A job description sets out the specific duties and responsibilities that go with a staff position, the skills and qualifications required for the position, and the person or structure to whom the person filling the position is accountable. The first step in drawing up a job description is to analyse exactly what is involved in the job.

The second step is to write it up following certain guidelines.

Analysing the job means looking at:

• All the tasks involved in the job
• All the knowledge and skills needed to do the job properly
• The relationship of the job to other jobs in the organisation

Guidelines to writing a job description

Include the following in a job description:

• The title of the job
• A brief statement about the purpose of the job
• The responsibilities of the job, listed in order of importance
• The tasks involved in fulfilling the responsibilities. As far as possible, you must say:
  • the proportion of time to be spent on each task
  • the minimum standard that is acceptable (for example, typing at 40 words a minute)
• A person specification, which states what kind of person should be employed for the job
  A person specification covers two areas:
  • skills, education levels, experience, abilities (for example, language abilities) needed
  • personal and physical attributes needed. In other words, things that would suit your organisation and the staff already working in it
• Conditions under which the person doing the job must be able to work. This includes for example having to work weekends or nights.
• The management structures and lines of accountability, and how the person doing the job described fits into them