How to Write a Job Description That Attracts Skilled Trades

We read a great many job descriptions, and the weak ones fail in the same way. They describe the employer rather than the job, they list duties rather than outcomes, and they bury the information a tradesperson actually decides on. Rate. Hours. Location. Length of work.

A skilled worker comparing three opportunities will spend perhaps thirty seconds on each. The description that answers their questions in that time wins, even if the job itself is no better than the others. This article covers how to write one.

What a tradesperson is actually scanning for

Before structure, understand the reading order. In our experience, candidates for trade and operator roles look for these things, roughly in this sequence:

1. What the work is. Not the job title, which varies between companies, but what they will be doing.
2. Where it is. Travel time is a daily cost and people weigh it accordingly.
3. The rate. Vague descriptions are read as low ones.
4. Hours and pattern. Start times, shift structure, weekend expectations, overtime availability.
5. How long it runs. A six-week job and a two-year job are different propositions.
6. What they need to have. Tickets, licences, experience.

A description that leaves any of these to be discovered at interview loses candidates who had another option.

The structure that works

Start with the job, not the company

The first line should describe the work. Three sentences of corporate history at the top is the most common mistake we see, and it buries everything a candidate came for. The company section belongs further down, where it adds colour rather than acting as a gate.

Write a title people actually search

Internal titles rarely match search behaviour. If your organisation calls it a "Site Operations Technician", but the market calls it a "Plant Operator", use the market term. You are writing for a search box as much as a reader.

Describe outcomes, not just duties

"Responsible for formwork" is a duty. "You will be setting and stripping formwork on a commercial build, working in a crew of four under a leading hand" is a picture. The second tells an experienced worker whether they want the job and whether they can do it.

Separate what is required from what is preferred

Long requirement lists deter good candidates who meet most of them. Split the list honestly:

• Essential: the tickets, licences and experience without which someone genuinely cannot do the job.
• Preferred: everything else.

If every item is essential, nothing is, and you will have a smaller shortlist than the role deserves.

Publish the rate, or a real range

This is the single highest-impact change most employers can make. A description without a rate is read as hiding something. A range with a genuine spread, explained by experience or ticket level, performs better than both silence and a single figure.

Be specific about hours and site conditions

Start time, finish time, days, the realistic overtime picture, and what the site is like. Weather exposure, noise, travel between sites, physical demand. Candidates who know what they are walking into stay longer, and the ones who would have left in week two screen themselves out before you spend time on them.

Close with a clear next step

One action, stated plainly. Who to contact and what to send. Multi-stage application portals lose trade candidates, many of whom are applying from a phone on a lunch break.

A reusable template

Adapt the headings below rather than copying the words.

• Job title: the market term, plus location
• The work: three or four sentences on what they will actually be doing, where, and alongside whom
• Rate: the figure or genuine range, and what moves someone through it
• Hours: start, finish, days, overtime reality
• Duration: project length, or permanent
• Essential requirements: tickets, licences, experience, right to work
• Preferred: everything else
• What we offer: the things that are true and specific, not the generic ones
• About us: short, and here rather than at the top
• How to apply: one step, one contact

Mistakes that quietly cost you candidates

• Copying the last ad for a different role. Recycled descriptions read as recycled.
• Using "competitive rate". Candidates translate this as below market.
• Listing twelve essential requirements. You will exclude people who could do the job well.
• Omitting the location or describing it as "various sites" without a base.
• Promising a culture you have not built. It surfaces in week one and costs you the hire.
• Writing for your industry peers rather than the candidate. Internal jargon and acronyms lose people.

For the wider process around the description, our article on streamlining your construction hiring process covers the steps that follow, and attracting and retaining skilled construction workers covers what keeps them once hired.

Where a recruitment partner changes the equation

A good description matters most when you are advertising cold. The alternative is not advertising at all.

Through our labour hire recruitment solutions we maintain screened and ticketed pools across our sectors, which means a role often gets filled from people we already know rather than from a response to an ad. When we do write a description, we write it with the candidates in mind, because we are the ones who will be on the phone to them.

Our construction recruitment team will also review a description you have already written and tell you honestly which parts will cost you candidates.

Key takeaways

Lead with the work, not the company. Use the title the market searches for. Describe outcomes rather than listing duties. Split essential from preferred honestly. Publish a real rate. Be specific about hours, duration and site conditions. Close with one clear next step. Thirty seconds is what you get, so spend them on what the candidate came to find out.

If you have a role you are struggling to fill, send us a recruitment enquiry and we will tell you whether it is the description or the market.

‍