Style Guide

What's the big picture?

Imagine you're sitting down to eat at a restaurant. One of your first questions is "what's on the menu?" Together, we're building a menu for jobs -- one large, collective resource that helps answer the general question "what are my options out there?" and the next, more specific question "what's that type of job like?"

Elements of a good review

A good review above all has the goal of sharing information to help others make more informed, more creative decisions about choosing among types of work. You can help people figure out if a particular industry or type of role may be worth exploring.

When writing a review, keep in mind:

• Be descriptive and state your reasoning. Use what, why, how, for whom, and in what circumstances.
• Do your best to keep it accessible, simple and jargon-free. If you must use an industry term, define it.
• Synthesize. When you reflect on a role, with the benefit of hindsight, are there any patterns or principles that stand out for you?
• Be succinct. You can write an extra long review, but bear in mind you risk audience boredom.
• Make it easy to read. Check your spelling. DON'T USE ALL CAPS. Use full sentences and correct punctuation.
• Context matters. Help describe the conditions or scenario in which a given role could make good sense.
• Remember, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Just because something is a fit for you, doesn't mean it will be a fit for someone else. The reverse is also true (a bad fit for you may be just fine for someone else).

Which voice to use?

First-person (what voice should I pick?), second-person (what voice should you pick?), or third-person (what voice should one pick?). As a default, go ahead and use the second-person voice. Like a travel guide, you're giving informed suggestions to others who may want to follow a path similar to yours. Of course, your suggestions are informed by your experience, so there may be times where you feel most comfortable speaking in the first-person voice (e.g. "In my experience, law school is not the best route to this job"), and that's ok too.

Headline

Like you, everyone wants to hear the bottom line. What's the one main thing I need to know about this job? If you recommend it, then for who?

At A Glance

This is your opportunity to describe this job as succinctly as possible. If you had only 5 seconds of someone's attention (and let's say that you do), in plain language how would you communicate what a person does in this type of job? Can you describe the crux of it in one sentence?

Highlights

What attracts people to this type job? Why do they stay? Do most people stay because they're learning something valuable? Or impacting people in a good way that's hard to do anywhere else? Or the pay makes it hard to leave? Share the reasons why you think someone might want to consider pursuing this type of job.

Lowlights

No job is perfect. Some of the not-so-good parts derive from inherent limitations in the type of role, or the industry, or the industry culture; others from the team, manager or company culture. Focus on the first set of stuff -- it's the most applicable to greatest number of people.

A Day In The Life

How would you describe a typical work day? Or is this type of job better profiled in 36-hour shifts, 3-day stints, or full work weeks? Are you at an office, in a classroom, on a plane or in a car? Are you working mostly solo, with a parade of new people, or some mix? Is the work pace evenly distributed, or are there periods when the workload spikes? Instead of the travel guides' "3 days in Paris", what's 3 days in this type of role?

How To Get This Job

There are many paths to any given type of job. What paths have you seen work? If someone with less experience than you asked about prerequisite experiences they should seek out, what would you recommend? If someone well qualified for this role became interested in it, what job search tips would you suggest?

How To Thrive In This Job

Getting the job is one thing, making the most of it is another. What do top performers do? What does a really valuable contribution look like in this job? If interested in moving beyond this job, what results should people be demonstrating? Are there particular skills or projects they should take on?