The Return of the Purple Squirrel

Earlier this year I wrote about the mythical purple squirrel that one fellow job seeker told me about.  The term represents the mythical perfect-fit companies always seek but can never find.  Rather than compromise on expected perfection, they keep searching and hoping they'll find that jack-of-all-possible-trades who can:

• Solve every single problem and need
• Get along perfectly with ever single conflicting personality in the office
• Bring decades of experience to the position without somehow being over 40 years of age, and yet is still
• Willing to work for the lowest salary grade possible.

Well, as they say in horror movie circles, "He's baaaack..." 

True enough, no less an authority than Juan Williams's favorite former employer NPR posted an excellent article on just how far companies are willing to hold out as they search for that ultimate candidate.  With rising health care costs, leaner budgets, and a continuing anxiety over the ongoing recession, firms are so reluctant to hire that it's not uncommon for them to decide even after finding suitable candidates with strong records that, "Well, for us the time is just not right at the moment.  Call us back in another 6 months."  (Which makes perfect sense, actually, since most job seekers have little else to do but circle back to the same companies that reject them every six months, right?) 

Anyway, you can read the full article here.  It's part of an ongoing series NPR is producing on how skills gaps (or perceived gaps) are in many instances keeping companies from hiring.  A particularly notable part of the series addresses the fact that many applicants apparently continue to "live in the past" when it comes to salaries.  The argument goes that if an applicant has transferable-but-not-identical skills, s/he should be willing to compromise on salary to take a position. 

This would be almost comical if it didn't ignore the more fundamental fact that employers often won't hire someone who used to make a higher salary in his or her previous job.  The reason?  Once the economy picks back up, they fear, the candidate will bolt for a higher-paying position elsewhere. 

This puts candidates in a perfect Catch-22:  If they disclose what they actually made at their last jobs, they may price themselves out of consideration.  On the other hand, if they lowball what they were actually making and the discrepancy is discovered as part of the standard due diligence normally done before a hiring decision is made, the candidate looks dishonest and won't receive an offer.  In short, you're damned if you do and damned if you don't. 

Bottom line?  Candidates may indeed have to get used to living in a different world as far as compensation is concerned, but they also shouldn't be penalized for once making something more at their previous positions, either.  Put another way, companies shouldn't expect to have it both ways, or they may find themselves unable to hire anyone at all.