Employment Application and Background Check Critique

Employment Application and Background Check Critique

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Abstract

In the current dynamic corporate world, understanding the nature of employees is requisite for enhancing organizational as well as public safety and security. Legal trends indicate that negligent hiring has cost the organizations a significant percentage of resources that would have otherwise been employed for other purposes. Employment screening is advocated for by various organizations as well as state agencies. In order to yield beneficial results, these need to be comprehensive enough. A critique of the Hillsborough County’s employment application and background check underscore certain inconsistencies in the process. The main strengths of the process pertain to its simplicity and definiteness.

Keywords: background check, employment application, critique

Employment Application and Background Check Critique

Employee information that is provided during the application and background investigation plays an important role in determining whether the respective applicant would be employed or not. The information contained therein is for screening purposes and provides as much details as possible about the applicant. In most cases, the employees undertake the screening to safeguard organizational security and safety. In other words, the cautionary measures are instrumental in underscoring the behavioral history of the applicant. This ensures that the organization knows the entire history of the applicant and understands his or her way of life before employment. In order to ensure optimal results, it is imperatively important for the respective employment application as well as the background check to be comprehensive enough. This enables the organization to have a clear and accurate history of the patient. It is against this background that this paper provides a critique of the employment application and background check of Hillsborough County.

This employment application requires the employee to provide vital information pertaining to whether she or he has committed or been convicted at any time for felony, whether the applicant has worked for the county before, whether the applicant has a legal permission to engage in active employment in the United state, the applicant’s employment history, education, professional license, certification or registration, military experience and relevant referees. Notably, this information is vitally important in understanding the general employment history of the applicant. To a great extent, this acquaints the employer with knowledge about the personality and professional background of the applicant. According to Rosen (2008), this is of paramount importance in determining the competence of the applicant. However, the information is not comprehensive or exhaustive enough and can not therefore be effectively employed in undertaking a background investigation.

In his review, Rosen (2004) indicates that an exhaustive background investigation needs to comprise of information pertaining to credit records, driving records, court records, medical records, drug test records, medical records, bankruptcy information, vehicle registration, social security number, worker’s compensation, property ownership information in addition to the preceding information. The abovementioned information might be provided by the applicant or collected from databases. Considering that the position that is being advertised is public, it is important for the applicant to provide as much information about him or her self as possible. This is because the responsibilities and roles that the applicant might engage in have diverse implications on the holistic wellbeing of the public. The relative information would therefore directly affect the general safety and security of the public. Notably, this goal is in line with the goals and objectives of the public service of America.

The application form provides certain conditions that the applicant needs to put in consideration before making the application. With respect to waivers, the application cites that the applicant risks being disqualified or even dismissed in cases where they have been already employed if the information provided herein is found to be false. This provision requires the employee to provide factual or truthful information. Notably, failure to provide this can have detrimental implications on the employment status of the applicant. In this regard, the applicant does not have any choice but to ensure that all information is factual and can be confirmed by third parties accordingly.

The applicant also authorizes the former employers; persons that they got involved with in various ways and other organizations to provide important information to the county. Seemingly, the above mentioned groups of individuals would not be held responsible in any way for releasing the respective personal information. In this respect, the applicant foregoes his or her privacy. Usually, different employers demand certain personal information that the respective organizations promise to keep confidential. Providing such information to the public usually had diverse impacts on the wellbeing of the individuals and can even undermine their security. Providing permission to release such information to other parties implies that the applicant is ready to forego this benefit. At this point, it can not be disputed that this impacts negatively on the privacy of the applicants. This is further compounded by the fact that such information might accidentally leak to other unauthorized parties.

Also, the applicant would be required to act according to the provided regulations, rules, and policies of their employer. This implies that s/he would be bound by the preceding provisions and would need to align his or her activities and behaviors to those that are provided by their employer. In this regard, the applicant would be required to relinquish his or her freedom for the sake of employment. Their behaviors would be required to be aligned to distinct rules and regulations that are formulated by the organizational management. Certainly, the respective individuals would not be allowed to engage in certain activities or assume certain behaviors whenever they wish to. The inherent restrictions affect their freedom in different ways.

