Thursday, May 01, 2008

Live Your Dreams - Learn How To Read Job Descriptions

A good job description provides you with basic information about the company, a short description of the role in this job, what the academic requirements are towards this job and any other experience that is required to qualify for the job. If you are a successful applicant, you will typically be invited to a first interview or some kind of assessment centre. I personally know of examples where the first step in the qualifications process - your job application: CV + Cover Letter - required a relatively small effort compared to the work that followed throughout the rest of the application process (multiple rounds of interviews, assessment workshops, psychological assessments, background checks (incl. friends and family). Hence, try to be as selective with which job offer you respond to as possible. You don't want to waste your time on opportunities where you will have little chances of success and require a lot of effort on your part.

The way you can be selective is first by setting yourself some realistic criteria on the job you want to apply for, such as picking the industry and functional area that interests you, i.e. being a business analyst in the financial services sector.