Changing business environments, alterations in organizational strategy, and key technological transformations are rendering traditional job structures obsolete in 2023. 

In today’s agile business environment, the traditional job catalog, which was once an asset for companies, is turning into a liability. 

The digital business environment of 2023 has altered how work is performed.  

The emergence of hybrid working models and cross-functional project teams is a result of evolving business needs. 

Flexible and multidisciplinary positions are becoming the norm, and contingent employees and automation are fundamental elements of the digital workforce. 

Traditional job structures are failing to catch up with these new methods of work.  

They’re unable to keep up with evolving roles and skillsets combined with digital working models and policies. 

All this calls for companies to design a future-proof job catalog for the digital era of 2023. 

What is a Job Catalog? 

A job catalog is essentially a list of all roles and responsibilities within a company, along with data about the requirements, level of authority, and salary scale of each position. 

It is a necessary tool for HR to determine what expertise they currently have and what talent they are missing. 

It also helps them know what is expected of each employee and how their performance will be measured. 

Alternatively, a job catalog also benefits employees by helping them understand what is needed to perform their job well, how they can grow, and what training they require. 

HR has to develop a job catalog precisely aligned with external job roles and skills. 

Why is it important for HR leaders to review job catalogs? 

Reviewing job catalogs is critical for HR leaders to ensure that job descriptions are accurate and up-to-date.  

This is necessary because evolving job roles have gone so far from traditional roles that job descriptions must be redesigned.  

Reviewing job catalogs also allows HR to identify gaps in current job roles and skills to shape their talent strategy more effectively. 

It ensures that the organization is competitive in the job market and can attract and retain skilled talent at a time when layoffs make a daily headline. 

Also, reviewing job catalogs supports effective talent management and workforce planning because it is mainly data-driven.  

The only way to utilize the modern HR trends is by staying data-driven in the approach to talent, and job catalogs help you do that. 

Why designing a Job Catalog important? 

Compiling a job catalog is important because it ensures that every bit of information relating to the job positions in the company is gathered in one location. 

It helps recruiters identify the right candidate for a certain position because they know what is expected of an employee and what skillsets and experience are required. 

A redesigned job catalog would also help recruiters quickly compile job descriptions, set a benchmark for candidates, and plan their workforce effectively.  

A job catalog could help identify skill gaps in the organization, which can inform training and development programs to help employees acquire the necessary skills.  

Additionally, a job catalog can be used to inform recruitment strategies by identifying areas where the organization needs to hire new talent. 

It also helps categorize your workforce, meaning the people performing similar activities can be grouped together and can be added to the organizational structure.  

How to design a Job Catalog? 

Building a uniform job catalog is a challenge, especially for organizations with insufficient in-house capacity or knowledge. 

The amount of effort this will require depends on the organization’s maturity. The more data-driven an organization is, the less work it will be. 

Here are five easy steps to create a job catalog in 2023. 

Step 1: List all jobs and define them clearly

List each employee and add in-depth information about their roles. For each employee, it’s best practice to include the name, department, parent function, job title, job description, job family, salary scale, and more. 

The more information you put in, the better the job profiles can be analyzed. 

Step 2: Weigh each job

Doing this helps compare all job positions and define levels within the hierarchy. This can be used by HR for talent development and succession planning.  

Some companies even attempt benchmarking and weigh a job on multiple characteristics, including responsibilities, working conditions, knowledge, and others. 

Step 3: Determine Compensation Elements

Understanding how the annual salary is calculated depends upon how many compensation elements were taken into consideration.  

For example, how many bonuses or holiday pay? How will the compensation be based on the local cost of living? 

Answering these questions allows you to gather all compensation elements in one place for the next step. 

Step 4: Combine the Data and define the Jobs

Here, you combine the Jobs (step 1) with the Classifications (step 2) and Annual Salary (step 3) to correctly define salary ranges and their allocations. 

Doing so gives you the picture of ‘what is’ and thus reflects the current state of organizational talent. 

Step 5: Build a job hierarchy

A job hierarchy is critical to add structure to your talent pool. The way to develop a data-driven job hierarchy is by analyzing all jobs and creating classifications based on multiple elements. 

This will require grouping together jobs of the same kind to create job families, which would ultimately result in job family groups and so on.  

By the end of this process, you would have combined everything and would will a ready job catalog that has four elements, namely: 

• Job Family Group: A collection of job families  
• Job Family: A group of related job profiles 
• Job Profile: A collection of job details assigned to a position 
• Job Details: This includes job descriptions, levels, skills & competencies, and more. 

Bottomline 

While creating a job catalog may seem easy, it gets progressively tougher for companies that do not manage job data with precision.  

In other words, companies that do not deploy the best data management practices may struggle to define a job catalog. 

HR leaders must carefully understand the Job Catalog and learn how it aligns with external Job roles and skills.  

This step can help them evaluate the skills available vs. areas of gaps in a directional manner. 

While designing your own job catalog is necessary, it’s also equally important to compare your job catalog with external job families and include innovative content in it. 

Draup for Talent, an AI-powered talent management tool, offers comprehensive insights into workforce trends and talent management strategies.  

With access to data from over 4,500 job roles across 33 industries, 7,000 universities, and 30,000 skills, Draup provides accurate data sets and expert analysis that can help you build a robust talent pipeline strategy. Its tailor-made reports and insights make talent management a seamless process.