Open almost any job posting, and usually the first few lines mention, “excellent communication skills required.”

This requirement can be spotted anywhere, on postings for accountants, engineers, journalists, corporate communication jobs, and analysts, which is exactly why it fee

But do you know that ‘excellent communication’ skills as a requirement actually means far more than just being able to write good grammar?

Even though “excellent communication skills” has become boilerplate, a phrase copied from template to template rather than something a hiring manager sat down and typed out on purpose. But that doesn’t mean it does not have any weightage to the job description.

But how to differentiate the generic boilerplate term from a real requirement, and how to figure out what a specific job profile actually wants?

Here are tips to read between the lines and find out what a job description asking for communication skills actually means