Job Fit Analysis

---
name: job-fit-analysis
description: Compare a job posting with a resume and say honestly whether to apply: each requirement marked met, partly met, not shown or not met, with the resume line it rests on; the requirements an employer screens on listed first; and the questions whose answers would change the picture. Works for any occupation and level. Use when the user asks "am I a good fit for this job", "should I apply for this", "how does my resume match this posting", or wants the gaps between a job description and their CV before applying.
---

# job-fit-analysis

You compare one job posting with one person's resume and tell them where they stand before
they spend an evening on the application. The reader is the candidate. They need a straight
answer, the evidence behind it, and to know which gaps are real and which are only missing
from the page. It works the same for a nurse, a warehouse supervisor, a graduate or a staff
engineer: the posting sets the requirements, the resume is the evidence.

## How to respond

These four rules outrank the steps below.

- **Answer first.** The first sentence answers what they asked: apply or don't, and why.
  The whole analysis is in the reply. Do not put it in a file unless they ask for one.
- **Use only what you were given.** The resume and what the person told you are the only
  evidence. Nothing is credited because people in that job usually have it.
- **Deliver from what you have.** With a posting and three lines about the person, compare
  those. Do not stop to ask for a full resume.
- **Write to the candidate.** Address them as "you", never by name or as "he", "she" or
  "the candidate". Plain words, no scoring jargon, no mention of this skill. When they gave
  you a few lines and no resume, say "what you told me", never "your resume".

1. **Read everything the person gave you.** The resume is the main evidence, and so is
   any other file of theirs they point to or that sits beside it: a LinkedIn summary, a
   portfolio page, a project's README. Evidence from one of those counts in full: mark the
   requirement `Met` or `Partly` on the strength of it, say where it came from, and say it
   is not on the resume yet, because the employer will only see the resume.

   When the posting is a link, read the full text. If you cannot open it, say so in one line
   and ask for the text pasted in. Give no verdict and list no requirements for a posting you
   have not read, and never rebuild one from what you remember of the employer. Do not guess
   at why the link would not open.

2. **List the posting's requirements.** Keep the employer's own wording. Sort
   them into what the posting calls required and what it calls preferred. When the posting
   doesn't say, treat what it lists first or repeats as required, and say you inferred it.

3. **Find what could get the application rejected.** Two kinds of requirement do it: the
   ones a recruiter or an application form checks before anyone reads the rest (a licence or
   registration, a degree, a certification, a minimum number of years, the right to work,
   location or shift, a clearance, a language), and any other required item the resume does
   not meet, such as a named system the posting lists under "must have". These go first,
   because one of them outweighs five met skills.

4. **Mark each requirement against the evidence** with one of four words:
   - **Met**: the resume shows it. Quote the line.
   - **Partly**: the resume shows something close, smaller or older. Say what it shows and
     what is short: "team of 12; the posting asks for 20 or more".
   - **Not shown**: the resume is silent on a specific thing. The person may well have it.
   - **Not met**: the resume shows otherwise, such as a diploma where a degree is required
     or two years where five are asked for.

   A requirement for a general ability, such as dealing with the public, organising work
   or communicating clearly, is `Met` by any job that plainly involves it: four years
   serving customers meets "friendly first point of contact". Keep `Not shown` and `Partly`
   for specific things: a tool, a qualification, a setting, a scale, a number of years. Do
   not mark half the table `Partly` to be safe.

   A similar tool is not the named tool. Cerner is not Epic, an in-house warehouse system is
   not SAP: when the posting requires the named one, mark it `Not met` and give the similar
   one as the nearest thing you have. A related task is not the named skill: cashing up a
   till is not bookkeeping in Xero, so that is `Not shown`.

   Take lengths of time only from dates the resume gives for that exact thing. When the
   posting asks for two years of something and the resume shows the activity with no start
   date, mark it `Partly`, say the resume doesn't show how long, and ask. Never state a
   duration you worked out from a neighbouring date.

5. **Give a verdict the person can act on.** Open with a plain sentence that says whether
   to apply, in the terms they asked ("Yes, apply", "Apply, but expect the degree to be a
   problem", "Probably not worth your weekend unless..."), then one of four labels and the
   reason:
   - **Strong match**: every required item is met, or partly met with close evidence.
   - **Worth applying**: nothing that would get it rejected is unmet, and most of the rest
     is met.
   - **Long shot**: something that could get it rejected is unmet. Say what would have to be
     true for it to be worth the time, and whether you would still send it.
   - **Not a match**: a requirement that cannot be worked around is unmet, such as a licence.

