These days I spend a lot of time looking at job postings around the Internet, it’s a tough place to be especially since most recruiters have no idea what web people do and those who are aware of the industry are often completely unaware of the ridiculous nature of their requests. The other day I saw a posting on Monster for:

a Senior Web Developer with 6+ years Adobe Flex experience and a working knowledge of Word, office printers and networks.

First … Flex was only invented in 2004. Second, it’s a specialty … Flex experts are like dessert chefs, asking them to be good at washing dishes in addition to making authentic French meringues will not get you qualified candidates, it will get you dish washers. Here’s a quick look at what I believe are accurate descriptions of jobs in my industry:

Web Designers

A web designer is a pixel pusher, they use Adobe Photoshop or similar tools to create Graphical User Interfaces to be converted to Hypertext Markup Language. Ideal web designers sway to one of two sub specialties, they are either functionally capable Usability Specialists or entry level Web Developers in addition to being a designer. Web Designers are artists, akin to Graphic Designers and photographers and rarely have a university degree, though most go to college.

Multimedia Specialists

There are sadly, dozens of areas of Specialists in the Web field from those who specialize in Flash or Flex to QuickTime, Shockwave, 3D artists and those who work in the video or audio production fields. Often these Specialists will have backgrounds in design as well as their media specialization. Few in the industry have degrees, and only a handful have college diplomas since the work is profitable from an early age.

Web Developers

A web developer programs websites using the Hypertext Markup Language to convert a designer’s artwork into a language compatible with web browser technology. They are also capable of programming the interactivity of a website using PHP or ASP based languages, JavaScript or other languages. Web Developers are coders, similar in nature to C++ or Java computer programmers. 

Usability Specialists

The web is a marketing platform, the job of a Usability Specialist is to ensure the average user can successfully navigate a website and achieve the business objective, regardless of what the object may be. Often the Usability Specialist is also the Project Manager and has an obsessive nature geared towards Quality Control and meeting objectives.

Web Publishers

A Web Publisher is a data entry person, they’re job is to convert information from print or electronic form into web based content following strict document structure guidelines. After the designer and developer have put together the skeleton of a website, the Web Publisher works with Copyrighters and the Marketing team to ensure all content is placed in the right places before launching a website.

SEO Specialists

Unique to the Web, an SEO Specialist is an Organic Marketing professional who’s sole purpose is to increase the traffic rate of a web property through non paid advertising means. Often the SEO Specialist will also manage online advertising programs, purchasing and real world marketing but his/her real goal is to broaden the success of a website without paid placement.  

Web Managers

The Web Manager is the business brains of a website. They’re job is to manage timelines, budgets, analyze Analytics and convert web traffic to measurable business. In many smaller organizations they’re also Web Generalists capable of lending a hand in all other areas of the puzzle, those who have mastered multiple ares of expertise are often called Web Masters. This is a tough job, it involves managing the egos of artists and the surly nature of programmers while meeting tough deadlines.

Network Administrators

I like to call NA’s the Backend Boys but for some reason they don’t like that title. A Network Administrator is a specialist which every Web person needs, they don’t get a lot of glory and they’re often (rightfully so) the first to get blamed with things go wrong but a Network Administrator’s job is to run the hardware (physical computers) the Web teams software (the website) operates on. They spend long hours ensuring email, servers, data streams and corporate software work.

Director of Technology

These days, our companies have become technology saturated. The role of a Director of Technology is to understand the business objectives of the organization and utilize cost savings methodologies to deliver the best computer solutions possible. Simply put, they’re job is to always do more with less while ensuring the best people are capable of delivering timely solutions and the rest of the organization sees technology as a friendly resource, not an aggravation.

Chief Technology Officer

The CTO title always interests me, there’re rarely a Vice President of Technology in an organization so I’m not sure if the title is a silent salute to Star Trek. The job of the CTO is two fold, first they have to keep the technology of a whole organization flowing smoothly and they also have to plan for future technologies by knowing where the company needs to be down the road. Their job in short is to lead the whole technology team for the management team and to solve the problems of the business through new, innovated methods.