Shutting Creeps Out With A Pre-employment Screening Conducted By A Background Check Company

Have you ever thought about how the purpose of a screen door is similar to a pre-employment screening? Why do we have a door for a door to our homes? Well, according to Wikipedia, “the screen door incorporates screen mesh to block flying insects or airborne debris such as seeds or leaves from entering and pets and small children from exiting interior spaces…”, I’ll leave it there. It is a protective barrier. What is a health screening? Medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com defines a health screening as, “Tests or examinations done to diagnose a condition before symptoms begin…” What am I getting at with the references to screening? Screening is to prevent something from getting inside your space, whether it is your home, your body or a particular area such as a workplace. Once a pest or intruder gets inside it can cause all types of harm or damage. A pre-employment screening serves the same purpose to try to prevent a potential foe or parasite from getting inside an organization and wreaking havoc.
       

Pre-employment screening can be conducted by a business, usually a Human Resource Manager or Department or by a professional Background Check Company. A prospective job candidate’s credentials are validated in this process to be sure the information provided is true. It is not uncommon for a job applicant to embellish a resume or application but to provide totally false or misleading information could be to cover up a checkered past. Human Resources Departments may do a decent job of calling people listed as references and they may be able to confirm that an applicant worked somewhere else but they may not get more than that. A Background Check Company can do a deep dive into a candidate’s history. Credit report information, criminal history, past residence information and sex offender listings are just a few of the details that can be investigated and could shed light on who it is you are considering to bring into your workplace.
     

Some of you are shaking your heads and thinking what does it really matter whether a candidate has moved around a lot? Maybe they forgot to list a few of the places where they lived, some people move a lot. Perhaps, but is there a chance that your applicant moved around a lot due to evictions? Maybe they weren’t paying their rent or maybe they were trying to stay one step ahead of the authorities. Is that credit report a big deal? Well, since I was a Loss Prevention Manager and I apprehended a lot of employees for cash theft and financial transaction fraud during my tenure and I know many of those people had credit problems I would say, yeah it’s kind of a big deal. Maybe you’ll concede that moving around a lot and credit history information may be a red flag but you still think a criminal background may just be the result of an embarrassing DUI when the person was 21 years old. That is possible. I have actually been on a hiring committee that was prepared to not consider an applicant because he had a DUI conviction when he was younger. He was honest on his application about the conviction and we took into consideration the time that had passed. We ended up hiring him and he did a great job as an employee. On the other hand what if that hidden conviction is an assault or robbery? Are you prepared to put your business at risk or worse yet, those currently working for you?
     

Pre-employment screening is your first line of defense to keep someone out who could hurt your business. It might be a risk to your company’s financial well-being or a threat to the physical and mental health of your employees. The wrong person can cause strife in a business and hurt morale and a successful team. Don’t let a potential bad guy sneak in, hire a background check company to ensure you continue to operate a profitable store and enjoyable place to work.

Need information on pre-employment screening? Give us a call at 1.770.426.0547 now.   
          

Pre-employment Screening Or Hiring Assessments; Is One A Better Tool Than The Other For Staffing Your Business? Part 2

In Part 1 of this article I spent some time discussing how hiring assessments can be detrimental to an employer in terms of the limiting effect it can have on a hiring pool. These assessments are often a hundred questions or more and can take an hour or so of a job applicant’s time. I related in part 1 my personal experience of taking an assessment for a department manager position and failing it despite my extensive management and retail background. It was also irritating to fail this assessment since I know many of the questions involved integrity issues and handling difficult situations or theft related incidents. Cover your ears, I’m about to shout…I WAS A RETAIL LOSS PREVENTION MANAGER FOR 13 YEARS AND HAD 17 YEARS OR MORE OF TOTAL LOSS PREVENTION EXPERIENCE, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD! Shouting over, you can uncover your ears. You don’t handle many more integrity or theft situations than I have over my lifetime. To top it off, I figured out what the test was wanting, tested for a sales associate job for the same company and scored a 100% on the same day. The questions were generally the same so it was a flawed system, in my humble opinion. Using a background check company is a better way to assess whether an applicant would be a good member of your team than using one of these assessments.
     

