Recruiting new employees to your company is necessary as you’d need to find a person who fits your organization’s culture and could positively impact your business. When recruiting, organizations would want to get the most qualified candidates with the correct skill sets, and they should suit the role they’re applying for.
If you run a business, pre-employment screening can help you get the right talent from a pool of applicants. Some screening techniques, such as SSN validation API, can help track earnings and experience by checking on the validity of applicants’ social security numbers.
However, screening won’t always give you the perfect results. And there are some things you need to do and avoid to make it successful.
Do’s Of Pre-Employment Screening
There are important things you should concentrate on when doing a pre-employment screening. Some of these include the following.
Do Background Checks
Before employing someone, you need to check their background for criminal cases, fraud, or drug abuse. You can also use address validation API to check the identity of the applicants for the job. This would help you get the social security numbers and mobile and telephone numbers and see how valid they are. If there are applicants who are submitting false information, it’d be best to avoid them.
Obtain The Consent Of Applicants
Asking for applicants’ consent before conducting a pre-employment screening is a requirement by law. You should make your applicants aware that they’d be subjected to pre-employment screening as part of the recruitment process. If they agree to it, they’d have to sign a written consent, after which you may conduct screening procedures.
Speak To References
Speaking to references could be a crucial step when you’re looking to fill a position in your company on short notice. Most applicants would put people who’d provide positive reviews about them in the reference sections. However, speaking to former colleagues and employees can give you more accurate information regarding who you’re about to hire.
Take A Whole-Rounded View
Applicants may have a negative aspect in their life, but that could all be in the past. Therefore, your screening should focus on the bigger picture rather than on only one aspect in their background. If you look at their criminal record, look at their performance records and drug tests as well so you don’t miss on great talents. You can also do online background checks to get a holistic view of your applicants.
Follow All Laws
There are several other laws than those requiring employers to get applicants’ consent before screening. You should take a look at all those laws and ensure to comply with each of them to protect not only your company but also your applicants.
Apply A Fair Process
Your recruitment process should be fair to all applicants and consistent to avoid cases of discrimination. When screening applicants, implement a uniform criterion for all the candidates applying for the same job. If you promote fair hiring, you increase the chances of attracting top talents to your business.
Don’ts Of Pre-Employment Screening
When screening applicants for any position in your company, there are things you should generally avoid. Here’s a list of the don’ts in pre-employment screening.
Don’t Do The Checking Alone
There’s a chance you may miss important information if you decide to work alone. Sometimes you may get overwhelmed with other responsibilities that you might forget to look at what matters most.
Fortunately, you can get the help of employment screening service firms, which utilize programs you might not have in your company. Working with these professionals would help you save on costs, time, and effort needed to perform pre-employment screening.
Don’t Outsource Abroad
Some companies would outsource abroad to help with their pre-employment screening processes. While this may be a good choice, you should opt to outsource to a company within your state or country. As the same law guides both of your companies, applicant data would be appropriately handled. If you outsource abroad, you’d have no control over what happens to the data, which can lead to third-party sales and breach of privacy.
Don’t Create A No-Criminal-Record Policy
Some applicants would have a criminal record of only minor offenses. In this case, it may be safe to consider them. If you create a no-criminal-record policy, you might be locking out potential employees who could have a positive impact on your organization. Instead, find a way to look at all their records and assess the contribution they can have to your organization.
Conclusion
Pre-employment screening would help you get the candidate with the best qualification and skills and the most competent talent for your business. It would help you filter the right talents and focus on them to create an ethical culture in your organization. But because laws govern the screening process, you need to be sure you get it right. Check all the things you need to do and those you need to avoid in order to succeed in your recruitment process.
