Best practices of Drafting and Updating Job Descriptions in 2019: Why You Need Them What to Include and What to Leave Out

Well-written, current job descriptions clarify expectations and support recruiting, promotion, classification, performance reviews and reasonable accommodation. This 60-minute webinar on writing job descriptions shows how to draft and update them to cover every requirement while avoiding discriminatory language.

You'll learn how to identify essential functions, what to keep in and leave out, and why flexibility matters. The session also covers person specifications that set out skills, experience and qualifications, health and safety obligations, and using job descriptions for job evaluation, hiring, training needs and performance measurement.

Poor job descriptions can create legal risk, missed opportunities and difficulty complying with the ADA.

• Identify your audience and what to do before writing a job description and person specification
• Identify essential functions and preserve flexibility
• Set out skills, experience and qualifications in a person specification
• Write SEO-friendly, mobile-friendly job descriptions that attract better candidates
• Avoid language that can lead to discrimination claims
• Use job descriptions for ADA accommodation, health and safety, performance management and training needs
• Apply job description information to job evaluation and hiring

• Reviewing and updating existing job descriptions rather than relying on old versions
• Drafting job descriptions that define the job and its essential functions
• Using the right language: what to keep in and what to leave out
• Using job descriptions in hiring and promotion decisions based on skills
• Creating job descriptions that support ADA accommodation decisions
• Classifying employees correctly to avoid overtime issues
• Writing SEO-friendly and mobile-friendly job descriptions
• Preparing person specifications

Attracting the right talent is both an art and a science. The art is compelling language that gives an honest picture of the work; the science is accurate titles and relevant keywords that search engines pick up, with mobile-friendly formatting.

This session explains how to identify essential functions and write job descriptions that limit liability. It suits business owners, managers, employers, HR staff and administrators, lawyers and accountants.

• Business owners
• Managers
• Employers
• Human Resources Personnel and Administrators
• Lawyers and accountants

Stuart Silverman has been practicing law for almost 30 years and is the principal of the Law Offices of Stuart M. Silverman, P.A., located in Boca Raton, Florida. The emphasis of his practice is in the area of labor and employment law, and business and commercial litigation. Mr. Silverman has represented both private and public employers, as well as individual employees in a whole host of complex business disputes and employment settings at administrative levels, and state and federal trial and appellate courts. His extensive employment litigation experience includes claims under age, race, sex discrimination, wage and hour claims, whistleblower and retaliation claims, ADA and FMLA claims, public employee's claims, as well as disputes under employment contracts, non-compete agreements, trade secrets disputes, and partnership breakups. Mr. Silverman is a frequent speaker on his areas of practice.

Mr. Silverman is also a member of The Workplace Violence Prevention Institute (WPVI), a group formed to investigate solutions and strategies from a proactive and systemic perspective to minimize the risk of workplace violence, specifically violence caused by employees or former employees. He earned his B.A. degree, with high honors, and his J.D. degree from Rutgers University. Mr. Silverman is admitted to The Florida Bar and the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida.