Understanding Job Descriptions
Job descriptions are parts of a written job posting that explain what the job is and what qualities the hiring company is looking for in canidates. A good job description will include:
- Duties the person doing the job will perform, the purpose of the job, and the scope of work
- Qualifications needed to be hired (often split into required and preferred)
- Salary, working hours, conditions and supervision information may also be include
- Directions on how to apply
What does it all mean?
Take a look at these two job descriptions – one is an internship with Thomson Reuters and the other is a full-time job with Bold Orange. (These job descriptions are also available as a PDF).


What do you notice after reading these job descriptions? What is confusing? What is clear to you? What don’t you understand?
If you’re confused or overwhelmed by job descriptions, know that you aren’t alone. Common struggles students have with job descriptions include:
- Industry or company jargon
- Full scope of job not included (either shows only the most exciting elements or is vague)
- Very detailed
- Job titles may make it difficult to determine the actual level of the job
(If you’re curious to learn more about why job descriptions are written this way and how they are changing, explore this article from the Harvard Business Review.)
We’ve chosen job descriptions that include a certain amount of jargon but overall are easier to digest in order to assist in breaking down what details you should focus on.
Step 1: General Information
These postings are from Handshake and LinkedIn (respectively) and because of the way these websites format job postings, there’s helpful information right at the top.

This circled info above provides a lot of information quickly: the job title is clear to note this is an internship, it tells us the expected pay range (and that it is paid internship), it tells us that the role is hybrid with some work being done in-person in Eagan, it tells us the dates the internship will run from, and it tells us that the company will consider internatial students who are elgible for OPT/CPT.

The Bold Orange position also tells us a fair amount of information – the role is also an internship and hybrid position (going so far to list waht days are requied in office), and it tells us the start date of the role and that there is the potential of full-time employment on completion of the internship. Salary and information for international students is not included – these would be things that might come up as you fill out the application or would require further research. Note that salary information may not be shared unless you are considered for an interview.
As job postings vary from site to site and also vary based on how and what an employer might share, you can use these examples to help you find the information you might need about the job right away – and if a certain amount of information is missing, decide whether the position is worth applying to or not (see below for a more in-depth discussion on this).
Step 2: The Qualifications
After reading through the role and tasks of the job, next determine whether or not you are qualified for the position. Qualifications will usually be split into two sections: required and preferred. Required often include:
- Education level
- Work experience
- Liscences, certificates, or technical knowledge
Preferred qualifications may include:
- Additional education
- Skills/prior experience
Employers will often include everything they hope to see in the perfect canidate, knowing that there is no perfect canidate out there. As a general rule of thumb, if you meet at least 50% of the qualifications, you should apply. Determining what the most important qualifications are is important – if there are certain qualifications you don’t meet, it may impact your changes or at the very least change how you present yourself in your resume and cover letter (ex: focusing on your transferable skills, your ability to be a quick learner, etc).
So how do you break down the qualifications into the most important parts?
- Look for the heart of the description – the two or three bullet points that capture the esscence of the role.
- Pay attention to keywords or buzzwords that show up again and again in the description
- If the job description is broken up into different tasks, some jobs will show based on percentages how much time certain responsbilities will occupy
- Use deductive reason to help determine what parts are most important.
Step 3: Mark It Up
One way to help pull out the important information in a job description is highlighting or circling the key components, either on a screenshot or on a printed copy. Why do this? Not only will it help you understand what the entails and determine what qualifies you for the job, it will help you tailor your resume to better showcase why you’re a good fit for this role.
Let’s use the Thomson Reuters job posting as an example of this. There’s a lot of great information about the company and compensation/opportunities offered, all of which are important to read through. For this process, however, let’s leave that out to focus on the core aspects they’re looking for in a canidate.

