Hunting the Rare Species

Have you ever seen a purple squirrel outside your house, office, a garden, or a forest maybe? I am assuming that you haven’t, but did you know that they actually exist?

Given the rarity of sighting a purple squirrel, the recruitment industry borrows this term to refer to a candidate who is a perfect fit for a given job opportunity.

A purple squirrel is a candidate who holds the ideal qualifications and experience, possesses the right mix of skills, one who is an innovator, who spearheads initiatives, is extremely talented, one who can be creative and be able to think out of the box, requires minimum training and starts contributing to the business soon after joining the organization. This candidate also fits perfectly well in the organization culture, is available to work in the location stated for the job requirement and is willing to accept an offer that fits within the budget assigned for the position in question.

A purple squirrel is a rarest candidate who is hard to find, who is extremely talented, a game changer, the difference maker, the innovator, the ultimate rockstar of an organization. This candidate is the one who creates the delta at work and often emerges as a high-potential employee in the organization, whom the business would always want to acquire and retain.

There are times a candidate is hired for a particular role in an organization and gradually moves into another role and starts managing both the responsibilities efficiently. Now the hiring organization becomes totally dependent on 1 person for 2 sorts of roles. Once this candidate moves out of the organization and the hiring manager start looking for a person to replace him, it becomes difficult for the recruiters to look for a suitable replacement. That is one such incident when the concept of purple squirrel holds true.

Other challenges that might be faced by an organization while looking for a perfect hire may include factors like time constraint, budgetary constraints, obsolete job description, poor branding and visibility or may be not recognizing the purple squirrel. In addition to this there can be instances when candidates take up the job offer but they don’t join as the best candidates usually have more than one offers with them.

 Some ways to find a purple squirrel could be, using multiple sourcing channels, organizing referral programs, joining online forums, attending events, using social media, tapping on passive candidates, mapping and developing a database of the available candidates in the said industry, etc. There are certain other factors which support the hiring of a perfect match but may sometimes be ignored by the hiring organization such as focusing on employer branding, boomerang hiring, making the best interview experience, etc.


Madhulika Makar

Talent Insights Leader I SHRM Recruitment Skills Training Partner I Industry Speaker

4 年

....and should one be focusing so much to find "that" purple squirrel in the 1st place !!

Jatin Arora

DIRECTOR-OPERATION AT ACURA GLOBAL SHIPPING

4 年

Well said Ishita. We were always in search of purple squirrel candidate but that usually end up most difficult task for lot of us. One challenge / obstacle i see here oftenly with purple squirrel ie they do not join / step back on the joining date and end up negotiating with their existing organization who try best to retain such a talent with all means for obvious reason. In my view this is one frequent issue with such profile nowdays. Suggest added tool to secure such talent from not to back out !!!! Thanks

Sweta Gupta

Talent Acquisition | Human Resource Management | Employee Relationship | Hiring Great Talents |(Masters in Business Administration)

4 年

Right, in our past organizations, we are experienced to find candidates like purple squirrels for many of the roles . As You know better.,but the time is more challenging now..

Sarthak G.

Hiring Talent @ KPMG Thailand | APAC - Financial Services |

4 年

Extremely true Ishita Nangru, In today's competitive environment where each organisation strives to get those picture perfect candidates, it is also essential to dig deeper into creating alternatives, research on market and always having a Plan B.

Jonathan Stewart

Global Talent Acquisition Strategy | Recruitment Leadership and Transformation | HR Communications | Change Management| Employer Branding

4 年

Proactively sourcing for skills/talent/capability rather than looking to fill a narrow role-defined JD or requisition is another way to hire great candidates. Some of my most successful hires have been a result of identifying individuals who possess the right current - or future - profile for my organisation (or even better, a skillset which the business lacks but needs) and then engaging with them, sometimes over time. When the match was a good one, the business were often more than happy to create a role for the individual based on what they could offer. This way, you are limited only by the readiness of the candidate and not hoping desperately for the stars to align.

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