How Often Should Job Descriptions Be Updated

Jill Bidwell, PHR, senior Hr generalist at hydraulic manufacturer Sauer-Danfoss in Ames, Iowa, says her colleagues jokingly call her "the queen of job descriptions."

"I do have a passion for them," she admits. "I preach to all our managers and Hr staff that the chore clarification is the mother of all HR processes. Everything from recruitment and training to functioning evaluations and compensation all stems from that document. Once they understand all of the diverse facets of the employment life cycle the job description touches, they take information technology a lot more seriously and put more than thought into it. It'southward not but a compliance do.

"Ideally, what is put in the task description tin create a job posting and performance goals. Information technology walks into a development program for grooming yous need. From a rewards perspective, it helps us benchmark other jobs," Bidwell says. In the Ames facility, she supports 1,000 of the 6,500 employees Sauer-Danfoss employs globally.

Janet Flewelling, director of Hour operations at Insperity, an 60 minutes service provider headquartered in Houston, agrees: "Task descriptions can have and then much value if used regularly and appropriately. If you have an up-to-date task description, y'all can use it for recruiting, performance management and compensation."

Despite the importance of task descriptions, very few HR professionals have a regular policy for updating them, says Michael R. Kannisto, Ph.D., SPHR, director of talent direction and acquisition at JLG Industries Inc. in Hagerstown, Dr.., and chair of a workgroup developing a voluntary standard for chore descriptions.

Updating descriptions is sometimes "the last thing on the listing to tackle because there are so many other issues that require Hr's time and attention," says Cathy Maddox, SPHR, HR coordinator at Lincoln Surgical Hospital in Lincoln, Bill. But revising job descriptions "is very important, especially when yous are hiring people," Maddox adds.

The Risks

Unfortunately, chore descriptions often aren't viewed as living documents. Once completed, they may be relegated to dusty three-band binders or long-unopened text documents. Experts say this is a mistake.

For instance, "If you don't proceed it up-to-date and you have [an employment] merits against you, that nonupdated job description tin do as much damage as a good 1 could benefit you lot. Information technology can piece of work to assist in your defense or it tin can work to assist the employee" filing the grievance, Flewelling says.

Kannisto adds, "With the compliance surroundings and legal implications, the stakes are a lot college for job descriptions to be crystal articulate with essential responsibilities. If you have a measure of performance that doesn't appear on the job description and you lot have a case brought against you, depending on the agency [involved], there could be punishment," he explains.

Legal implications aside, "y'all aren't operating your business equally efficiently every bit possible" if y'all don't proceed job descriptions current, Kannisto says. "Chore descriptions help with workforce planning. Yous can come across how talent flows through the arrangement and holistically how it all fits together."

"Having a bad job description is worse than [having] none at all," asserts Tracy McCarthy, senior vice president of 60 minutes at SilkRoad, a talent management system headquartered in Chicago.

The Timing

How often should job descriptions be reviewed and updated? Once a year at a minimum, experts say. Merely circumstances might telephone call for more-frequent updates.

If nothing significant happens throughout the year, "once a year, to coincide with the functioning review process, is a bully time to update," Flewelling advises.

That's what happens at Sauer-Danfoss. "We have employee reviews on a agenda year. After we finish the reviews, nosotros set goals and objectives for the side by side review period. During that fourth dimension, we update job descriptions," Bidwell explains.

"If y'all are a growing or irresolute system, it'southward probable that you'll have to do it more often," McCarthy says. Considering SilkRoad is "always evolving," for example, it updated descriptions most three times during 2011. A great opportunity to update is when y'all are hiring for a position, Flewelling adds.

If in that location is a modify to the chore, practice not wait until an annual review to brand alterations. Updating job descriptions "should be an ongoing process anytime something significant changes," says Lindsay A. Nienhuser Barton, SPHR, human resource director for industrial explosives manufacturer Dyno Nobel Inc., in Cheyenne, Wyo.

Even if a job and an incumbent employee take non inverse, or fifty-fifty if incremental changes have been made to the clarification annually, Hr professionals may still want to consider a consummate job clarification overhaul every and so often. When Kannisto and his chore force went through the process of creating Hour job description standards, they explored task descriptions from the 1800s up to the present. He says information technology became clear which ones were written in which decade.

"The element of the culture and the words you use are obvious a decade afterwards," Kannisto says. He compared it to watching a World War II movie made in the 1960s: Even though the flick is virtually the 1940s, the film quality, the colors, the hairstyles and other small details date the film. If yous read a job description for a longtime employee, information technology will sound dated if it has been fine-tuned only annually, he notes.

