Analyzing ROI on Your Background Screening Program

Some organizations conduct pre-employment background checks as a contractual or regulatory obligation. Other corporations judge pre-employment screening as a collateral expense. Executive leadership may acknowledge their legal responsibility to mitigate risk, but they’re quick to point out it represents a significant investment in time and money.

Any company can quickly start to question if background screening is really worth it. How much actual dollar value does a background screening program deliver?

• The typical organization loses 5% of revenue each year to fraud. It takes time and effort to recover the money stolen by perpetrators, and many organizations are never able to fully do so. 58% of victim organizations never recover any of their losses due to fraud, and only 14% make a full recovery.¹
• The cost of replacing an experienced worker who doesn’t work out can cost 50% or more of that individual’s salary, and these costs go up if the employee has specialized skills.²
• Employers lose 72% of negligent hiring cases, with an average settlement of $1.6 million.3

Traditionally, the Human Resources department has been primarily administrative, and HR experts have worked as employee advocates. HR’s role in today’s corporate supply chain has shifted significantly, moving away from providing services and support on a reactive basis, toward offering intrinsic value as a strategic business partner. Executive leaders have opened their eyes and minds to the importance HR plays in driving productivity and improving business performance.

From the Blooper Book

Let’s take a break from the action and look at some job applications where, through good intentions or bad grammar, some candidates just missed the mark:

Tell us how you really feel:

Have you been convicted of a crime in the past seven years, other than minor traffic violations? (Checked no) “I’ve never heard such a stupid question.”

In that case, we’ll just forget this ever happened:

Have you been convicted of a crime in the past seven years, other than minor traffic violations? (Checked no) “I told the employer they don’t need to do a background check on me.”

Better than looking at the floor, I suppose:

New Jersey "Opportunity to Compete Act" (Ban the Box)

New Jersey becomes the 6th state to "ban the box" for private/publicly traded employers, joining  Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Baltimore, MD, Buffalo, NY, Rochester, NY, San Francisco, CA, Seattle, WA.  Other cities/states have passed similar laws that that impact state and/or city employees.

The law was signed by New Jersey Governor, Chris Christie, on August 11, 2014 and becomes effective on March 1, 2015.  The law applies to all private and publicly traded employers and/or employment agencies in the state of New Jersey with 15 or more employees.

Illinois has proposed two bills if passed could significantly decrease Workers Compensation claims and costs

New Policies Regarding Employees Discharged for Cause

Under the proposed bill SB2625, employers would no longer be required to pay temporary partial disability to employees who have been terminated for cause. Employees who feel they have been unfairly fired and denied benefits would be able to request a hearing with the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Commission. If the termination is found not to be the employee’s fault, all benefits would be restored and retroactively paid from the time the employee became disabled.  With this new proposed bill this is a good time for employers to review their workers compensation investigation policies or procedures or establish a good workers compensation investigation process.  A good investigation will help the employer determine fault as well as require post-accident drug testing and other evaluators to assure determine if the employee is at fault and/or violated a company policy.

Social Media Policies

With the ever increasing usage of Social Media it is important for employers to establish policies to avoid litigation.  The National Labor Relations Board has found social media policies unlawful for some employers finding that they interfere with employees’ rights to act collectively.  Some of the violations the Board has found in policies are as follows:

• prohibit posts that are inaccurate or misleading or that contain offensive, demeaning or inappropriate remarks;
• prohibit posts discussing non-public information, confidential information, and legal matters;
• threaten employees with discipline or criminal prosecution for failing to report violations of an unlawful social media policy;

Career Builder Conducts National Survey on Resumes – Are They True or Fabricated?

¹According to the survey conducted by Harris Poll on behalf of Career Builder the following information was gleaned:

• Fifty-eight percent of hiring managers said they’ve caught a lie on a resume;
• One-third (33 percent) of these employers have seen an increase in resume embellishments post-recession.
• Half of employers (51 percent) said that they would automatically dismiss a candidate if they caught a lie on his/her resume,
• Forty percent said that it would depend on what the candidate lied about
• Seven percent said they’d be willing to overlook a lie if they liked the candidate.

The nationwide survey, which was conducted online by Harris Poll on behalf of CareerBuilder from May 13 to June 6, 2014, included a representative sample of 2,188 hiring managers and human resource professionals across industries and company sizes.

Workplace Drug Testing in Australia

¹Workplace drug testing gets a fair amount of media coverage, but there is a potentially far larger issue that employers need to be aware of – alcohol.

A survey conducted by the Australian Drug Foundation found that nearly one in five employees had performed work duties while drunk or tipsy.

A similar number admitted to pulling a sickie due to the effects of alcohol, while about 40% said they’d gone to work while still feeling the effects of their drinking.

According to the foundation, alcohol and other drugs cost Australian businesses $6 billion per year in lost productivity and absenteeism, with alcohol use contributing to five per cent of workplace deaths and 11 per cent of accidents.

Best Practices:

• Employers should have a robust drug and alcohol policy
• Establish a zero tolerance policy
• Conduct pre-employment, random and post-accident testing
• Train Managers on how to identify that someone is intoxicated.

²For employers who perform work on government construction sites, New guidelines were released by Industrial Relations Minister Robert Clark that require companies tendering for taxpayer-funded building projects worth more than $10 million to do a minimum number of drug and alcohol tests on employees.

¹HC Online: “One in five workers drunk on the job”

²HC Online: “Workplace Drug Testing: What you need to know”