Share this post
Editor's Pick
in Recruitment
4.5 (432)

Candidate persona mapping template

Candidate persona mapping gives you a clearer view of your ideal employees for better targeting.

Template by Thao Nguyen Le
4 minutes to finish · English · PPTX
Save
Download nowIt's free
  • 268 already downloaded
  • Easy and simple to use

To stay on top of the current Talent War, recruiters need more than traditional strategies to get the attention of most-fit job seekers. A candidate persona serves as one of the most efficient tools to help understand prospective candidates better. Download (for free) our template to identify your perfect candidate and build the right hiring strategies.

Overview

The competition for talents is expected to resume soon as companies look to bounce back from the COVID-19 pandemic downturn. Add that to the already existing problem of low retention rate, and you’ll see that recruiters need more than traditional strategies to get the attention of qualified job seekers. 

A candidate persona mapping serves as one of the most efficient modern solutions to this problem. But what does this term mean and how to integrate this into your hiring process.

What are candidate personas?

Candidate personas are semi-fictional depictions of what you want the ideal candidate for a job to be. They are created by using hiring trends and research to predict such candidates’ minds, personality traits, career goals, and identity. A well-crafted candidate persona will help you identify the perfect candidate to fill an open position.

How can you use personas?

Since candidate personas help you know how your ideal candidate think, you can use it to improve your recruitment process in the following ways:

  • Create better job descriptions
  • Source for active & passive candidates
  • Improve recruitment metrics

How do you create candidate personas?

There are three standard steps to creating candidate personas; these are:

  • Gather information: Start by gathering data from your past hiring record. Then research about the targeted candidates’ demography, qualifications, skills, etc.
  • Interview: Hold discussions with potential candidates and employees, especially the high performing ones. Get to know their motivation, goals, interests, and driving factor.
  • Do more research: Research the latest hiring trends, what these talents want, and other factors like their preferred job application sites.
  • Collect data, analyze them, and put your persona profiles together

Candidate persona template 

Section 1: Who?

First, give your ideal candidate the personality traits you want them to have. You may give the persona a name to make it more authentic and even add a picture.

Background  (Current job - Qualifications - Experience)

  • Software Engineer
  • B.Sc. in software engineering, information technology, or computer science 
  • Three years of extensive experience working with Python, C++, Javascript, and other programming languages 

Demographics (Gender - Age - Income)

  • Male

  • 24
  • $3000 - $5000

Personal preferences

  • Flexible work schedule
  • In-person communication 
  • Follow tech news
  • Independent but friendly

Tip: Conduct research into the skill sets, demography, income, etc. of the average Software Engineer. Join niche job boards and follow the discussions in online groups to get a clear picture of what Software Engineers want.

Section 2: What?

Write down the motivators that you believe should drive your ideal candidate.

Goals (Primary goals - Secondary goals)

  • Build well-known and useful applications or websites for users.
  • Become a software development team leader 

Challenges (Primary challenges - Secondary challenges)

  • Limited tools and resources
  • Problems keeping up with the latest industry trends
  • Basic English skill

What can we do (to help our persona achieve their goals? to help our persona overcome their challenges)

  • Provide training and seminar opportunities to help employees learn from industry giants
  • Invest in tools and resources
  • Create a mentorship program to help new Software Engineers learn fast and develop leadership skills

Tip: Interview candidates and consult the hiring team when creating this part of the persona mapping. For the employees, get insights from the exceptional ones among them as they are who you’d want the ideal candidate to be like. Use the details from the interviews to build this section.

Section 3: Why?

Real quotes (about goals, challenges)

Goals: 

  • “I want to spend my day working on applications and websites that would be helpful to many users.”
  • “My long-term goal is to be a leader in the field, steering a software development team in their quest to create state-of-the-art products.”

Tip: Your quotes should be a composite of the different things the people you interview told you about. Choose the most common goals and challenges.

Common objections (Why wouldn't they join your company?)

  • We are a small start-up
  • Slightly below-industry income

Section 4: How?

Now, convince the ideal candidate that your company is the best place for them to be.

What can we offer

  • Great workplace culture
  • Fast career progression
  • Work-life balance

Download the full candidate persona mapping template 👉

What you'll get:

  • An introduction of candidate personas and how you could put them into practice.
  • A detailed template to help you develop your own candidate persona by steps.
  • Examples and tips on how the perfect persona should be

How to use this template

  • ✂️
    The template is fair use for your own purposes. Feel free to copy or refer to the structure and guidelines inside.
  • 🛎
    Keep in mind that this template is not a legal document and may not take into account all relevant local or national laws.
  • ✍️
    The contents in the template are just a starter. Make sure you insert and edit the variables (name, logos, etc.) to tailor the template to your business.
  • 📟
    Upgrade the material by changing or adding in texts, sections, and visuals
  • 🖨
    Export as PDF or print it out for easier handling and communication with your team.

Who this template is for

  • Recruiters who want to level up their hiring strategy
  • Business founders that need a fresher view on how they target their talents
  • Hiring managers who are seeking the perfect team members

Frequently Asked Questions

Download now
  • 1.
    Is it really free?

    Absolutely!

    We’re committed to helping you as much as possible in all things HR. Download and we will keep you updated on hot-baked useful resources coming out weekly.

  • 2.
    Why do I have to fill out my information?

    Your information is safe with us.

    We ask for your information in exchange for a valuable resource so we can: (a) send you more free and useful resources we publish weekly via email (b) inform you about pieces that we think may be of value to you. You can check out our privacy policy here.

  • 3.
    What is Grove HR?

    Grove HR is the best free HR platform that helps SMBs digitize their HR operation so that they can create an attractive digital employee experience.

    Operating on both desktop and mobile, it provides a full employee lifecycle solution from recruitment, onboarding, managing employee records to time-tracking, payroll, and more.

Download now