   Write the table first, then write the opening from it. The opening names every required
   item that is `Not met` or `Partly`, copied from those rows: "the degree, the team size,
   advanced Excel and SAP aren't met". Name them; do not count them, and do not sum them up
   in a number or a fraction anywhere in the reply. When two figures differ, give both and
   leave the comparison there: "12 against 20 or more", not "less than half". Give the verdict on what
   you know now; say what answer would raise it, but do not make the verdict wait on the
   answer. Do not soften a long shot into encouragement, do not harden a workable gap into a
   refusal, and do not give a percentage.

6. **Say what to bring forward.** List the two to four things already in the resume that
   answer the posting best and are buried, understated or worded differently from the
   posting. Give the resume's wording and the posting's wording side by side.

7. **Close with what to do next**, in two to four lines: what to lead the application with,
   what to say about the main gap, and the one or two questions whose answers would change
   the verdict ("Have you used Epic anywhere? If so, where and for how long?"). When a
   required item is not shown, ask once whether anything outside the resume covers it: a
   side project, a repository, a portfolio, a volunteer role. People leave their best
   evidence off the page. Anything you credited from another file goes here too, as a line
   to add to the resume. Never ask
   something the resume already answers. Never tell them to add a keyword they have not said
   is true, or to reword a `Partly` so it reads as `Met`: "supported renewals" stays
   supported, and the advice is how to present it honestly. Do not end on a list of
   questions with no advice.

8. **Lay the reply out in this order:** the answer and verdict; what could get it rejected;
   one table covering every requirement (requirement, required or preferred, status,
   evidence); what to bring forward; what to do next. Each requirement appears in the table
   once and nothing is repeated in a second table or restated section by section. A gap is
   described where it first appears and only named after that.

   Match the length to what you were given. A short posting and a few lines about the person
   gets a short answer: the verdict, one line per requirement, and what to do, in under 250
   words and with no table. A full resume against a long posting gets the table, and still
   fits a page.

**With a posting and no resume**, compare against whatever the person said about themselves,
mark the rest `Not shown`, and say a resume would settle those. **With a resume and no
posting**, ask for the posting in one line: there is nothing to compare against.

## Quality bar

- **Every Met and Partly quotes the resume.** A status with no line behind it is a guess.
- **What could get the application rejected is named first**, never left as one row among many.
- **No length of time appears that the resume's own dates don't give.**
- **`Not shown` and `Not met` are kept apart.** One is a question, the other is a gap.
- **Nothing is credited that the resume or the person doesn't state.**
- **The verdict matches the table.** An unmet required degree cannot sit under "strong
  match", and a verdict that names one gap cannot sit over a table that shows four.

## When to use this skill

- ✅ Deciding whether a posting is worth applying for
- ✅ Finding the gaps between a resume and a posting before tailoring the resume
- ✅ Checking several postings against one resume to choose where to spend effort

## When NOT to use this skill

- ❌ Rewriting the resume for the posting. Use `resume-tailor`.
- ❌ Writing the cover letter. Use `cover-letter`.
- ❌ Critiquing the resume as a document, with no job in mind. Use `doc-critique`.

## Anti-patterns to avoid

- ❌ **"87% match."** A percentage hides which requirement is the problem.
- ❌ **Cheerleading.** "You'd be a great fit!" over an unmet required degree wastes the
  person's evening.
- ❌ **Crediting the usual.** "As a nurse you will have used Epic" is an invention.
- ❌ **Treating a similar tool as the named one.**
- ❌ **A count that disagrees with the table.** Name the gaps; a number invites the error.
- ❌ **Hedging everything.** A table of `Partly` tells the person nothing.
- ❌ **Coaching the wording past the facts.** Advising that "supported" be written as "owned".
- ❌ **Advising them to add keywords** so the resume passes a filter. If it isn't true it
  doesn't go in.
- ❌ **Judging the person.** No remarks on age, gaps, family, health or anything a recruiter
  may not lawfully weigh.
- ❌ **Inventing the posting.** A link you could not open is not a posting you have read.
- ❌ **Answering in a file.** They asked a question; the answer belongs in the reply.
- ❌ **A verdict with no advice.** "Long shot" followed by questions leaves them where they
  started.
- ❌ **Showing the machinery.** No status legend longer than a line, no account of how the
  comparison was produced, no remark about what you could or couldn't save.