Human resource and recruiting leaders have experienced unprecedented change in recent years. An array of workplace trends and innovations have combined to reshape how HR delivers value to its business line partners, how recruiters use next-generation technology to perform their jobs, and how the HR function is perceived in the C-suite.

In this new year, many of these trends will accelerate, and new ones will also emerge. Here’s what to expect in the human resources field as we turn the calendar to the new year.

Candidate as King: The First Step in Employee Engagement

The importance of creating a positive candidate experience will grow in 2020, reflecting the ongoing job seekers’ market in light of currently low unemployment rates. Top candidates may quickly reject recruiting experiences that are too cumbersome, don’t keep the communication open by keeping them in the loop, or fail to integrate modern technology for better user experiences during the hiring process. Candidates will prefer processes that are friendly, intuitive and friction-free.

One study found that 72% of applicants with a poor candidate experience will share that experience on sites like Glassdoor, on social media, or with family and friends. Another recent study from PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) found that nearly half (49%) of job seekers targeting in-demand fields say they’ve turned down an offer because of a bad experience during the hiring process.

The need for a candidate experience that mirrors the convenience, efficiency and speed of the best online consumer transactions should extend to the background screening process. Inaccurate screening reports, unwieldy information-gathering processes, or delays caused by use of outdated technology can cause candidates who’ve already accepted a job offer to reconsider their commitment.

Employers should be giving candidates the flexibility to enter needed information from any device, providing text notifications and reminders to help them complete tasks, and offering time-saving features like document uploads and e-signature. In 2020, these should constitute table stakes that employers must expect from good background screening service providers in 2020.

Technology Innovations Will Continue to Transform Recruiting

Recruiters have been among the biggest beneficiaries of new technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning. These tools assist recruiters in investing long hours in screening thousands of resumes, answering applicants’ frequently-asked questions, and the juggling act of scheduling candidate interviews.

That trend will likely continue in 2020 as technology innovations help bring new efficiencies and improved hiring outcomes to recruiters. According to a research by the Talent Board, top recruiting technologies companies  are projected to invest in video-based job descriptions and virtual assistants to help source from existing candidate databases. The study also indicates that text-based recruiting and reference checking technologies will be high on the list of technology investments.

Next-generation, mobile-first technology can make background checks faster as well as more accurate and comprehensive. For example, the most common background check on candidates – county courthouse records – can now be done in one business day in some cases.

The best systems allow recruiting teams to set up an account and submit their first background check order within minutes, an efficient feature of recruiting in-demand talent – where time is the essence.

Onboarding Assumes New Strategic Importance

Organizations that don’t take new-hire onboarding seriously can pay a steep price. A negative onboarding experience can cause new hires to leave a company. For example, the average US employer spends $4,000 and 24 days to hire a new worker, according to a Glassdoor study. That same study also found companies with a strong onboarding process improve new hire retention by 82% and productivity by over 70%.

With labor pools shrinking and top talent hard to find, retaining good employees will continue to be a front-burner issue not only for HR and hiring managers but also for the C-suite.

Background checks should be viewed as a critical first step in the onboarding process. If the screening process is too cumbersome, lengthy, or is not mobile-friendly (where it doesn’t allow candidates to use their phones to submit needed information or provide consent during the process), it can set a negative tone early for your newly-hired employees or candidates. An intuitive, frictionless, and fast screening process sends a message to new hires that their new employer “walks the talk” about creating great employee experiences.

The Employee Experience Will Remain Front and Center

In his keynote speech at the 2019 HR Technology Conference and Exposition in Las Vegas, industry analyst and thought leader Josh Bersin said that human resource leaders should think of their technology systems not only as HR tools but as “action platforms” designed to streamline workflows and create more actionable insights for business unit leaders.

Bersin said providers across HR technology categories are increasingly focused on building platforms that improve the user experience for both employees and job candidates, not just back-office HR users. These vendors are designing more of their HR applications to be accessed within the flow of managers’ daily work and to integrate with mainstream work platforms.

Employee experience has become a new engagement mantra. In 2020 HR leaders will remain laser-focused on creating processes and implementing technologies that make employees’ lives easier. The key will be to make interactions with HR more memorable across the talent lifecycle, from onboarding to performance management, from learning to development.