A background check company conducts pre-employment screening for employers and looks at the background and history of someone applying to a business. These checks can be customized to the needs of a particular company so that pertinent information on a candidate can be more carefully scrutinized. A long-haul truck company may be more interested in an applicant’s driver history and training schools attended than his/her credit history. A school will be more concerned with a thorough check of sex offender registries than they will be of a driver history. All employers may want to know that their employees have proper I9 credentials to ensure their workers are working legally in the United States. Based on the position search criteria may be even more stringent. The depth and intensity of the checks can be determined by the background check company and the business. The important thing to know is that you can learn a lot more about who an applicant is through pre-employment screening than through a test/assessment that may not give a true picture of the person you are considering for the job.
     

Aside from my own experience I also want to share the story of another person who has been affected by one of these assessments. I met a homeless man and had a conversation with him. During the course of our conversation, I asked whether he had applied to a store nearby where I knew they were hiring and have a need for hard working, freight team members. The gentleman said he had applied and even had an interview but had failed the company’s assessment so they couldn’t hire him. I was furious. Not only was this man not out panhandling or asking for handouts, he was trying to apply for work and was turned down because of one of these STUPID assessments. And while he may have been telling me a story I don’t believe he was because I have failed one and I have a college degree and over 34 years of work experience. 
     

I do not know this guy any more than I know the men who traveled to the moon. What I do know is had the business he applied to relied on a background check company to run a pre-employment screening in lieu of an assessment, he may have had a chance to pass and get a job. It is possible this business lost an opportunity to hire one fantastic worker. I know there are those who will be naysayers and insist that hiring assessments are unbiased and give the best evaluation of a candidate’s personality. Hold that thought. According to an article on the website “workable” titled, “Pre-employment Testing: pros and cons” by Nikolleta Bika, October 11, 2016, she lists the positives of pre-employment testing but she also lists the negatives of testing including: testing can be discriminatory, they invite lies and tests assume unique people are made through molds. https://resources.workable.com/tutorial/pre-employment-testing What I am trying to point out is testing is not necessarily going to give you the best candidates and you may cheat yourself out of a great employee. Use pre-employment screening and your interview process to get the best candidates for your team.

Get more information on pre-employment screening, contact us or call 1.770.426.0547 today.

Pre-employment Screening Or Hiring Assessments; Is One A Better Tool Than The Other For Staffing Your Business? Part 1

I have a question for you store owners, (I am addressing you but I really hope that some of those in positions of authority to make decisions regarding hiring  in larger companies will read this article too). How many of you utilize those hiring assessments when you are having prospective employees complete your applications? You know the ones I’m talking about they ask a prospective employee five different times what they would do if they saw a manager stealing. The catch is that the question is worded differently each time and some of those times it is asked in a confusing manner that requires the applicant to be very careful when reading the question. I know the intent behind the surveys. The idea is to see if the applicant is being consistent and too many inconsistencies results in a failing score. When managers see the score they automatically disregard that applicant. The other problem with the assessments is that many are measuring the strength of an applicant’s responses. Too many “mediocre” responses and scores are lowered. How do I know this? First, as a Loss Prevention Manager and Logistics Manager for nearly 14 years for a major retailer I have been involved with the hiring process, I know how these things read. I have also been on the applicant’s end of one of these. I will go into that a little later. Before I do that I want to let store managers and human resource managers know that there is a more effective method of hiring great people without losing good ones due to what I consider a flawed and quite frankly, flawed evaluation process. Pre-employment Screening is a much more effective method of evaluating a potential candidate.
     

Pre-employment screening is the process of having a prospective employee’s history verified. The easiest way to get this done is to hire a background check company to do the legwork for you. These companies specialize in contacting references on an applicant’s application. They can validate a person’s work history along with other personal information that might include a criminal background check, a driving history, and past residences where they say they have lived. What does it matter if a person lists the wrong place where they once lived on their application? It could be that your applicant has been moving to avoid something. It might be they are trying to skip around to avoid credit collectors or worse, law enforcement officials. The professionals that work for background check companies know where to find information someone may be trying to hide and they know why that information is important. 
     