We’ve gone through and added some mark-ups to help pull out the important information. Yellow highlighting indicates the keywords and skills they’re looking for someone to actively develop on the job, the blue underlining indicates what skills someone coming into the job will already have, and the red arrows note what qualities are the most imporant/desired in a canidate. Blue astricks note what qualities are preferred but not required.
This job description is an easy one to digest – it’s short, isn’t super jargon heavy, and keeps the most important qualities at the top of the list. You might notice that qualities like sales experience, communication (with customers, teams, and supervisors), and using data analysis are repeated both in the job description and the “About You.” This tells us that these are the top qualities they want you to have some experience with in order to further develop them.
Step 4: Break It Down
Now that you have a better idea of what kind of canidate the company is looking for, you can break down the skills and abilities into keyword sections to help you determine what to pull out on your resume or what to discuss in your cover letter.
Example Keywords
Hard Skills: analytics and forecasting, capturing customer information
Soft skills: oral and written communication, sales development, apdatable, self-directing
Hardware and software used for the job: Google Analytics, Salesforce, Hubspot, WordPress, MS Office, MS Teams
Education: 3rd or 4th year undergraduate student in marketing, business, or related majors
Industry jargon: market leads, consultative and solutions-based sales, accurate forcasting
Breaking down the skills into some of these categories can also help you know if there are certain parts of the job posting you don’t understand. For example, let’s take a look at some keywords found in the Bold Orange posting.
Hard skills: building/testing/deploying campaigns, executing maintenance, researching automation, attention to detail
Soft skills: audience builidng, attitude (energy, excitement, can-do attitude), written and verbal communication, desire to keep learning
Hardware and software used for the job: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, CMS (such as WordPress)
Education: senior or recent graduate with bachelor’s degree
Industry jargon: SMS channel best practices, QA practices, CMS
This posting uses a fair amount of jargon so if you’re unfamiliar with the acronyms or know them by a different name (ex: QA is qualitative anaylsis), you can do some reseach to see how familiar you are with what they mean.
Job Posting FAQs
Usually that means an employer is looking for someone who has a degree that has allowed that canidate to gain specific experience. However, a degree does not equate to a specific job so “related degree” means that as long as you exhibit what they are looking for, you will be considered for the role.
Employers will often use descriptors to indicate what they’re looking for in terms of familiarity with certain systems. They may say “proficient,” “working knowledge,” “familiar”, etc. Familiar indicates less experience than proficient in most cases, but pay attention to the job description. If it spends a great deal of space talking about systems you have not directly or persnally used, it may be harder to make your case that you have enough experience for the role. However, if you strongly meet many of the qualifications but haven’t used WordPress before, most employers are willing to train on some of the technical aspects if you have familiarity wtih another similar platform or evidence that you’d be quick to learn it. How you state your experiences and your qualifications for the role is important here but, ultimately if your resume isn’t pulled because you don’t have any mention of CSS and that’s a huge part of what the hiring manager is looking for, it’s okay – that job just wasn’t the right one for you.
While we encourage all employers to include the salary range on job postions as it supports equity and addresses pay gaps, not all companies will do so. It will soon be law for companies employing more than 30 people in the state of Minnesota, but it has yet to become a national standard and there are ways that companies still avoid the question (such as posting extremely large ranges).
Unfortuantely, asking for salary information may not result in any clear answers or at worse will prevent you from being considered. Instead, use tooks like LinkedIn or Glass Door to see what similar roles at that company are making. If you’re still unsure, it can’t hurt to apply but be prepared to ask about it once you are considered for an interview. Once you know the salary range, also considering how you might want to negotiate for the salary you expect, based on what you know about the role and what similar positions pay.
Unclear or vague job postings can be a sign of a job scam. You’ll want to do some additional research before you apply. Find out whether the job is posted elsewhere off the job site you are using. If it is and if it has a better job description, apply through that site instead. If you cannot find the job anywhere else and cannot find much information about the company, be cautious as it may not be a trustworthy posting. Use the job scam guide linked above to be aware of other indications that a posting is fradulent.