I bet you’ve encountered this situation before: you have a new hiring manager with his first open requisition. He only wants the best candidates, so he’s given you a laundry list as long as your leg for the job description. You start to read it, and realize he’s asking for a developer who also knows everything about testing, as well as the intricacies of a specific software configuration management tool. The description ranges from low-level responsibilities that an intern could do, to something the senior managers would find challenging. And, you’re supposed to find someone by next Tuesday.

You don’t want to dim your hiring manager’s enthusiasm for finding exactly the right person—but this candidate doesn’t exist. What do you do?

Ask a few questions and ask the hiring manager to do just a little homework.

With whom will the candidate work?
If you are used to dealing with high tech folks, you might have heard them talk about “user stories” or “use cases” or “scenarios” as a form of requirements. You’re doing the same thing when you ask, “With whom will the candidate work?” If a candidate is supposed to work with other staff at the same level or in the same project team, you’ll look for a certain kind of experience. If you need someone who can work across the organization as well as up and down the hierarchy, you’ll look for another kind of candidate. There’s a continuum, of course, but asking this question first helps you establish some of the boundaries.

What output do you want to see from the candidate?
I like to ask hiring managers to envision a day, a week, a month, and a year-in-the-life of the candidate. When you ask about the output, you might hear things like, “UML documents” or “mentoring of junior staff” or “performance tests, next week.” Each of those deliverables presumes a certain kind of activity at a particular level.

Note that asking a hiring manager what a person will do makes the job real to that manager. You want to test for reality here. If hear “Define and shepherd a new process” when the hiring manager is talking about a junior candidate, you have a chance to ask more questions, because a junior level person is not going to define and shepherd a new process through the organization—except in the narrowest possible area.

What are the essential technical skills?
For knowledge workers, this is the tough question. Hiring managers become confused between “essential” and “desirable.” You can help them with another question about each technical skill: “If you found a candidate without this skill but all the others, would you consider interviewing the candidate, or would the lack of that skill eliminate the candidate from consideration?

Essential technical skills tend to fall in the functional areas of a job: how a developer develops, how a tester tests, how a product manager develops roadmaps, and so on. Rarely are tools and technology, such as the latest greatest website building tool essential. Sure, tools are desirable, but most knowledge workers can learn tools. Your hiring manager needs to consider what technical areas of the job are essential and which are more flexible.

What are the essential non-technical skills?
Of the non-technical skills, I hear the most about communication skills. Most candidates say they have “excellent communication skills.” Most managers want candidates to have excellent communication skills. So why is it so hard for people to talk to each other at work?

Make sure your hiring manager is explicit about the types and level of non-technical skills, such as communication skills. I once worked with a developer who was great at communicating in email, but lousy in person. Or, you might need someone who can deliver great presentations, but is required to write little.

When you ask about the essential non-technical skills, return to the day, month, week in the life of the candidate. That will help the hiring manager articulate the essential non-technical skills.

Once your hiring manager has asked and answered these questions, you’ll have the beginning of a job analysis for this job. You and the hiring manager might have to iterate on the analysis as you start to source candidates and as the hiring manager screens candidates, but at least you’ll have a starting point. And it isn’t a laundry list a mile long.

For more information on how to structure a job description, download Johanna’s templates for the job analysis at www.jrothman.com/Books/hiring-knowledge-workers.html.