The “Nice to Haves”

On many job postings, straight after an often impossibly long ‘Required Experience’ list, you’ll often see another list of ‘Nice to Haves’.

The problem with including ‘Nice to Haves’ in your job ads is that it runs a real risk of putting off potential candidates who met the criteria in the ‘Required Experience’ list, but don’t have some (or all) of those ‘Nice to Haves’.

If someone reads the first half of your job ad (the part that tells them why it’s a good job) and becomes interested, that interest will be heightened if, in the second half of the ad, they read that they match the desired profile.

But the ‘Nice to Have’ section just adds a layer of ambiguity that doesn’t need to be there.

I can imagine some qualified people reading it and thinking, “So that’s what they’re really looking for. That probably means I’m going to get ghosted. OK, I’m out.”

Why would any business want to put off qualified people from responding – especially in a candidate short market? It’s almost like some companies are trying to do the 1st round of selection in the actual job advert. Madness.

People don’t want ambiguity when it comes to managing one of the most important aspects of their life – namely, how they earn their living.

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