How to write a job brief that gets you better candidates
A job description lists duties. A brief tells a recruiter who will succeed. The one-page brief we ask hiring managers for, and why it works.
Executive summary
Most bad shortlists start with a vague brief. Agree five things before the search starts: why the role exists, three to five must-haves, the real budget, how long you can wait for a notice period, and what's an instant no.
- A job description and a job brief are different documents. Recruiters need the brief.
- Limit must-haves to three to five. Everything else is a nice-to-have, and should be labelled that way.
- Share the real salary budget and the longest notice period you can accept. Both decide who can actually join.
- Name the deal-breakers early. It's the fastest way to cut wasted interviews.
When a role has been open for weeks, the usual reaction is to widen the net: more job boards, more agencies, more CVs. In our experience the problem is rarely the size of the net. It’s that nobody agreed what a good catch looks like.
That agreement is the job brief. It takes about twenty minutes to write, and it changes the quality of everything that follows.
A job description is not a brief
A job description is written for candidates. It lists duties, qualifications and a little about the company. It’s usually long, and often copied from the last time the role was filled.
A brief is written for the people doing the search. It answers a different question: who will actually succeed in this role, at this company, right now? It’s short, honest, and includes the things you’d never put in a public advert, like the real budget or why the last person left.
The five things every brief needs
1. Why the role exists now
Is it a replacement, a new position, or part of an expansion? A replacement tells us what didn’t work last time. A new role tells us how much ambiguity the person must handle. Both change who we look for.
2. Three to five must-haves
This is where most briefs go wrong. A list of twelve “requirements” means none of them are really required, and recruiters end up guessing which ones matter.
Pick the three to five things the person cannot do the job without. For a senior site engineer that might be: experience on high-rise residential projects, a specific scheduling tool, and readiness to relocate to the project city. Everything else goes on a separate list marked “nice to have”.
3. The real budget
Share the salary range you can actually approve, including variable pay. A hidden budget doesn’t get you a cheaper hire. It gets you a shortlist of people who drop out at the offer stage, weeks later, when the numbers finally come up.
4. How long you can wait
In India, notice periods of 30, 60 or 90 days are common, and senior people are often on the longer end. Decide up front: can you wait 90 days for the right person, or do you need someone within a month? That single answer can change the pool of people a recruiter should approach.
5. The deal-breakers
What would make you say no in the first five minutes? It might be frequent job changes, no experience in your industry, or a salary expectation above a hard ceiling. Saying it early saves you from interviewing people you were never going to hire.
Two more questions that help a lot
- Who would you hire tomorrow if you could? Name one or two people, at your company or elsewhere, who’d be great in this role. It tells a recruiter more than a page of adjectives.
- What does the interview process look like? How many rounds, who’s on the panel, and how quickly can they give feedback? Strong candidates often have more than one option, and a slow process loses them.
A simple template
| Section | What to write |
|---|---|
| Role and reason | Title, team, and why it’s open now |
| Must-haves | Three to five, in order of importance |
| Nice-to-haves | Everything else |
| Budget | Fixed and variable range you can approve |
| Notice period | The longest you can wait |
| Deal-breakers | Anything that’s an instant no |
| Process | Rounds, panel, and how fast you’ll give feedback |
What happens next
Once a brief is agreed, a recruiter can be precise: who to approach, what to ask on the first call, and whom to leave out. In our process the brief is the first step, written up and sent back for your OK the same day. You can read the rest of it on our How We Work page.
If you’d like help turning a job description into a brief, tell us about the role. Even if we don’t end up working together, you’ll leave with a sharper brief than you came in with.
How we wrote this
- Based on
- Every search we run starts with this brief. It is the same set of questions our recruiters ask hiring managers on the first call, before any candidate is approached.
- Written by
- AgniHire Recruitment Team, Recruiters, AgniHire Talent Solutions
- Last checked
- 24 October 2026
We fix mistakes as soon as we find them. See our editorial policy, or tell us at hello@agnihire.com.