recording and join us again next week for another great webinar have a great afternoon everyone.