- Shayne Leslie
The gap between a good job ad and a poor one

How many of you are ready to have a look around for a new challenge this year?
There is a significant problem with many job ads, however. The writers of these epic tomes seem to detail the position under three headings, About the Role, Key Responsibilities and Essential Criteria/Ideal Candidate, yet criteria across the headings don't quite match.
By the time we’ve made it to the end of the ad, as candidates we’re genuinely confused. Guess what happens. We give up.
The ads don't specify:
How will candidate’s responses be assessed?
What are today’s priorities and associated skills being sought?
What are the challenges and specific skills being sought to problem solve?
What kind of leadership does the position require?
Candidates don’t want to waste their time. You don’t want to waste your time.
Let's look at a real live seek ad for a F&B Manager in the South-West of Sydney.
About the Role
When I summarise the key points, I find the following:
Focus and vision to manage the day-to-day operations
Accountable for the development, implementation and evaluation of service standards, developing revenue growth, staff development and presentation of all food and beverage areas.
Culinary and/or hospitality operations background
New ways to improve and challenge the current processes and systems to make a difference.
The opening sentence, point 1 is already confusing. It is talking about management but messes with leadership. Focus, for example, is looking at your computer screen and concentrating on the task at hand. Vision is looking out the window. They are two completely different skill sets and mind sets. Focus belongs in operations. Vision belongs to strategy and leadership, and is better suited to point 4. Already, we are confused.
2 refers to the reporting hierarchy and 3 relates to general background. We are left with a mish-mash of management, leadership, reporting frameworks and a confusion of basic theoretical terms. And that’s just paragraph 1. Yet we know nothing of the organisation...
Key Responsibilities
I’ve summarise the Key Responsibilities from nearly 200 words to 50.
Effective management
Strategic goals
Consistently grow revenue
Procedures for consistency and delivery
Innovative marketing strategies
Control, analyse and report
Accountability for financial management
Lead, coach and performance manage
Development of team
Oversee purchasing
Quality control program
Safe and hygienic
The Ideal Candidate
When we look at the ‘Ideal Candidate’ we end up with a different bunch of words!
Club or Hotel experience
Business, communication, change management and customer service skills
High level of customer experience
Concept ideas, menus and products
Strong finance
Substantial negotiation skills
Results driven
Strong leadership and motivation skills
Work under pressure and solve problems
Communication skills
Performance management
Solid report writing, computer and literacy skills
WH&S, RSA, RCG and Food Safety
Flexible hours
So where should I begin?
I would ring the HR person to discuss and see if I am going to be a good fit, but there is no number to call. How rude. I am expected to guess. It may be an indication of the workplace culture and attitude to staff.
I could spend the time to group the whole lot of criteria to better formulate my response, which I have done below under the heading 'Criteria Summarised'. For jobs I really want to go for, this is the amount of effort I put in (note, some criteria are mentioned more than once in the job ad – does this make them more important? I don’t know!).
What I would like to know from this list is what is super important so I can position information on my application letter for maximum impact. I know the reviewer is only going to give my resume and letter a cursory glance at first so I have about 4 seconds.
The way the criteria is set out should help me understand this. But it doesn’t. My 2 big questions are:
What skills are required from day 1 (the immediate pain points) versus what skills will the organisation help me develop?
Do they need a leader to go and mess things up, or a steady team player, or someone who is going to keep a detailed eye on numbers?
Criteria Summarised in the Integrated Recruitment way!
Leadership
Vision; make a difference
Communication / Communication skills
Change management
Substantial negotiation skills
Results driven
Strong leadership and motivation skills
Work under pressure
Solve problems
Management
Focus to manage the day-to-day operations
Culinary or hospitality operations background / Club or Hotel experience
Effective management to meet strategic goals
Revenue growth / Consistently grow revenue
Control, analyse and report
Business skills
Finance
Accountability for financial management
Strong finance
Operations
Procedures for consistency and delivery
Oversee purchasing
Quality control program
Safe and hygienic / WH&S, RSA, RCG and Food Safety
Flexible hours
Marketing
Service standards / customer service skills
Innovative marketing strategies
Concept ideas, menus and products
Workforce Development
Staff development and presentation
Lead, coach and performance manage / Performance management
Development of team
#jobadvice #recruitment #linkedin #applyingforajob #cv #resume