Here are some views by Nigerians.
By https://www.nairaland.com/nicerazor
There are large numbers of applicants who are searching for jobs with questionable characters this leads us to the question ‘How well do you know your employee or prospective hire?
Often, we leave our children, wards, properties, businesses at the mercy of people to take care of them without knowing who they are or if they are really who they say they are. How well do you know your domestic staff like your child’s nanny, house maid, your driver, your security guards, or your new hire in the workplace?
Background investigations and reference checks are employer’s principal means of securing information about potential hires from sources other than the applicants themselves. A background investigation generally involves determining whether an applicant may be unqualified for a position due to a record of criminal conviction, motor vehicle violations, poor credit history, or misrepresentation regarding education or work history. A reference check generally involves contacting applicants’ former employers, supervisors, co-workers, and educators to verify previous employment and to obtain information about the individual’s knowledge, skills, abilities, and character.
REASONS FOR CONDUCTING A BACKGROUND CHECK
A major reason to conduct background and reference checks is to avoid harm or legal liability of various types to the employer or to others. This includes harm to:
- Other employees by sexual harassment or workplace violence.
- The organization’s customers, for example, sexual assault on business premises.
- The public by negligent driving.
- The employer’s business through financial loss or image and reputational issues.
Defense of legal claims, such as negligent hiring, is a compelling reason to conduct in-depth criminal records searches of job applicants. A multilevel jurisdictional criminal records search can be strong evidence that the employer exercised due care in hiring.
MAXIMIZE PRODUCTIVITY
Hire the best and reject the rest, the saying goes. Typically, past performance is a strong indicator of future performance and can reveal an individual’s professionalism, productivity, job skills and interpersonal communication abilities. A reference check helps distinguish between a true highflier and a mere poser.
DATA VERIFICATION
Verifying the information provided by the applicant regarding his or her education and credentials, employer history, tenure, and other data will not only confirm required qualifications but can provide some insight into the applicant’s reliability and motivation. According to a 2018 HireRight report, 85 percent of employers surveyed uncovered a lie or misrepresentation on a candidate’s resume or job application during the screening process—up from 66 percent five years ago.
With the reasons above carrying out a due diligence on your new hires will save your organization a great deal and having that peace of mind in running your business.
This leaves us with a question: As a business owner do you do due diligence when hiring employees?
Comments by https://www.nairaland.com/hofeshhomes
“We have seen cases when people lied about what they do for a living. Some would say, “IT specialist”, ” lawyer” etc. But by the time we give them forms to fill and do due diligence on such persons, we find out they lied, some even have pending court cases with their former landlords in court because they lived for some years and refused to pay.
Someone even unemployed, as evidenced when a landlord rented a house to a young man who lied he was a Music business boss. The young man was always in the compound, and even owed the next rent.
In Nigeria now that insecurity is worrying, doing background checks on tenants, especially, is good because you can rent your house to a person that is into criminal activities and when the person is arrested, sometimes, the landlords are arrested with them.”
#duediligence
#trustbutverify
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