So, why am I so vehemently opposed to hiring assessments? Am I against trying to minimize the chances of hiring a bad apple? Not at all, I just know that they can and do take strong candidates out of your hiring pool. I also know that if someone is clever they will answer what will get them through that assessment, whether they are a good applicant or not. When I was between jobs a number of years ago I applied for a department manager job for a retailer and took the assessment. Mind you I had experience as a military Non-Commissioned Officer (NCO), a Bachelor of Arts degree, about 18 years of retail experience and 14 of that in management. I failed to meet the company’s minimum score for a department manager. The store manager could not allow me to retake the test for 6 months but I could take the sales associate assessment. I knew then what the test was looking for and scored a 100%. The manager said he had never seen that score before. I was hired for the associate position. I took that knowledge and when my children were applying for jobs I told them how to answer questions. All three were able to get jobs the first time around. No, don’t worry, I won’t give away any tips but I want you to understand a Pre-employment screening is a much more reliable tool than that silly assessment.
     

In Part 2, I will explain further why I dislike assessments so much. I will also explain more on why I believe a Background Check Company is a much better alternative to ensure you are hiring a great team of employees.

Pre-employment screening is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk. 
     

Be A Trainer And A Mentor To A Young Worker But Use Pre-Employment Screening To Aid In Sound Hiring Decisions

There can be challenges in hiring young people to work for you and some employers are reluctant to even try. They may say that they have no experience or that the young people aren’t mature enough to handle the responsibilities that come with the job, especially in retail. What are some of those challenges? Younger employees may be more prone to use their smart phones while working. They may tend to call out frequently especially when their friends are going to go out somewhere like a Friday night football game or a dance, etc. They may not dress appropriately for an interview. Maybe they don’t conduct themselves well in an interview. What if they decide to steal while working for you or give merchandise to their friends? All of these could be legitimate concerns but I would argue that they could be concerns you can have with older workers too. Rather than avoiding hiring young people, it would be a better option to conduct pre-employment screening to help hire the best candidates.
     

Pre-employment screening is conducted by a background check company specializing in validating a prospective employee’s application and resume. They may also look at a person’s personal history that is open, public information. For example, a criminal history report can be reviewed or a driving record can be researched. Some credit history information is accessible to certain companies and individuals. Much of this information is useful for determining the compatibility of a candidate for a business. In what way? Well, if an applicant has a checkered credit history it might not be a good idea to hire them for a cashiering position. Someone with too many traffic tickets may be a poor fit for a position that requires someone to drive a company vehicle. A nursing home center may want to do a more in-depth search on sex offender registries to ensure the safety of patients in their care. Hiring someone for a position and then learning about their past due to a safety or security issue puts a business owner at risk for a lawsuit.
     

Can a background check company make a difference when it comes to hiring young people with little or no work experience? It can still be useful to run a pre-employment screening for these applicants even with the lack of work history. You may still find out about driving history or in some situations a serious criminal history. A juvenile’s criminal record may not be able to be researched due to protections for minors but serious crimes could show up if they are treated as adults. A reputable background check company knows what information they may legally obtain and takes precautions to avoid breaking laws that could violate an individual’s rights. 
     

All of that said I believe that everyone needs an opportunity to get experience and it is in that first job that a store owner or manager can make a huge impact on a young worker. You may not have thought about it but you can be a mentor to someone in their first job. Yes, it may take a little bit more of your time and some extra effort but you have a chance to teach valuable life lessons to someone in their first job. Consider that you can teach that young person that every job serves a purpose and to take pride in it. Whether it is mopping a floor or emptying trash cans the tasks need to be done. Failing to do so and not doing it properly makes the store look bad and customers won’t want to shop there. Even as a Loss Prevention Manager, when I saw our store outside trash can overflow I would empty them rather than let that be the first impression our customers would see. You can teach them how to provide great service to all customers, the nice ones as well as the rude ones. All of these lessons can be carried with them throughout their lives to make them productive workers and good citizens.
     

