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Permalink Reply by John Morand on October 19, 2009 at 8:55am

Background checks accomplish several factors, both legal and from a company cultural fit perspective.

From a legal perspective the need is compelling and straightforward. If you hire an employee with a criminal past and that employee repeats their transgression, the company may be held liable. If you hire an accountant guilty of fraud or embezzlement, hire a production supervisor with anger issues or hire an HR person who has been guiilty of harassment themselves, not only is the company at great risk, but the livelihood of every employee and retiree is similarly endangered. Lawsuits for negligent hiring can run well into the millions of dollars.

Degrees from programs that have promised a level of educational competence in safety, accounting, HR, Production Management, medical records, etc., all can lead to a false sense of security by the employer. If an applicant is hired, the expectation that their degree added value instead of just a piece of paper exposes companies to huge amounts of liability for employee error, theft, incompetance or inability. Degrees granted simply for life experience can be even worse than that. Not everyones life experiences were positive, learning opportunities or lessons in how to or not to act in a pressure filled situation.

The tougher one to gauge during a background check is the employees cultural fit. Did the employee lead a team that required constant micromanagement or lots of verbal poking and prodding? Did that employee come from a culture that was passive and may not mesh well with your hard charging team? Did that employee work as an independant contributor in a company where teamwork is everything? This due diligence must be investigated.

Recruiting cost plus opportunity cost plus non productive time of the employee that is leaving or just left can cause irreparable harm. Making a bad decision can make it worse.

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Permalink Reply by Nick Fishman on October 19, 2009 at 11:52am

Thank you for taking the time to respond John. Identifying if the person is the right cultural fit is indeed a significant challenge for recruiters. Just because someone doesn't have a criminal record, doesn't mean you can stop there. Professional Reference Interviews can provide insightful information about your candidate's general character, work habits, reliability, etc.

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Permalink Reply by Andrea Holtman on October 19, 2009 at 9:18am

Background checks are important because on occasion you'll run into a placed candidate who gets escorted offsite in his first week at the new company because of an outstanding warrant for heroin possession AND grand theft.

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Permalink Reply by Nick Fishman on October 19, 2009 at 10:25am

Love your response! Couldn't offer a more compelling case for background checks.

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Permalink Reply by Curt Willbrandt on October 19, 2009 at 9:20am

I'll offer up my opinion about both service-oriented criminal background checks/pre-employment drug screening and traditional reference checking done by a Recruiter.

Since we hire candidates for various contracting opportunities, we have the very same concerns as the clients we support. Our goal is to make sure that the employees we hire have no skeletons (no Holloween pun intended) in their background and that they have been consistent in the information they have disclosed to us in their interview and in their job application.

It is as true today as it ever has been - you should judge a person by their actions and not just their words, and with the drug screening and criminal background check you have another tool you can use in your overall evaluation of the candidate. If someone has been honest with us about any past mistakes, I'm much more likely to recommend them to a client assuming this is not something that poses a problem for our client, ie. regulatory or other corporate policy related problems. Honesty is still the best policy, even when you have some issues in your past. Bottom line on the Pre-Employment drug screen and Criminal Background checks, they're necessary for risk mitigation, reducing potential liability, and limiting damage to your own reputation.

As for traditional reference checks done by Recruiters, if they are done in a qualitative manner instead of just a quick and dirty effort to get checked off your to-do list, they can give tremendous insight into a candidate you are considering hiring or recommending to a client firm.

Strengths, weaknesses, and a solid feel for someone's integrity and breadth of experience are the intangilbes that come from doing your own reference checking. You can easily find problems, but more importantly you can find many new "marketable" aspects of a candidate from talking with people they've worked with. Since Agencies are tasked with "indentifying" talent, and can not generally "certify" performance, the Professional Reference Check helps boost up the quality of service you can offer your Clients and often gives you marketable information about a candidate that your competition is going to be lacking.

