How to read a job description
A job description is a mix of the work, the filters, and the advertising. Reading it well means sorting those before you touch a resume. If you tailor first, you will emphasize whatever adjective appeared nearest the top, including words that were never the job.
Separate the team from the task
The opening often says what the team or the employer does. That is context. The duties say what you would do on a week. Read the duties twice, and the about-the-company paragraph once. People reverse that and then write a resume about a mission they will not be hired to perform.
If the duties and the title disagree, believe the duties when you decide whether you can do the work, and notice the title because it is what a search and a form will use. A "manager" title with no one to manage is a different job from a manager title with a team. Do not smooth that over.
Read the verbs before the tool list
Verbs tell you the job: build, support, sell, reconcile, drive, teach, stock, coordinate. A list of tools at the bottom tells you the instruments, which matter only next to a verb. "Excel" next to "reconcile the books" is a duty. "Excel" in a pile of logos is a hint.
Underline the verbs you have done and the verbs you have not. The second list is the gap. It is allowed to be long. A posting that is half gap is a stretch, and a stretch is a decision, not an invitation to rewrite your history.
Required, preferred, and decoration
Required, must, and license language are filters. Preferred, bonus, familiar with, and nice to have are not the same sentence. Employers are not always careful, so read the verb next to the word. A "preferred" license that the shift cannot legally run without is still a filter. A "required" soft skill that is really a compliment is decoration.
Decoration includes fast-paced, rockstar, family, competitive pay, and a list of values. You can ignore those when you tailor. You should not ignore schedule, travel, on-site days, physical demands, or a certification named next to a duty.
Filters that are not optional flavor
Location, remote or hybrid rules, work authorization, sponsorship, a start date, a license, a clearance, and a willingness to work a named shift decide whether the application can be honest. Read them before the interesting bullets. Failing one of them means you stop, or you apply knowing the filter and without disguising it.
The application-question guides cover how to answer several of those filters without a convenient fiction. Read the posting's version of the question, because a form sometimes asks it more narrowly than the description did.
Notice what the posting never says
Absence is information. If nobody is mentioned, do not assume you will lead people. If no tool is named, do not assume your favorite tool is the one they use. If pay is absent, the posting has not made you an offer. Do not fill the silence with the job you wish this were.
A posting that describes several jobs at once, with verbs from different professions, is asking you to guess which one they will actually assign. You can apply only if you would accept any of those jobs, or you can skip it. Tailoring as if it were the single job you prefer is how the resume and the work diverge.
Turn the read into apply, skip, or tailor
Apply with the resume you have when the title and the verbs already match your first lines. Tailor when the match is real but buried. Skip when a filter fails or the verbs are work you have not done and will not claim.
Write one line in the tracker or in the margin: why this one, in their verbs. If you cannot, you have not finished reading. That line is also the seed of a "why this role" answer, if the form asks. It should be the same reason in both places.
Read a posting before you rewrite anything
Find the duties
Set the company story aside until you can say what the person in the role does.
Mark verbs you have done
The unmarked verbs are the gap. Do not convert them into resume lines.
Separate filters from compliments
License, place, authorization, schedule, and must-language are filters. Adjectives about culture are not.
Note what is missing
Do not invent a team, a tool, or a salary the posting did not state.
Choose apply, tailor, or skip
Match means send. Buried match means reorder true lines. Failed filter or fictional overlap means stop.
Related reading
Questions
- Should every bullet in the posting be treated as required?
- No. Separate filters from preferred lines and from decoration. Treating the whole page as required pushes people to claim work they have not done.
- What if the title and the duties conflict?
- Decide fit from the duties. Use the title as the name you must respond to, not as proof of seniority the duties do not support.
- How long should this read take?
- Long enough to mark verbs and filters, and short enough that you still know whether you would say yes. If you cannot explain the job after the read, you are not ready to tailor.
Where ApplyASAP fits
ApplyASAP can only tailor toward a posting it can read. You still choose the titles and places, which is another way of saying you already did the filter step: what you will and will not do. A posting you would not accept is not made acceptable because a resume can be rewritten around it.
ApplyASAP is one option when you want the sending done for you. It finds openings for the titles and places you name, tailors your resume to each posting, and does not invent employers, dates, degrees, titles, numbers, certifications, or people you managed. It answers the application questions, and the team sends and tracks each application. Skills it adds are ones your role and level usually carry, and you can take any of them off. The resume still has to be true.