A job description is a document that lists the duties, skills, and working conditions of a job, so a prospective employee knows what the role involves. It usually covers the candidate's qualifications, daily tasks, tools, supervisors, and the mission of the company. Companies can publish it as a public job ad or share it as an internal posting. You can create your own with the free job description template below.
Last Updated: October 2026. This guide is reviewed and updated regularly to reflect current law. If you notice an error or outdated information, please contact us.
Build Your Document
Answer a few simple questions to make your document in minutes
Save and Print
Save progress and finish on any device, download and print anytime
Sign and Use
Your valid, lawyer-approved document is ready
A job description tells candidates what a role involves and tells your team what you expect from the person in it. It helps you advertise the position, set clear responsibilities, and compare applicants on the same terms. A job description generally has the following purposes:
Free job description templates save time, because they give you a ready structure and you only fill in the details of your role. Use the free template on this page to create your document online, then download and print it.
Human resources managers usually write job descriptions. The work starts with some research, then moves on to organizing what you learn into a clear and concise document. A human resources manager would typically go through the following steps:
Before crafting a job description, you need to thoroughly gather all of the required information. The best practices of learning the performance standard include getting information from employees using questionnaires or worksheets. It helps learn what tasks are being performed and how they should be done.
Another thing to do is to collect information from position descriptions on various job boards. The Occupational Outlook Handbook from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics can be handy here as well. The info you seek for is knowledge, skills, abilities, experience, and physical characteristics required for a particular job.
Then, ask the employee who currently holds the position to review the collected information. If possible, ask their supervisor to review it too.
The next information you need to define is the essential functions of the position. Federal laws require them to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which is why it is important to define and word functions as to not seem potentially exclusionary to people with disabilities.
When defining tasks for the position, try to:
This analysis helps you tell essential functions from minor ones. Include the essential ones in the job description.
No single job description structure fits every company, so follow your own company's habits for writing them. Most job descriptions include these common parts:
Before you post the job or use the description in interviews, show a draft to upper management and the position supervisor. Ask them to approve it or to tell you what to add or remove.
Write the job description carefully, because job seekers use it to picture the position and your company as a whole. Follow these four steps to fill in a standard job description template, and keep each part short and specific.
Add the job title. Write the job title in a larger font so it catches a job seeker's attention and shows right away that this is the position they are looking for. Keep the title specific, such as Sales Manager instead of a vague label.
Write a brief job overview. Share the information a candidate wants most: what you expect from them, what successful performance looks like, how the position affects other members of the team, and what role it has in the company.
The recommended length of this section is about 4 sentences.
List the job duties and responsibilities. Put them in order of importance, with the most important ones at the top of the list.
To make the list clearer, start each sentence with a verb and write in the present tense. Avoid wording that suggests a bias toward men, toward people of only a certain age group, and so on.
Outline the qualifications. They usually include education and experience from previous workplaces, technical skills, certifications, and licenses. For specific job titles, qualifications might contain certain physical abilities a prospective employee should possess. For instance, it might be relevant for lifeguards, fitness trainers, or firefighters.
As well as that, the qualification section of a job description might contain certain personal characteristics.
A company hiring a content manager might want a creative person with an out-of-the-box way of thinking and good management abilities. A programmer might be expected to have good communication skills, logical thinking, perseverance, and attention to detail.
Job descriptions look different from one industry to the next, but every good one is informative and concise. The sample below shows how a human resources manager might write a job description for an experienced sales manager.
Vacancy description:
A fast-growing financial markets company needs a full-time Sales Manager in our San Francisco office! We seek to hire a person who will be responsible for supervising and organizing our sales team. Our perfect sales manager will help us meet our customer acquisition and revenue growth targets by keeping our company competitive and innovative.
Requirements:
Duties:
Working conditions:
Hurry up to send a response to our vacancy!
A job description is typically the only document that describes a position, the qualifications needed to take it, and what role it plays in a company. A job description lets a company determine what candidates are considered the best fit for the role and evaluate in the future whether an employee is performing primary job duties that are required for the position.
Use the free job description template on this page. Select Create My Document, answer a few questions, and download or print the finished template at any time. You can also save your progress and finish on any device.
Start by researching the role. Ask subject matter experts who they want to see on their teams. Then list the major responsibilities in clear language, using action words, so applicants can tell which skills the position calls for.
An effective job description is brief but detailed. It answers the common questions candidates would otherwise ask, such as:
Besides being brief and informative, a job description should engage readers from the first lines. A good way to draw in prospective employees is to focus on the responsibilities along with the chances for development in the company. Another effective method is to make the job posting urgent. Finally, say how candidates can apply, and keep the steps to apply short.
Including physical demands in a job description helps companies comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The most important task here is to make sure the wording used in a job description does not seem to be exclusionary to individuals with disabilities.
For instance, avoid the words “a person taking the position will have to walk.” They exclude people who cannot walk but can still move from one place to another.
Therefore, to comply with the requirements of the ADA, an employer has to write in a job description “move” instead of “walk.” The same goes for the word “talk” – it is more tolerant to include in a job description the word “communicate” if the role doesn’t necessarily require a prospective employee to speak out loud.
General information, not legal or tax advice.
