When scaling your team, finding the right front end developer can be a challenge. A poor hiring decision can lead to setbacks, low-quality code, and wasted time. To ensure the right developers are applying for your role, we unpack what you need to include in a front end developer job description and the most important front end developer requirements.
Front end developer job description
A well-crafted front end developer job description is a key first step to ensure that the right people are applying for the role. Your job description should include the following information:
- The position name
- Your company’s name
- The roles’ key responsibilities
- Minimum experience and qualifications for the position, and
- Key benefits you’re offering as part of your compensation package
When creating a job description, setting up a role scorecard can help you identify the essential skills and responsibilities for the position.
Front end developer roles and responsibilities
Before deciding on the specific responsibilities for a front end developer, it is important to understand the core skills to look out for when looking for top front end developers:
- HTML, CSS, JavaScript and Typescript: These are the core technologies for building web pages and user interfaces.
- Popular front-end JavaScript frameworks such as React, Angular, Vue.js and libraries such as jQuery.
- Other frameworks they might have experience with include Node.js, Nuxt.js, Next.js, Nest.js and Express.js.
- Responsive design techniques and cross-browser compatibility, to ensure that the website functions well on multiple devices and web browsers.
- Web accessibility best practices and guidelines.
- Web performance optimisation techniques, such as minifying code and lazy loading images.
- Version control systems such as Git and using it in a team environment.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at the most common front end developer roles and responsibilities:
- Creating visually appealing and responsive user interfaces that are accessible on various devices and screen sizes.
- Translating design mockups into functional web pages or applications using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
- Ensuring the UI is consistent with the design guidelines and brand identity.
- Writing clean, semantic HTML and CSS code to structure and style web content.
- Ensuring cross-browser and cross-platform compatibility.
- Optimizing web assets and styles for performance.
- Writing JavaScript code to implement interactive features and enhance user experience.
- Using JavaScript frameworks and libraries like React, Angular, or Vue.js to build complex web applications.
- Handling asynchronous operations, user input validation, and data manipulation.
- Implementing responsive web design to ensure websites and applications adapt to different screen sizes and devices.
- Using media queries and other techniques to create a consistent user experience.
- Identifying and fixing issues related to browser-specific rendering and behaviour differences.
- Testing and debugging code to ensure it works on various browsers.
- Ensuring that web content is accessible to users with disabilities by following WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) standards.
- Using ARIA attributes and other techniques to improve accessibility.
- Optimizing web assets (images, scripts, styles) for fast loading and rendering.
- Minimizing the use of unnecessary resources to improve page speed.
- Collaborating with other team members using version control systems like Git to manage code changes.
- Collaborating with designers, back-end developers, and other stakeholders to ensure the seamless integration of front-end and back-end components.
- Communicating technical concepts and progress effectively to non-technical team members.
- Using tools like Google Analytics or other performance monitoring tools to track user engagement and website/application performance.
- Being aware of common security vulnerabilities and best practices to prevent them.
