<story><title>You Only Need 50% of Job “Requirements”</title><url>https://talent.works/blog/2018/11/27/the-science-of-the-job-search-part-vii-you-only-need-50-of-job-requirements/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>rossdavidh</author><text>I think many people write their job description&amp;#x27;s requirements, as if it were the opening stage of a negotiation.  You list everything you want as if it were a requirement, and you will only get about half of that.  But the problem is, it isn&amp;#x27;t a negotiation, it&amp;#x27;s a minimum spec (especially if you put the word &amp;quot;required&amp;quot; next to that line), and so many quite good candidates won&amp;#x27;t apply.&lt;p&gt;However, typically, I see 20-30 requirements, many of which (e.g. &amp;quot;passionate about software development&amp;quot;, &amp;quot;good communicator&amp;quot;) aren&amp;#x27;t specific enough to tell the candidate whether they are a good match or not (do poor communicators know they are poor communicators?).  Of the rest, really only 2 or 3 are actual requirements, and the candidate has to guess which those are.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>SilasX</author><text>&amp;gt;I think many people write their job description&amp;#x27;s requirements, as if it were the opening stage of a negotiation. You list everything you want as if it were a requirement, and you will only get about half of that. But the problem is, it isn&amp;#x27;t a negotiation, it&amp;#x27;s a minimum spec (especially if you put the word &amp;quot;required&amp;quot; next to that line), and so many quite good candidates won&amp;#x27;t apply.&lt;p&gt;They have the option to distinguish &amp;quot;minimum&amp;#x2F;required&amp;quot; vs &amp;quot;nice to have&amp;quot;, though.</text></comment>
<story><title>You Only Need 50% of Job “Requirements”</title><url>https://talent.works/blog/2018/11/27/the-science-of-the-job-search-part-vii-you-only-need-50-of-job-requirements/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>rossdavidh</author><text>I think many people write their job description&amp;#x27;s requirements, as if it were the opening stage of a negotiation.  You list everything you want as if it were a requirement, and you will only get about half of that.  But the problem is, it isn&amp;#x27;t a negotiation, it&amp;#x27;s a minimum spec (especially if you put the word &amp;quot;required&amp;quot; next to that line), and so many quite good candidates won&amp;#x27;t apply.&lt;p&gt;However, typically, I see 20-30 requirements, many of which (e.g. &amp;quot;passionate about software development&amp;quot;, &amp;quot;good communicator&amp;quot;) aren&amp;#x27;t specific enough to tell the candidate whether they are a good match or not (do poor communicators know they are poor communicators?).  Of the rest, really only 2 or 3 are actual requirements, and the candidate has to guess which those are.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cimmanom</author><text>But then there&amp;#x27;s that research that shows that on average, men will apply to a job if they meet less than half of of the requirements, so if you don&amp;#x27;t overspecify you&amp;#x27;ll be flooded with crap applications.&lt;p&gt;Of course, then you get the research that women will apply only if they meet &amp;gt;90%, so the overspeccing contributes to gender imbalances.</text></comment>