Hiring the right talent for your financial roles isn’t easy.
According to studies, 91% of organisations throughout the UK struggled to find candidates with the right skills in 2018. As the skills gap widens for crucial accounting, analytics, and financial management skills, businesses will need to work even harder to complete their teams.
Fortunately, specialist recruitment companies like Rebus Recruitment are available to support your hiring goals. However, you’ll also need to make sure that you have the right assets in place to attract today’s top-level employees.
A high-quality job description is one of the best ways to “sell” your open roles to senior candidates. So, how do you write a job description that works?
Step 1: Define Your Ideal Candidate
Before you can begin searching for the ideal financial talent, you need to understand the demands of your organisation. Are you looking for an accounting expert, a group financial controller, or a financial services manager with an actuarial science degree?
Knowing what you need from an employee will mean that you can start listing the key features and assets you’ll need from a candidate. For instance, to fill your director of finance role, your ideal person may need:
- Management and leadership experience
- Aptitude for the latest regulatory practices
- Strong technology and analytical skills
- A degree in finance or accounting
- 10 or more years of experience in the industry
Step 2: Make Sure You’re Not Hunting for Unicorns
Once you have your list of key characteristics that you’d like to see in your financial candidate, go through it and make sure that you’re not asking for too much. It’s reasonable to expect a senior-level staff member like a financial controller to handle more responsibilities than the average employee, but it’s possible to get carried away to a point where you’re no longer realistic with your expectations.
Your financial controller may need to understand budgetary benchmarks, know how to reduce expenses and have experience improving revenues. However, they shouldn’t be responsible for marketing your business and securing new accounts too. Make sure that you’re not trying to fill multiple positions with one new employee.
Step 3: Paint a Picture of the Role
With a clear vision of who you want to hire for your position, and what kind of tasks they’ll be responsible for, you can begin to flesh out your job description to give applicants a sense of what the role entails. Remember, don’t just list their daily jobs, let them know what it will be like to work at your organisation. Cover things like:
- Responsibilities: Detail the daily tasks your new employee will accomplish, as well as the part they’ll play in driving your business towards long-term goals. For instance, a Tax Accounting Manager might need to complete corporate returns, assist with audits, and research changing regulations. You can cover each requirement in more depth during your induction plan.
- Company culture: Promote the kind of environment the candidate will work in. Are you a large company that can offer exciting development and networking opportunities? Are you a close-knit team that takes care of each other?
- Logistics: Who will your employee be working with each day? Who will they have reporting to them? Let your candidate know how they fit into the bigger picture of your business.
Step 4: Think about the Future
If you’re hiring a new account manager and you’ve hired for a similar role before, then you may be tempted to recycle your old job descriptions. However, the financial world is continually changing with new technological advancements and regulations. With that in mind, it’s important to think about what you need now, and what you’re going to need going forward.
Maybe you’re implementing some new technology, or part of your team is looking into a new method for account reporting.
How might the role change in the years ahead, and how can you help your new financial employee to thrive on their career path? Thinking about the future in your job description shows candidates that you have a plan for the years to come. This can also convince applicants that they have a stable future with your organisation.
Step 5: Show the Benefits of Working with You
Remember, a job description is your chance to sell a role to the senior talent you need. Many high-level employees scan through listings, looking for one that will accelerate their career development. Catch the attention of the right people by demonstrating the benefits of working for you.
In your ad, go beyond a bulleted list of duties to craft sentences that explain what the executive can accomplish as part of your team. Include things like:
- Salary and benefits: Make sure that your remuneration is competitive and look for benefits that will make you stand out, such as flexible work days.
- Experiences and opportunities: What will your candidate do when they work with you, and how will this support them in the future? For instance, will they be able to network with industry leaders?
- Development plans: Show that even high-level employees will still have room to grow with promotions, training opportunities, and mentorship programmes.
Step 6: Edit and Refine Your Description
Finally, the best financial job descriptions get straight to the point.
Make sure that the document you publish gives your candidates a clear overview of what they can expect from your business, and what you need from them.
Ideally, it’s best to avoid “catch-all” statements like “perform other duties as required,” as this can lead to confusion. What’s more, remember to eliminate any terms that might harm your chances of diverse hiring, such as:
- Over-the-top vague language like “Off the Charts” or “Ninjas.”
- Biased language such as “dominant” or “gentle.”
- Confusing terms or too much jargon – even for senior-level employees, this can be off-putting.
About Rebus Financial Recruitment
Rebus Financial Recruitment provides a specialist and focused recruitment service to its customers, which historically range from a wide variety of organisations including SME’s to large PLCs.
We strive to offer both the client and candidate a seamless recruitment experience. Using our expertise, we get to the heart of employer and employee needs; and, in doing so, we match the two perfectly. To get in touch call us on 01282 930930.
