Most finance job briefs start with good intentions and end with a long list of requirements. Everything on the list seems relevant. The difficulty is that a list with no priorities does not tell candidates, recruiters or interviewers what really matters.
Separating essential from desirable requirements is one of the most useful things you can do to a brief. Here is a straightforward way to do it.
Start with the first three months, not the ideal candidate
The question "what would the perfect person have?" produces a wish list. A better question is: what must this person be able to do, without significant training, in their first three months?
For a Management Accountant that might be:
- preparing monthly management accounts, including accruals and reconciliations
- explaining variances to budget holders
- supporting the next budget or reforecast
For a Financial Accountant it might be:
- running month-end close for the balance sheet
- preparing year-end files for the auditors
- maintaining fixed asset and intercompany reconciliations
Whatever you write here is a candidate for your essentials list. Most roles end up with four to six.
Test each requirement with three questions
For every item on your current list, ask:
- Would we reject an otherwise excellent candidate who lacked this? If not, it is desirable.
- Could a capable person learn this in post within a few months? If yes, it is usually desirable, unless the timing really cannot wait.
- Is this describing a capability, or a proxy for one? "Five years' experience" is a proxy. "Has owned a month-end close" is a capability. Prefer capabilities; they are fairer and more useful at interview.
Common items that are often essential by habit
These appear on many finance briefs. Each can be genuinely essential in a particular business, but each is worth checking:
| Requirement | When it is essential | When it is usually desirable |
|---|---|---|
| A specific accounting system | The person must run it from day one with no support | Similar systems are common and training is available |
| A specific professional body | There is a regulatory or contractual reason | Several bodies would equip someone equally well |
| Sector experience | Sector-specific accounting is central (for example complex stock or contract accounting) | The core accounting work is similar across sectors |
| Advanced Excel | The role builds or maintains complex models | The role mainly uses Excel for reconciliations and reporting |
| Immediate availability | A hard deadline cannot be moved | A start before a known date would do |
If you keep an item as essential, write down why. That reason is useful in the advert, and it helps interviewers ask about it consistently.
Watch for contradictions
A useful final check is to read the essentials as a set. Do any pull against each other, or against the package? Common examples:
- full qualification plus long post-qualification experience, alongside a statement that part-qualified candidates are welcome
- strategic business partnering alongside a heavy transactional workload
- leadership of a systems change in a role with no reports and a narrow remit
Contradictions do not mean the role is wrong. They mean a decision is still to be made, and it is better made before the advert goes live.
Write desirables as genuine bonuses
Desirables are not a second essentials list. Keep them short and make them sound optional: "it would help if you have", rather than "you will also need". That keeps strong but less conventional candidates in the pool.
Use the same list everywhere
Once agreed, the essentials list should drive the advert, the job description, any agency brief and the interview scorecard. If interviewers are scoring things that are not on the list, or the list includes things nobody tests, the brief and the process have drifted apart.
The Finance Hiring Health Check includes a requirements table for your vacancy, showing what to keep, move, reword or remove, and why. You can see the format in the fictional sample report.
Related reading: Hiring your first Financial Controller: what to check before you advertise and how to scope a finance role before you advertise.