The Current State of Job Requirements
Have you ever looked at a job ad, skimmed through it, and decided not to apply because you thought that you could not even come close to matching the requirements the ad was asking for? Maybe you were job hunting and felt like you were being flooded with job ads having impossible requirements making you shake your head in disbelief.
Looking for a Big Data Engineer with an M.Sc or Ph.D degree in a related field, having at least 7 years of experience in Hadoop and Spark. Must also have a few years of experience with AI-powered Blockchain technologies and willing to start yesterday.
Does that sound familiar? Welcome to the current state of job ads; where candidates complain that requirements are too hard to match, and hiring managers claim that they cannot find the candidates they’re looking for. How did we reach this point? Let’s break down the job ad above.
Looking for a Big Data Engineer with an M.Sc or Ph.D degree in a related field
Is requiring an M.Sc or Ph.D really justified to work as a big data engineer? If you’ve noticed that a lot of new job descriptions nowadays are asking for a higher education than a graduate degree, then you are not wrong. Masters degrees have now become the new bachelors degrees in the hiring world. If the job has not changed, then why should the candidate’s education? Many hiring managers are now asking for post graduate degrees for the same jobs which only used to require a graduate degree, pushing students further into debt with their student loans, assuming they afford to do so.
Having at least 7 years of experience in Hadoop and Spark
How can a candidate possibly fill the job of a big data engineer, requiring 7 years of experience in Hadoop and Spark, when these technologies have not even been out for that long? Although this example is strictly relevant towards IT jobs, these unrealistic expectations are also found in other industries such as engineering in which hiring managers ask for prior experience with specific brands of machine tools. Although it is understandable to want experienced candidates, such unrealistic expectations only make it harder to fill positions in a company.
Must also have a few years of experience with AI-powered Blockchain technologies and willing to start yesterday
Do I really need to explain this one? Okay, I may have gone little overboard with last part of the job ad, but I just can’t count the number of times I saw something like this in a job description. How many times have you looked at a job description and saw a requirement listed which had nothing to do with the job itself?
What is happening?
Well, a number of things really. Such job ads are possibly being put together by a number of people all looking for different things in a candidate. This is the number one factor causing job ads to become bloated, possibly no longer relevant to the job itself, and unrealistically requiring more than one candidate from varying professions to fill the same job.
The recruiter writing such requirements could be lacking the technical or job related understanding to write the ad. Which is understandable of course, as you can’t expect recruiters to be an expert in every field they hire candidates in. This is often the case when HR managers hand insufficient job requirements to recruiters, leaving them scrambling to make up what they think sounds good based on their very extremely limited knowledge.
Hiring managers have gotten very picky, preferring to find the candidate with the required experience rather than investing in training. This is in turn decreasing employee loyalty as employees no longer feel valued and appreciated which of courses increases turnover in a company. This of course puts companies behind the competition as employees flee towards jobs offering better benefits.
Many recruiters are being put under unnecessary pressure which encourages them to write impossible job requirements in the search for the super candidate which doesn’t exist. This becomes very evident in job requirements which at times sound like they merge two professions together.
Poorly written job ads may also be contributing to these insane requirements. It is often the case that rather than specifically requesting X amount of years of experience in a specific tool or technology, recruiters may simply be looking for a candidate having that amount of experience in that role, while also having knowledge of those tools or technologies. The wording of a job ad can make a huge difference, so it is important to proof read each and every one.
Many hiring managers also intentionally request impossible job requirements to build a case for H-1B allotments, which are very hard to currently obtain. This allows hiring managers to make the case that there is no national that can fill the requirements for the job, as this person does not exist, making it easier for them to obtain work visas and hire international candidates with much lower salary expectations.
Are we doomed?
No, not really. However, changing things won’t be an easy fix as this will require many people within a company to change their mindset, and we all know how much people hate being told that what they believe is wrong.
Recruiters should take a look at the job requirements and determine whether employees currently filling the same role in the company could have met the job requirements if they joined today. If the answer is no, which is the case most of the time, expectations need to be somewhat managed.
Recruiters can still present hiring managers with candidate resumes they think are the right fit for the job. After all, the recruiter is meant to be a consultant, a counselor, an operator, and a salesman. It is the recruiter’s job to manage the expectations of the hiring manager, gently of course, by empathising with the pressure and uncertainty the hiring manager would be facing.
More recruiters should be comparing their salary expectations against those currently being offered by competitors in the industry. It is essential that recruiters start to push for their companies to start participating in salary surveys that provide robust and detailed compensation data for all industries and geographies. How else are hiring managers going to realise that they’re asking for top talent without offering enough pay?
Transparency is key. Although it is the recruiter’s job to understand the market better than the hiring manager, the hiring manager is always the key decider in the recruitment process. Recruiters must be vocal and always keep the hiring managers in the loop, always using data to back their claims.
Invest in your employees. Not all candidates start off with all the experience the job requires. Companies that invest in their employees are more likely to respond to changes in the market.
“The only thing worse than training your employees and having them leave is not training them and having them stay.” — Henry Ford
What can we do in the meantime?
Just apply regardless. I like to use the 70% rule when looking for a job. If you feel that you meet 70% of the job requirements listed in the ad, consider applying. Recruiters could be trying to cast as wide a net as possible, which can easily backfire as qualified candidates easily get confused leaving them questioning whether they’re right for the job.
You could also track down people who work at the company to get a feel on whether all the requirements are really required. LinkedIn could be an easy way of doing this and could even help you score referral points.
Tailor your resume for every job you apply for. One size does not fit all, and tailoring your resume for the job you’re applying for can easily increase your chances of scoring an interview.
Get in touch with the recruiter if you don’t hear anything from them after a month or two. They could either still be looking for candidates and had to lower their expectations which means that you would be reminding the recruiter that you’re still interested in the job, or they could even give you a reason as to why they turned you down for the job helping you reevaluate your job hunting strategies.
After all, experience is not the only important thing for a candidate to thrive in a company. Soft skills, interpersonal skills, and being a team player all play a huge role, let’s not forget that. So even if you only meet 70% of what’s listed in the ad, you could still stand a reasonable shot at getting an offer.
“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take” — Wayne Gretzky