Take a chance on hiring a young person (in addition to experienced workers) and be a powerful influence in someone’s life. Use pre-employment screening to help protect your interests in the process of giving a helping hand to a new worker.

For more information about pre-employment screening contact us or call 1.770.426.0547
     

Don’t Be Fooled By Applicants Who Aren’t Who They Say They Are; Pre-employment Screening Keeps Things Real

I LOVE listening to my favorite oldies while I’m writing. Who doesn’t love the Ventures, The Beach Boys or The Beatles? How about Chuck Berry? Don’t forget Elvis Presley, Clarence “Frogman” Henry or Doo Wop with Gene Chandler and “The Duke Earl”? It becomes a little discouraging when, as I browse through online sites like YouTube, to watch some of the videos of these groups that I see commenters arguing about who stole who’s notes or lyrics. For example I was listening to “Surfin’ U.S.A.” by the Beach Boys and then the nasty little comments by a few of the Chuck Berry fans pointed to the Beach Boys lyrics being played to a Chuck Berry tune. Okay, they have a point, but it turns out to be only part of the truth. The WHOLE story is that the song was done as a tribute to Mr. Berry’s song “Sweet Little Sixteen” but according to the website Songfacts, the Beach Boys failed to get his permission first and Mr. Berry did threaten to sue the group but they wound up paying him royalties. How about other music controversies? Elvis Presley did not first sing “Hound Dog”, that actually was first sung by blues singer Willie Mae “Big Mamma” Thornton in 1952. Presley recorded his rock and roll version in 1956. For some readers who may not be quite as old as me, or enjoy the oldies, a somewhat more recent controversy took place when 80’s rapper “Vanilla Ice” “…sampled the base line to the 1981 Queen/Bowie collaboration “Under Pressure” (Rolling Stone, “Songs On Trial: 10 Landmark Music Copyright Cases”, by Jordon Runtagh, June 8, 2016). Now before you go ballistic wondering what in the world ANY of this has to do with Retail Loss Prevention hear me out. If you didn’t know any different and you took them at face value, you would assume the artists who recorded the music were the originals unless their album cover (or CD cover) stated otherwise. The same applies to job applicants. Unless you conduct a pre-employment screening you assume what the applicant says about themselves is true. How do you learn fact from fiction and avoid a problem down the road?
     

Pre-employment screening is a process in which a background check company receives the personal information on a job applicant and the information is verified. For example, if a social security number is provided the company can ensure the applicant is the person to whom the number actually belongs. The background check company can look at credit histories for applicants to determine if they might pose some risk of financial fraud to your business. And how about a person’s work history? You are looking for someone with a specific skill set and an applicant says they have work experience that qualifies them for the job you need to fill. Are they who they say they are or are they taking someone else’s work history and passing it off as their own? See? Much like my music analogy, “You don’t always get what you want” (to steal a line from a Rolling Stones song) unless you get a company to validate a candidate’s credentials.
     

I would also like to point out that there are ramifications when a band or artist is found guilty of using music or lyrics that “belong” to someone else. According to fuse.tv Johnny Cash used the lyrics from “Crescent City Blues” by Gordon Jenkins for his hit song “Folsom Prison Blues” and had to pay the composer $75,000 for the lyrics and the tune (this was disappointing to me since I have been a big Cash fan since I was a young boy). From the NME music website, George Harrison was found guilty of “subconscious plagiarism” with his song “My Sweet Lord” copying the music of The Chiffons hit “He’s So Fine”.  According to the article, while the term means he unintentionally plagiarized he, “Still had to pay 1.6 m in damages, though.” What costs might you incur if you don’t take care to look at a candidate’s history? You may end of firing him or her and going through the hiring process again. You could end up with someone stealing from you. It is possible you could hire someone who has a criminal history that is not compatible with your business. There are a number of bad things that could result from not conducting pre-employment screening. Sing a happy tune when you use a background check company to hire people who are who they say they are.

Pre-employment screening is important and we can help you with it. Call 1.770.426.0547 and let’s talk.