To evaluate a function, you start by reading the job description. That sounds obvious. It is not.
A job description is a text. And like any text, it reflects the function it describes as much as the person who drafted it and the context in which it was written. Reading it to evaluate is not skimming it. It is knowing how to read between the lines.
What a job description reveals about its drafting
The same role can give rise to very different descriptions, depending on the hand that writes them. A few cases you come across regularly.
The standardised description: a generic template, taken from a reference framework, laid on top of the function. It describes a theoretical role, not the real role as it is lived in this organisation. Usually, when you interview the manager of this role, you receive a wealth of information that is not mentioned in the document, and it is this information that reveals the real scope of the role.
The description written to weigh more: strong verbs, stretched scope, responsibilities phrased to inflate the evaluation to come. The word "strategic" placed in every sentence is a common sign. Consciously or not, it says too much.
The description below the function: it sometimes happens that the job holder drafts their own job description, and, unlike the previous case, some under-describe what they do. I once flagged that the description of a unit leadership role seemed to me clearly below the real function: it was phrased only with verbs of collaboration, no decision of its own was mentioned, the scope of responsibility was reduced to a minimum. The group director to whom this function reported confirmed this to me, and told me that he was in fact encouraging this person to assert their role more visibly. The description did not reflect the function, it reflected the job holder's self-perception.
The description that takes refuge in jargon: the technicality of the vocabulary takes up all the space, and the role behind the terms can no longer be made out. What remains essential is to understand the real complexity, the challenges, the impact, the responsibilities, and all the other elements that make an evaluation possible.
The description that does not state the tasks: it lines up responsibilities and titles, without ever saying concretely what the function covers day to day. It tells, but never the concrete.
In all these cases, the finding is the same. The document exists, sometimes long and polished, but it does not give access to the real function.
Reading the verbs
A simple tip helps focus your reading and clarify what the job holder actually does in their function: looking at the verbs.
The verb says a lot. Does the job holder carry out the action and bear responsibility for it? Or do they collaborate, participate, contribute? The difference is not trivial.
A description where verbs of collaboration or participation dominate signals a function that sits within responsibilities carried by others. As in the example mentioned above, one can then question the accuracy of the drafting, or the impact of this function within the organisation.
Checking your reading with the blank page
Reading is not enough: it is also a matter of verifying that you have understood.
For this, I use the blank page. Once the description is read, I set it aside and I reconstruct the function from memory, step by step, the way one retraces a sequence of facts: what activities the function actually covers, with which interlocutors, which decisions it carries and which it does not, what its challenges are, what is critical, what is urgent. And at each step, the same question: is anything missing?
The order matters. You read first, you reconstruct afterwards. Starting with the blank page, without having read, would lead to extrapolating, to inventing a function instead of understanding it. The blank page is not a starting point, it is a check. It is there to bring out the gaps between what the document says and what the function actually is, or what it would logically be.
Situating the function within the added-value chain
From this verification, the real question emerges: what does this function bring? Why does it exist?
This is what I call situating the function within the added-value chain. A function has no value in itself, in isolation. It has value through what it adds to a sequence, and this sequence is more often transversal than strictly hierarchical. Understanding this contribution is understanding the function.
Analysis of the org chart sheds light on this reading: it shows how the structure is organised around the function, and clarifies what belongs specifically to this role, as distinct from what belongs to neighbouring roles.
Matching by logic
A function understood from the inside can then be matched with other functions of comparable logic, in the same department or elsewhere in the organisation. Not by similarity of title, but by similarity of nature: the same type of contribution, the same order of complexity, the same kind of decisions.
And one asks what truly underpins this comparability. It is this questioning that prepares a solid evaluation.
Bringing the description back into coherence
The reading, and the evaluation that follows, do not leave the job description unchanged. Once the function is understood, I often suggest, for traceability reasons, that the drafter complete the description with the elements gathered verbally during the interviews. The objective is simple: that the level finally determined corresponds to the job description archived in the library. A description that remains below the function, while the level retained reflects the real function, creates an inconsistency that an audit could later bring to light. Closing this loop ensures that the document kept on file and the decision made tell the same story.
The essentials
Reading a job description to evaluate is not placing all your trust in a single document. It is recognising what it carries of its drafter, then reconstructing the real function behind the text.
This reading involves a degree of interpretation, and often generates a series of questions. This is precisely why the evaluation that follows almost never stops at this reading alone: it goes through cross-checks and internal validation. This is the subject of another article in this series, "Job evaluation is not just a technical act".
The HDH (HR Decision Hub) platform helps companies put this practice into place themselves, in particular by reorganising job descriptions and highlighting the key elements of a function. This way, you can keep your decisions explainable and traceable end to end.