Background checks on chaperones?
I confess that when I read the headline, “Livonia schools runs criminal checks on chaperones,” I found myself thinking that some people might be going overboard. But the article reminded me of an important thing about background checks and how you use them. You use them as part of a process of judgment.
You decide whose background should get checked. The Livonia schools thought it was a good idea to check on chaperones because they’re in positions of trust with young people they could easily take advantage of.
Who should you be checking out? Who will be in a trusted position they could abuse? Who has access to money, people, or information and could use that access to do something bad?
You decide what kind of check is called for. A criminal background check and a close look at the sex offender registry was what Livonia decided.
For most hires and people with access to money or sensitive data, I suggest both a national criminal background check and a pre-employment credit check. When you make decisions on this, think about what people actually do and what they actually have access to.
You decide what information is important. If you’re hiring an accounting clerk you will certainly want to look at credit history carefully. If you’re hiring a truck driver, the driving record is important. Everybody should have their background checked for criminal activity.
And, this is important, you decide what to do with what you find. If you hit something that might cause you […]
How times have changed
The Arizona Daily Star ran a story with the headline “Tucson police hope PDA’s make background checks quicker.” Here’s the lead.
Tucson police have turned to palm-sized technology to help its officers and those at other law enforcement agencies conduct background checks and keep track of crime trends. A grant from the Department of Homeland Security has enabled the department to acquire more than 200 PDAs, which they have decided to distribute among their own officers as well as about 20 other agencies across Southern Arizona.
Frankly, it got me thinking about the old days. We never used to use criminal background checks or pre-employment credit checks in hiring. Part of the reason was that we didn’t have to.
Even a couple of decades ago, people didn’t move as often as they do now. So you were hiring people from the area and it was easy to check them out by talking to people who knew them.
Employers would talk to you back then. I can remember a time when people didn’t sue you for giving out damaging, but true information. But in the last couple of decades, employers have gotten suit-shy. They’ll verify dates of employment, but not much else.
In today’s world we need a way to check on people when there isn’t anybody who knows the applicant that we can chat with. The old ways won’t work anymore. But technology has come to the rescue.
Another reason we didn’t check for a criminal record on an applicant and why we didn’t check […]
No background check is perfect
According to a headline in the Waco Tribune, “Bus driver charged with assault aced background check”. In the story, the claim is even stronger. “Hillsboro schools Superintendent Jerry Maze said the 64-year-old school bus driver accused of propositioning a 14-year-old student for sex passed the school’s ‘very comprehensive’ background checks.'”
There are people out there who will trot out stories like this one to prove that background checks are a waste of time and money because they don’t actually catch any bad guys. Those people are wrong.
The first thing to agree on is what everyone means by “background check.” The schools Superintendent refers to “very comprehensive background checks” but doesn’t describe them.
If you’re hiring, a background check ought to include verification of credentials, reference checks, a pre-employment credit check and a national criminal background check.
Let applicants know up front that you do these checks and you’ll find that some choose to go no farther. That’s usually because they know that a background check will reveal things they’d rather you didn’t know. Just having background checks as part of your process has a deterrent effect.
It’s important to do a national criminal background check, too. People move a lot these days. A check of local records won’t tell you about a criminal past that occurred in another state.
Even so, people will slip through the cracks. A criminal background check only shows convictions. It won’t tell you about times a person was charged with a crime but not convicted. And no background check […]
Balking at background checks
The Dallas Morning News reports that completing required background checks on non-educational school workers is turning into a real nightmare. The title of the article is “Costly fingerprinting required for Texas public school workers.” Here’s an excerpt.
Red tape and resistance have tripped up the state’s first crack at collecting fingerprints for an estimated 1 million people who work in Texas public schools. School districts across Texas have reported paperwork delays in hiring new janitors, bus drivers and other non-educational employees who must provide fingerprints to the state before they can start work this month. Most of the troubles are rooted in bureaucracy, but some bubbled up out of protest.
You probably will never fingerprint people, but you’re bound to run into resistance to background checks. Most of that comes from people who feel that they’re being treated like a criminal or that they’re not trusted.
That’s a legitimate feeling, but it doesn’t mean you can let those folks have their way. You’re doing background checks for two reasons. You want to keep your business safe from fraud and theft. And you want to keep the people in your business safe from violence.
Make that case. If you’ve got an applicant that balks, use a technique that counselors often use with their clients. It’s called “Feel-Felt-Found.” If an applicant tells you they feel like you don’t trust them because you’re running a background check, you can respond in something like the following way.
“I understand why you might feel that way. I know […]
Learning from the banks
Bank Info Security just ran a great article titled: 6 Steps for Better Background Checks. You need to register to see the article which shows this arresting subtitle: “Stopping the Insider Threat Starts With Screening Your Job Applicants.”
As the article notes, more and more organizations are doing background checks for internal security and to protect themselves against negligent hiring lawsuits. While the article is written for banks, it includes some tips that are good advice for any business. Let me pick out a few.
Managing editor Linda McGlasson suggests that you start with verifying the resume. You can use a pre-employment credit check for some of that work and handle the rest with a couple of phone calls.
She also suggests that you include a statement on your application where candidates can attest to the fact that the information on the application and resume are true. I agree with that. Just having to swear to the fact that they’re not lying keeps some people honest.
Another suggestion is to have the candidate agree that it’s OK to speak to anyone at their previous job, not just their boss or the HR department. I agree with that, too. Official sources might not tell you much these days, but co-workers will and getting explicit permission to talk to them is a good idea.
Finally there’s the suggestion to have candidates sign a release to the effect that “I waive my rights to sue a previous employer and allow them to give information about my job […]
Do background checks on prospective tenants for the good of the community
In Pikeville, KY, a community group is “urging property owners within Pikeville city limits to help build a safer community by doing background checks on potential renters“. Makes sense to me.
What’s unique about this story is that this is not a law enforcement agency or landlord’s association that’s urging the background checks. It’s a community group. They think that having landlords do background checks on prospective tenants is good for the community.
They’re right. You may have heard of the “Broken Windows” theory first named in an article by James Wilson and George Kelling. The theory says that neighborhoods don’t go bad all at once.
First there are some broken windows that don’t get fixed. Then trash starts getting thrown on the sidewalk instead of put into trashcans. The downward spiral starts with small things.
And those small things often start with tenants who are criminals. They don’t just trash your place and jack up your maintenance and repair costs. They bring in their friends who aren’t exactly model citizens, either.
One cop once put it this way to me, “Look,” he said, “Criminals have this whole lifestyle that says they can do what they want regardless of how it affects other people. Do you really think that some guy who’ll steal your wallet or break into your house will pause to throw trash into the proper container? Not likely. He’ll throw it on the ground.”
Here’s the bottom line. Doing the kind of background criminal and credit checks that are good for your […]