Question 1

Why do job adverts list requirements nobody could meet?

Accepted Answer

Because job adverts are usually written as a **wish list**, not a specification — and understanding that changes how you should respond to them.

**Why they end up that way:**

**They are assembled, not authored.** A hiring manager lists everything desirable, HR adds standard requirements, and an old template contributes leftovers from a previous role. Nobody removes anything, because removal requires a decision and addition does not.

**Anchoring.** Employers ask for more than they need, expecting to compromise.

**Filtering volume.** For roles attracting hundreds of applicants, a long list is a crude way to reduce it.

**Genuine errors.** Adverts have famously requested more years of experience with a technology than the technology has existed, which happens when someone copies a list of tools and appends a standard experience figure to all of them.

**Internal justification.** Occasionally a specification is written around a preferred candidate.

**What this means for applying.** The widely cited claim that men apply when meeting 60% of criteria while women wait until 100% originates from an internal Hewlett-Packard observation and has been repeated far beyond its evidence base — but follow-up survey work has found a real pattern: the main reason people do not apply is believing they would not be hired, rather than lacking confidence in their ability.

The practical implication holds regardless of the statistic's provenance. **Apply if you meet the core requirements**, which are usually the first few listed and the ones stated as essential rather than desirable.

**How to read an advert:**

**Essential versus desirable** is the most useful signal, where given.

**The first three bullets** usually reflect what the job actually involves.

**Named certifications and legal requirements** are genuinely non-negotiable; years of experience rarely are.

**A vast, incoherent list** often indicates the employer has not defined the role — worth asking about at interview.

Question 2

How do you write a useful job advert?

Accepted Answer

By describing the job and the conditions honestly, and by removing the barriers that quietly exclude good candidates — most job adverts fail at both, which is why they attract the wrong applicants

Question 3

What is the difference between a job description and a person specification?

Accepted Answer

The job description describes the role; the person specification describes the person who could do it. They answer different questions, and reading them as one document is why applications miss the

Question 4

How long should a CV actually be?

Accepted Answer

Two pages is the working default for most people, and one page is better early in a career. The reasoning is not a rule handed down from anywhere; it reflects how the document is actually read.

Question 5

Why don't job adverts list the salary?

Accepted Answer

Because withholding it has historically favoured the employer in negotiation, and until recently almost nothing compelled them to publish it. The reasons employers give: Flexibility. They want to pay

Question 6

What is an applicant tracking system and how do I get past it?

Accepted Answer

An applicant tracking system is software employers use to receive, store and search applications. Understanding what it actually does matters, because the folklore around it is worse than the

Question 7

What does pre-employment screening actually check?

Accepted Answer

Considerably less than candidates fear and more than they expect, with the scope depending heavily on the sector and the seniority of the role rather than on a single standard process. What is almost

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