As the trusted screening partner of 70% of the largest staffing firms in the world, Sterling understands the intense competition for talent, complex program requirements, and increased pressure our customers face. Learn more about Sterling’s screening solutions for the evolving workforce, visit www.sterlingrisq.com today.

This post first appeared on The Staffing Stream on January 6^th, 2020.

This publication is for informational purposes only and nothing contained in it should be construed as legal advice. We expressly disclaim any warranty or responsibility for damages arising out this information. We encourage you to consult with legal counsel regarding your specific needs. We do not undertake any duty to update previously posted materials.

It’s not uncommon for outsourcing to be confused with offshoring, but the reality is, there are significant differences between them. But how do they vary, you might ask?  Well, Outsourcing refers to the movement of an internal operation to an external organisation, whether this be within the same country or overseas. Whereas offshoring involves the process and the geographical activity of relocating a business function to a different country, this can be external or internal to the organisation in question.

While outsourcing may incorporate aspects of offshoring, there are multiple benefits that can be leveraged to the advantage of your organisation, including:

Managed Growth: Often, a key consideration for businesses when choosing to offshore is that they can usually benefit from cheaper economies, allowing costs to be controlled whilst the business scales.

Non-Core Competencies: Your organisation has the ability to secure competencies or skills you may not have in-house, which allows focus on what you do best.

Shared Ownership: Technology and organisational infrastructure can prove to be a costly investment, as part of your service you may have the ability to share this and ultimately, outsource the associated costs.

Understand the Organisational Drivers and Business Context
Your organisational drivers may give you insight to answer the important question of whether to insource or outsource. There may be no wrong or right answer to this, but this is very much driven by the organisational needs at the time and may depend on the business unit in question and future direction of the organisation. For example, perhaps your main driver is risk management, where outsourcing may provide your organisation with better oversight. The new provider may even have better technology, more up-to-date controls and improved regulatory compliance processes that help mitigate risk – in this case outsourcing could be seen as a viable option. However, its important to remember that the decision to outsource shouldn’t be made on one driver alone.

In contrast, how do you decide whether to bring a service back in-house? One factor that could contribute to you bringing back internal customer services in-house, may simply be that your organisation knows your customers better than any external organisation could hope to.

Whilst, drivers are key it’s also vital to consider the business context and the strategy of the organisation itself. Perhaps an organisation is acquiring and may require HR to be flexible, which may prove to be problematic if the HR function isn’t set up in a way that would enable this. Additionally, if you have a cost-based driver you may want to consider the economic uncertainty surrounding aspects such as Brexit. Outsourcing shouldn’t just represent a one-way opportunity, but rather a process that is continually reviewed.

Question Your Current HR Delivery Model
Once you understand the drivers, and the context of this within your business, you should ask the right questions of your current HR delivery model. This will help form a more complete picture of the steps you should take. These include:

• What’s currently outsourced or insourced and whether it’s currently working well?
• What’s core to your business?
• Are you currently investing or planning on investing in certain areas?
• Do you understand the volumes?
• How much does it currently cost to deliver the service?

Sustaining Future Success
Planning forms a critical part in supporting the transition to a partial or fully outsourced model. Having people in-house or even within the supplier’s organisation to oversee the transition can help when it comes to sustaining future success. Not only that, but setting expectations prior to outsourcing rather than allowing a carte blanche approach can help to ensure results are delivered. Your organisation will also want to consider checking KPI’s as frequently as needed, with clear escalation routes in order to resolve issues quickly. But most importantly, don’t be afraid of celebrating the success when things go right, this will boost moral and further improve your relationship with your supplier.

The Case for Outsourcing Background Screening
In our webinar “The Why, When and How of Outsourcing to Improve your Hiring Programme”,  89% of our audience, believed compliance surrounding background checks has become more complex in recent years. Which comes as no surprise, when you consider the growing complexity of the landscape. Our trends report, corrobates these finding, as 31% of respondents reveal that the most common justification for conducting background checks is to improve or meet regulatory compliance. Working with a screening provider such as Sterling that possesses global reach and local knowledge, can help guide an organisation into what’s legally permissible across the globe, but also what’s culturally acceptable. By taking a collaborative approach with the organisation in question, a trusted screening provider can help to recommend the right course of action for improving or establishing a robust screening programme. Employers may also leverage the compliance and industry expertise of the supplier, who should have deep-market knowledge and work to the standard of the sector.

