Understanding what Job Advertisements are Saying

Job advertisements can be overwhelming, some can be long and wordy, while others never seem to give enough information. However, reading job advertisements should not be tedious and difficult. Below are a few tips and tricks on how you can understand your job advertisements and what it is telling you.

Understand the main purpose of the role

Arguably the most important aspect of job advertisements is to understand the purpose of this position. Often, well written job advertisements would immediately state that the main purpose of their job in the title of the in the introduction.

What are the main skills required?

To understand the main skills required, you can obviously look at the “skills and requirement” section of the job advertisement. But what is there is no distinct section for skills and requirements in this advertisement? If that is the case, you will have to read through the description of the duties and tasks involved with this position. This is because often job requirements are implied throughout this section. For example, if the job states that, “we want you to use your abilities to bring together our supply chain and ensure smooth operations.” Then you will have to have good management and communication skills, and an ability to encourage teamwork amongst internal and external organizations.

What personal qualities are they looking for?

This strays away from technical or work skills that you need to have, but rather your personality and personal ideals and values that you uphold. This is important to consider because not everyone is going to be able to fit into every company. Each company have their own set of values that they work by and adhere to and an environment that prioritizes a certain type of personality. So, you would need to understand whether your personality and values aligns with the companies, and this can also be found in the job advertisements. Here you would need to look at the “about us” section of the job listing where the company talks about themselves. For example, if the company states that they are “fast paced” and with filled with “energetic team players”, then you may need to be quick on your feet and sociable to fit in.

What are the specific application requirements?

Every basic job advertisement has specific application requirements, and these are usually listed at the end of the job advertisements. These requirements should specify the what type of documents they want to receive from you, the deadline for application, how to send your documents in and a contact number or email for further information. If they do not list these important requirements on the job advertisements, then it would be necessary to contact them directly and ask them to ensure that your application is correct and meets the deadline.