Everyone Has a Part

Creating and maintaining job descriptions should involve employees, managers and 60 minutes. Each person has a part, often with overlapping responsibilities.

Employees. "Obviously, the person performing the work has the all-time idea of the scope and size of the job," Kannisto says.

"Employees can vouch for what they actually do and should accept input into their descriptions," McCarthy agrees. "However, the director must also be a function of this procedure to ensure that the responsibilities and requirements are aligned with actual activities."

Managers. At Sauer-Danfoss, managers use a template to write or update job descriptions that are reviewed by 60 minutes, Bidwell says. The manager is in charge of keeping descriptions up-to-date when someone leaves and as part of the performance management process.

At Lincoln Surgical Infirmary, "HR would never assume that they know more about the position than the person who is really doing the job or managing the job. The director is asked for his input. HR will then put the information into the standardized format and send that dorsum to the manager for his approval or input on further changes," Maddox says.

HR professionals. "Hr's responsibility is to coach and facilitate the process of updating," Barton says.

Information technology'south only natural that HR "owns" chore descriptions, Kannisto says, because "a chore description touches and then many pieces of the system—recruiting, succession planning, training, legal, compliance. HR is the only one who tin be responsible for that."

While 60 minutes professionals may not know the essential functions of every position, they are in a unique position to see how each chore description fits into the larger organization and the system's legal obligations.

For example, HR can "look for consistencies beyond departments to compare similar jobs to prepare consistent diction and responsibility levels," Flewelling says. In addition, "60 minutes is responsible for keeping [job descriptions] alive and using them during recruiting and operation processes." She notes that HR is also responsible for ensuring that job descriptions comply with the Off-white Labor Standards Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

At Sauer-Danfoss, "HR'due south function is to review the job description and see if it makes sense in layman'southward terms," Bidwell says. "Considering nosotros're a manufacturing visitor, we use a lot of engineers who like to speak technically. We desire to await at specific skill sets and understand the reasons why those exist."

Potential Problems

Alexandra LeBlanc, pb sourcing specialist at 7 Step RPO, a recruitment outsourcing firm in Boston, places job description maintenance into a larger context. "Keep an open line of advice with employees so y'all're aware of incremental changes equally they occur. Keeping job descriptions electric current isn't only about redefining a function. It's also about understanding how and why job functions are changing, and anticipating any possible chore description updates to reflect those changes."

What if an employee's job description and daily tasks practice not friction match? Experts say employees should be encouraged to inquire HR for a job description review if there appear to exist inconsistencies between what the job description says and what they do. These situations need to be handled advisedly, however, and with the manager'southward input.

At Sauer-Danfoss, "when nosotros get requests from employees to review a job description, we directly them dorsum through their leader," Bidwell says. "We inquire the leader to come to HR to work through the issue. If someone feels they aren't beingness recognized for actress work they are doing or the telescopic of their task has expanded, nosotros can have a conversation with the leader to validate that and, if necessary, update the clarification. Nosotros can arrange bounty accordingly at that time."

Bidwell adds that information technology is important to review the chore clarification and non just friction match the description to the person currently doing the job.

Kannisto concurs, alarm "You should non build a job clarification around an individual. If an employee brings an enhanced skill set to the job, that does not mean that those special skills demand to be written into the job description or the compensation needs to be increased, unless you determine that this is a core chemical element of the chore."

If, upon review, the task clarification turns out to exist accurate, there is an opportunity to have a discussion near whether the employee is spending fourth dimension doing something that isn't part of the job, Flewelling says. If the employee argues that his or her qualifications are much higher than what is in the job description, "that is the fourth dimension to accept a give-and-take about how the employee can move upwards in the arrangement to have better advantage of his skills or education."

Similarly, LeBlanc says, "60 minutes should exist aware of any inconsistencies with workload distribution and raise the upshot accordingly. If there is one employee doing the work of many, or employees who are unable or unwilling to exercise what'south asked of them, there needs to exist serious discussion about each chore description, function and how those fit in with the business organization goals."

Flewelling concludes, "If you regularly utilize a job description, rather than just have one on file, you're more than likely to keep it up-to-engagement. If yous pull out a job description every time you piece of work on operation reviews, compensation planning, succession planning, training and evolution needs, you are a lot more probable to maintain it."

The author is a freelance author and onetime HR generalist and trainer in Wixom, Mich.

Source: https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/news/hr-magazine/pages/0113-job-descriptions.aspx

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