For detailed insights of whether to outsource or bring your services back in-house, catch-up with our webinar on-demand, where HR expert, Ian Williams and Sterling EMEA MD, Steve Smith reveal all.

This publication is for informational purposes only and nothing contained in it should be construed as legal advice. We expressly disclaim any warranty or responsibility for damages arising out this information. We encourage you to consult with legal counsel regarding your specific needs. We do not undertake any duty to update previously posted materials.

This article first appear on: Sterlingcheck.co.uk

Most companies do an excellent job of screening their candidates to mitigate risks, but they are strapping themselves up for surprises when they lack the frequent rescreening of their employees. As robust as a background check can be, it is only valid at that point in time, before the hire. A 2018 survey shared with SHRM by Sterling shows that only 4 percent of 6,500 HR professionals said that their organizations perform continuous, rolling background checks on their employees

Neglecting the follow-up background checks may cost some companies in the case of accidents, harassment, or other unethical work behaviors, especially those in high-risk industries.

What does rescreening mean?

Similar to screening, it is the process of performing background checks on employees after a period of employment, be it five months or five years. Rescreening processes are typically less broad than the first screening, with certain parameters you can exclude – such as education, previous employment history, and personal identification. Rescreening should alert companies on threats based on circumstances changes and dynamic risks leading to possible embezzlement, fraud, and theft to violent behaviour.

Reasons for rescreening current employees

Keeping up with your employees’ lives

People change over time, and rescreening helps to justify your investment in the employees. As the face of your company, your employees have access to your key corporate information and need to interact with clients, vendors, and the public. Employers are not able to predict the future of their employees from the point of hire, and it is unfair to assume patterns of employees’ current behaviors based on their background checks ages ago. It is crucial to rescreen employees lined up for promotions, transfers, secondment, or a change in their job responsibilities in case of potential liabilities.

Verify initial background checks to reduce mistakes

Some employees managed to slip through the cracks bypassing the initial screening process or get away with their provision of false information. Irrespective of whether it is a case of innocent mistakes or intentional frauds, companies can protect themselves with regular rescreening. Negligent hiring is a legal claim made against businesses who do not adequately assess the risk that an employee poses to the workplace.

Changing requirements for background screening

Companies are valuing more in-depth background screening over time, such that the background screens from 5 years ago will be different than the more comprehensive checks today. Employees need to be rescreened to make sure all their credentials are not in conflict with the organization.

Talent acquisition and retention have become a more significant challenge in the hiring landscape today, and that pushes companies to invest in thorough and rigorous background screenings. Pre-hire screens is a crucial risk management technique, but it is not enough. With an average job tenure of 4.2 years in the U.S., companies need to mitigate risks during employment with constant rescreening.

How to run a rescreening program

A well-defined rescreening program keeps security standards high and helps to identify internal threats. Commonly, rescreening programs run annually, and when employees move into high-risk roles with greater responsibilities. Sterling RISQ is an industry leader in employment background checks and performs rescreening programs suited with your candidates in mind. Contact us to learn more about how Sterling RISQ can help uncover risk through rescreening based on our unique client case management model enabled by state-of-the-art technology.

Sources:

https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/talent-acquisition/pages/shrm-trend-continuous-background-screening.aspx

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/tenure.nr0.htm

This publication is for informational purposes only and nothing contained in it should be construed as legal advice. We expressly disclaim any warranty or responsibility for damages arising out this information. We encourage you to consult with legal counsel regarding your specific needs. We do not undertake any duty to update previously posted materials.

Employers understand the importance of conducting due diligence on their candidates by completing background checks. But it is just as important to monitor and re-screen employees after hire. Employees represent your company and brand to clients, prospects and the public at large, while also handling important internal resources. Trusting that employees are honorable and honest is at the heart of this relationship and background screening helps achieve peace of mind. A bad hire who is still employed at a company can lead to loss of productivity, workplace safety issues and co-worker dissatisfaction. This, in turn, affects a company’s bottom line since the average cost of replacing an employee is between 16% and 20% of the annual salary.

