The NBA is scrambling to deal with a point shaving scandal involving one of its referees. The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) and the Big Ten think they have the answer: background checks for referees. Here’s how an article in the Baltimore Sun describes the ACC position:

For the second season, the ACC is requiring all of its approximately 225 officials for football and men’s and women’s basketball to allow the league to conduct a background check. Every official will be checked once every four years, and roughly 75 checks are conducted each year.

So far the checks have resulted in several referees being questioned about their activities. No referees have been removed from the ACC roster. That’s a good process: using the background checks to determine where to investigate further.

A criminal background check can tell you if a person has a criminal record. A credit report can give you an idea if lifestyle and reported income match up. But they’re only a starting point.

Most of the time you will probably want to do what the ACC does, use the reports as a starting point for questions. You should consider other things as well.

The combination of point-spread betting and the fact that a single player can make a huge difference in the score and outcome of a game make basketball a candidate for point-shaving scandals. One thing basketball leagues, college and pro need to do is look for ways to make this harder and to put systems in place to catch offenders […]

It’s an article of faith that the younger generation, especially the people joining the workforce now and part of what’s called “Generation Y,” are a tech-savvy bunch. That’s surely true overall, but their savvy may not extend to protecting their privacy in important ways.

According to a news release from Adecco, a recruiting and staffing firm, “in a recent Adecco Workplace Insights survey, 66 percent of Generation Y respondents were not aware that seemingly private photos, comments and statements were audited by potential employers.”

This is an interesting finding, since more and more employers are using Google and other online sites to check out prospective employees. We’ve posted on that issue here before (see below).

If you’re an employer, the lesson may be that you still have to use judgment when evaluating an applicant and his/her history. Certainly some things that you find on your criminal records check or pre-employment credit report may be knock-out factors for you. But many times you’ll want to use them as a starting point to find out what happened and what it says about the quality and fit of the applicant you’re considering.

The same is true for what you find during checks using internet sites, only more so. If you’re using information from the net you must make sure that you’re got information on the person you’re considering. You must make sure you’ve got accurate information. And you must make a judgment based on what you find and verify.

If the Adeeco survey is right, many of […]

Pittston, Pennsylvania is located in the northeastern part of the state, between Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. The Wilke-Barre Times Leader reports that Pittston Area School District Superintendent Ross Scarantino and the school board have to defend the hiring of a teacher who, it turns out, was charged with a felony count of burglary in 2004.

The newly hired teacher, Kelli Diaz, was indeed charged with burglary then. But those charges were dismissed by a judge in 2005. She completed college and her student teaching. She obtained a teaching certificate. Then she applied for a job with the Pittston School District.

After interviews and a thorough background check, Ms Diaz was hired. Then an anonymous person sent a letter to the newspaper questioning the hire, based on the 2004 charges.

Both Scarantino and the Board have said that, even knowing about the charges now, they still believe that hiring Diaz was a good decision. The question is: “What could they have done differently?”

To understand what happened we need to remember that under the US Constitution, people are innocent until proven guilty. That means that when the charges were dismissed by the judge, Ms. Diaz slate for background check purposes was wiped clean.

Could the District have asked “Have you ever been arrested?” Probably not. Most employment experts would consider that a prohibited question. For a longer list, check out this article with prohibited employment screening questions by Diane Stafford from the Kansas City Star.

The School District has a solid hiring case based […]

Last month the Utah Department of Corrections suspended a program where inmates were used for data-entry when it came to light that the inmates may have stolen confidential information. Last year there was a similar incident in Fresno, CA. Several years back, there were stories of inmates in state prisons gaining access to the private information of people who were customers of companies that had outsourced computer work to the prison system.

Now, there’s a story in the Financial Express of India about how Indian firms that handle business process outsourcing are starting to ramp up their background check processes because of “biased information, bad track record and poor quality of work by employees.”

With all of the outsourcing and business partnering going on in today’s increasingly flat world, security, and thus a background check, are getting more and more important. So what does that mean to you?

There’s simply no way you can check out everyone who may have access to your personal information. There’s no way you can make sure that every company you deal with is responsible about handling confidential information. But, you should be aware of the potential problems and do what you can.

If you outsource or share information with business partners about your customers, find out about their security measures. Find out if they do background checks and who they do background checks on. Find out how they handle information. If necessary, get written agreement on security and confidentiality issues.

Be watchful of your […]