On the risk-reward continuum, while reference checking is time consuming, it does help you better represent a candidate and often provides insights into the candidate's background that none of your competition may have. So, in my judgement, it's worth the effort and boosts the level of service you can provide your clients.

Professional Staffing firms use these tools to provide good service, mitigate risk, and better service the needs of everyone involved.

Those who tend to spray-and-pray by blasting resumes all over town based solely on buzzwords in the resume and a 10 minute interview, they don't value these tools and generally provide the poor type of service that gives the Staffing Industry a bad name.

Good effort, good service, and a good reputation go hand-in-hand with using these tools to better meet the needs of your clients.

That's my 2 cents worth.

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Permalink Reply by Nick Fishman on October 19, 2009 at 11:45am

Great insight Curt. Thank you for sharing. Of course I agree with you. It's great to see that you are able to use background checks to distinguish your services and create real value with your clients.

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Permalink Reply by Betty Ryan on October 19, 2009 at 12:11pm

The importance of professional reference checks has many benefits. First, you demonstrate to your client how thorough you are and also to the candidate. Remember, that candidate can turn into a future hiring authority. Also, a detailed reference check is an excellent way to obtain new clients and new candidates in your niche.Don't skim over references..treat them like gold.

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Permalink Reply by Nick Fishman on October 26, 2009 at 9:57am

Congratulations Curt. We had a lot of great responses to why background checks are important to your organization, but we felt that you nailed it best. You are the winner of our Amazon Kindle. I like that you defined the need and use of background checks, but what I liked the most was inclusion of why they help you differentiate yourself in the marketplace. Please give me a call (847 564 5410) or send me an email so that we can make arrangements to get the Kindle to you.

Thank you again for your insights!

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Permalink Reply by MPH-Ron on October 19, 2009 at 10:02am

The problem with background checks it the source. Public data files by definition are public and contain many errors. For substance abuse the old reliable drug screen, for financial responsibility the Credit report, for positions requiring a driver license the SOS report. If you are recruiting a CEO or CFO then the employment of a PI would be better than the usual contract services.
The cultural fit is more of a challenge as the company may want to hire an elephant as opposed to a tiger but as a recruiter you know that they need a Tiger. I believe that it the responsibility of good recruiter to occasionally recommend the a-typical candidate to infuse energy into the mix. Many times a person with a nontraditional background for example can help a company take it to the next level.

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Permalink Reply by Dave Alvarado on October 19, 2009 at 10:15am

very good information....a colleague of mine experienced this once before with a someone not being so forthright about their education. Fortunately my company has always made a habit about doing background checks so we were able to prevent a lot of pie in the face from this occurrence. We wound up pulling the candidate and saved the hiring manager and ourselves the embarrassment of having to explain how and why this person got so far into the interview process. So yes...I believe that background checks are necessary.

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Permalink Reply by Cindy Cremona,CPC on October 19, 2009 at 12:47pm

In today's high unemployment & competitive climate, Recruiters need compelling reasons for our clients to hire. Employers need and often require validation that their candidate's are legitimate, qualified and fully screened. This becomes particularly critical with out of state hires & for candidates from obscure schools who have little or no work experience, where references are unknown quantities and difficult to verify.

Today's employer is cautious, cost conscience and critical. In order to gain their confidence it's crucial that we are presenting credible candidates. Fully submitted background checks ensure good hires as well as our professional reputations. I'm looking forward to the rest of your insightful presentations this week!

Side note: I'm a voracious reader. Could I potentially be a Kindle convert?

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Permalink Reply by Nick Fishman on October 19, 2009 at 1:00pm

Thanks for your thoughts Cindy. Regarding your Kindle question, I'm a huge reader as well and I still haven't been converted. They're really cool and I've seen a number of people using them on planes. I've just never been a big fan of buying first generation gadgets because you know they'll be that much better the second time around. That said, if someone offered a free Kindle, I'd snap it up faster than you can say "background check":)

Maybe I'm just cheap!

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