Summary:
Employers continue to attract top talent across national boundaries. But they face an increasing risk of reputational harm from negligent hiring of unreliable candidates. There are ways that allow HR to ask about how virtuous a prospect profile is. Rules must be followed. The author presents 4 best practices for employers who seek to effectively conduct checks on candidate’s reliability and past performance.
Your’e hiring internationally. An employee profile seems to be perfect– excellent qualifications, adequate work experience and valuable skills. You can’t wait to hire them and start working. But the feeling of risk prevails– how exactly do you know if the information is not misrepresented? Moreover, how do you verify the character of the candidate?
These concerns are addressed in what the HR calls conducting ‘Background checks and Reference checks’. Simply stated, they are a checklist of candidate qualities which the HR verifies, after taking consent from the candidate, from relevant sources.
For example, background checks investigate the candidate against topics such as criminal record, motor vehicle violation, credit fraud and misrepresentation of education and work history. Reference checks, on the other hand, reach out to candidate’s colleagues, supervisors, and educators to verify the character, employment and performance thereof.
There are ethical concerns in this. To comply with the moral values and the local law, follow the four best practices on conducting candidate checks in your international hiring.
Embrace transparency.
You can’t miss this. Yet there’s a huge chance that you skip communicating all the steps to the candidate.
Many state and federal laws across countries make it mandatory for employers to inform candidates on every detail regarding the investigation. This includes details on which checks would be performed and how they would be performed.
Create a written policy. Write down all the checks required and state the procedure for each. Also mention how each step complies with the local law of the candidate’s territory.
Share the policy document with the candidate and act generously to address any sort of concerns.
Get consent.
You’ve already communicated the written policy. The candidate is satisfied and approves of all the checks that are to be conducted. But there’s an additional requirement.
Ask for candidate consent clearly. Create an application that explicitly outlines the candidate’s approval of investigations. As per the law, when the application is signed, only then can the formal process begin.
Consider experts’ analysis on criminal history.
There are many ways to check the criminal record of a candidate. These are through governmental sources– such as court records, law enforcement agencies, registries and criminal record repositories etc.,
However, it’s not advised that an employer collects and examines criminal records in-house. That’s because research shows criminal records present incomplete and inaccurate information (due to misspellings and clerical mistakes). Hence, when performed by non-experts such analysis leads to false judgment.
A better way is through seeking services from third-party organizations. These are businesses that provide expert services on finding criminal records of candidates. They know which clues lead to wrong analysis and which ones prove conviction on the candidates.
Take feedback on the results.
The law bounds an employer to share negative results with the candidate. In case the employer fails to communicate the report with the candidate, a lawsuit can occur.
The best way is to share the results with the candidate and allow their feedback on the analysis. This leads to suitable explanations and ends misunderstandings in analysis (if any).
Background and reference checks ensure responsible hiring. But the legal requirements and ethical concerns around investigations require the employer to adopt a sound strategy. Taking third-party help and a clear communication and consent policy are fail-proof ways to conduct checks.
