The most common reason qualified people skip jobs they could get is misreading the requirements. A posting lists ten bullets, you have seven, and you close the tab. But those ten bullets are not equal. Recruiters and hiring managers write them as a wish list, and they know they will rarely find every box checked. Learning to tell required from preferred is the difference between applying smart and applying scared.
How postings signal the difference
The language usually gives it away once you know what to look for. Required qualifications tend to use hard words: must have, required, minimum, essential. Preferred ones soften: preferred, a plus, nice to have, ideally, bonus points for.
Many postings also use headers, a Requirements block and a separate Nice to have or Preferred block. When they do, take it at face value. The first list is the bar, the second is the wish.
The rule of thumb on missing items
There is a widely cited pattern: people who hesitate to apply unless they meet close to every requirement leave good opportunities on the table, while others apply at a much lower match rate and get hired. The practical takeaway is simple. If you meet the required qualifications and most of the preferred ones, apply. If you are missing a required one but have a clear equivalent, apply and explain it. If you are missing several hard requirements with nothing to bridge them, your energy is better spent elsewhere.
Distinguish a hard gate from a soft preference
Some requirements really are non-negotiable: a license to practice, work authorization, a specific certification the role legally needs. Treat those as gates. Most requirements, though, are softer than they read. Five-plus years of experience usually means we want someone who clearly knows this work, and four years with strong results can clear it. Years are a proxy, and proxies bend.
Recruiters would rather see a near-fit who explains the gap than have a strong candidate self-reject. The posting is an opening offer, not a contract.
When you are missing something, address it
Do not paper over a gap and hope it goes unnoticed. If you lack a preferred skill but have a transferable one, name the bridge in your cover letter or application. Saying that most of your experience is in B2C, but the retention metrics they listed map directly to subscription work you have done, reframes a gap as adjacent experience. That one sentence does more than padding your CV with keywords you cannot back up.
Tailor to the requirements you do meet
Once you decide to apply, make the requirements you meet impossible to miss. Mirror the posting's exact phrasing for the must-haves in your CV and cover letter, since both human readers and ATS scan for them. A tool like Postulit helps you line your experience up against a specific posting, so you can see at a glance which required and preferred items you actually cover before you decide to hit submit.
The honest bottom line
Apply when you meet the gates and most of the spirit of the role, even if a few preferred boxes are empty. Skip when the gaps are in the hard requirements and you have nothing to bridge them. Everything in between is a judgment call, and the cost of applying is one well-targeted hour, while the cost of not applying is a job you might have gotten.