What is Workforce Monitoring and Re-Screening?

Re-screening is the process of performing background checks on current employees at periodic intervals, while monitoring is proactive, ongoing checks for potential issues.  There is a misconception that background screening is a one-and-done process for businesses. A current employee can engage in illegal behavior, impacting both the individual involved and the company brand.

The Sterling Background Screening Trends & Best Practices Report 2017-2018 found that 89% of companies conduct employment background checks with eight out of ten respondents saying that background checks uncover issues/information that wouldn’t have been found otherwise. A publication from Professional Background Screening Professionals Association, “How Human Resource Professionals View the Use and Effectiveness of Background Screening Methods” supports our insights and goes further into the reasons why companies conduct background screening. The report found the following:

• 86% of employers cite public safety as the top reason to conduct background checks
• 52% perform background checks to improve the quality of hires
• 39% due to law/regulation requirements
• 38% to protect the company reputation
• 35% to prevent and/or reduce theft, embezzlement and other criminal activity

Reasons for Monitoring and Re-screening

Businesses invest time and money to ensure they know who they are hiring. Depending on the position, employees can access financial records, organizational property and proprietary business information. Employees represent your company with clients, vendors and the general public. Organizations have performed their due diligence before they hire, but what about ongoing employee screening? Employers who rely on self-reporting policies may encounter problems when it’s too late. In addition to periodic rescreening, below are just four reasons for conducting event driven post-hire background checks:

• Change in employment status: It is important for employers to have a policy to rescreen employees whenever their employment status changes. This could include transfer to another department, change in responsibilities or even from a leave of absence.
• When an employee is being considered for promotion: With a promotion an employee could be taking on additional scope or responsibilities. Rescreening could be an insightful tool if only a partial background check was performed in the past. Additional checks such as employment and education verification will confirm if the employee has met the criteria for the new position.
• As part of an employee investigation: There are always potential risks when an employee’s behavior changes since the time of hire. Negligent retention could make an organization directly liable for retaining an employee when it should have known about an employee’s potentially dangerous behaviors but kept that person employed.
• Employees should be rescreened after a merger or acquisition: Companies need to be aware of the risks that could exist in in its newly acquired staff, since background screening policies vary per industry and company. It is hard to overstate the importance of knowing about new employees and relevant information about their professional lives.

To protect themselves from potential compliance issues, companies should apply a consistent employment background screening program throughout the employee population.  The most popular background checks to be repeated are criminal record checks and drug and health screening.

Importance of Workforce Monitoring and Re-Screening for the Financial Services Industry

Workforce monitoring and re-screening is crucial for many industries, including financial services. Even exemplary employees, with no issues in the past, can encounter traumatic life events that dramatically impact work performance or lead to criminal activity.

Regularly screening employees (pre and post-hire) can mitigate the risk of exposing a financial institution’s funds or customer information to fraud or theft, limiting exposure to loss, lawsuits and negative publicity. From a regulatory perspective, having rigorous due diligence practices in place will satisfy exam teams and may result in a quicker exam process with fewer findings. Some organizations rely on post-hire employee self-reporting, but this could leave gaps in accuracy and completeness of the information a company receive.

Continuous monitoring is a more proactive approach that allows financial services organizations to quickly identify criminal or financial issues faster than periodic re-screening. In addition to background monitoring, financial service businesses should continually review information from various sources to obtain the most detailed profile of the employee including outside business activity certifications, credit reports, criminal background checks and arrest records, lien and judgment data and information from educational institutions.

Within Financial Services, FINRA registered representatives have additional requirements to be concerned about. In addition to the initial disclosures that need to be included on the rep’s Form U4, any new disclosures need to be reported to FINRA within 30 days. Ongoing monitoring and regular re-screening can mitigate the risk that a rep fails to self-disclose in a timely manner.

Partner with a Third-Party Screening Provider

Having adequate pre-employment screening procedures for employees, while a good start, is not enough to avoid potential risks for an organization or its clients. Sterling RISQ helps the world’s top banks, brokerage houses, private equity firms, insurance companies and other financial services firms efficiently and effectively monitor and re-screen employees. Find out more information about the importance of continuous monitoring and re-screening by contacting us today