The application form is designed in such a way that it is used when applying for all positions. This implies that individuals at different levels in the organization would be required to fill the form and provide the particular information to the management. This enhances efficiency during recruitment as the use of the relative information would be eased. The process of coding and storing the relative information would also be eased especially considering that the organization is likely to receive innumerable applications. Nonetheless, this would be short-lived because the management seeks to use the application form for a specified period of six months.

At this point, it can not be disputed that there are certain revisions that need to be done to the application and background investigation form in order to enhance its credibility. To begin with, there would be need to elicit more criminal information from the applicant. Working for the public service is very sensitive and requires a clear understanding and appreciation of the needs of various facets of the society. This includes the special needs of women, the disabled fraternity, children, the elderly and so forth. Appreciation of the respective needs is vitally important in enhancing effective performance. As aforementioned, public safety and security is at the center stage of the goals and objectives of the public service. For this reason, it would be important to understand the criminal record of the employees in order to ensure attainment of the highest degree of safety as well as security.

Then, it would be important to exclude the information pertaining to worker compensation. In their consultative review, Nixon and Kerr (2008) indicate that worker compensation constitutes private information that needs to be safeguarded by both the public and private organizations. Such information is also sensitive in the sense that it can influence the decisions of the current employees with respect to developing compensation packages for their employees. From a psychological point of view, it is widely agreed that most employees tend to be greatly influenced by the previous compensation packages of their new employees during the design of their salaries. This culminates in prejudice and previous compensations rather that experience and skills are employed in determining the packages of the new employees. Eliminating this information from the application and background application form would go a long way in addressing any incidences of bias or prejudice.

Hillsborough County has certain policies and regulations that guide the process of background checks. There are various checks that the organization undertakes in order to determine the history of the applicants. To begin with, the company undertakes literacy takes in which it seeks to determine the number of languages that the applicant can speak as well as read and write. In his review, Nadell (2004) indicates that relative competencies are essential in enhancing the performance of the applicants. Further, the organization undertakes a check of the employment history of the applicant. Besides providing insights in to the competencies and experience of the applicant, this also underscores the reasons as to why the applicants quit their previous employments. It can not be disputed that relative information is critical in defining the behavior, traits and general personality of the applicants in relation to their work environments.

Another check that is undertaken included the military experience of the applicant. The applicants in this regard are requested to detail their previous ranks as well as relative duties and responsibilities. Further, the organization checks the professional license, certification or registration of the applicant. This is important because it underscores the eligibility of the applicant as well as the legality of the same with respect to working in the county. The drug policy of the organization is very comprehensive. Testing for drugs is done during the medical check up and the applicants or employees are informed before hand. Medical as well as psychological tests are undertaken to determine the status of the applicants in this regard. Distinct standards and regulations that underscore company policies regarding drug use have been formulated, implemented and enforced accordingly. Successful applicants need to pledge that they would abide by the relative policies before their process of employment is finalized.

With regard to Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance policy, the organization requires the applicants to exhibit a history of highway safety and security. Applicants that have handled commercial vehicles previously are required to provide certification of competence. A credit check is included in the background report of the applicants. This sees to provide a history of credit payment as well as various other credit habits that current, former or potential employers might be aware of. In addition, relative personalities can draw conclusions about the applicant with regard to credit behavior. The references that are provided by the applicants are usually contacted and interviewed accordingly. The sole aim for this is to elicit as much information as possible bout the applicants from the respective persons.

At this point, it can be argued that the background check procedure that is currently in place is not adequate. This is because it does not provide sufficient information about the history of the applicant. The relative forms need to be reviewed and revised in order to capture the respective information accordingly. The strengths of this application form and background check are wide and varied. As aforementioned, the information provided is simple and can be stored easily. This also implies that retrieval and use of the information is equally easy. Another strength of this background check involves the fact that it covers a wide range of concerns. This is regardless of the recognition that the information that it elicits in the respective areas is not comprehensive enough to determine the actual history of the applicants.

One weakness of this background check is that it is not exhaustive. This implies that the information that it elicits can not effectively be employed in determining the history of the applicants. Its elimination of a comprehensive criminal record of the applicants indicates that it has not put in place practical measures to safeguard the safety as well as security of the public. As it currently is, the process can be considered to be sub standard. Relevant stakeholders need to undertake practical measures in enhancing the complexity of the process. Vital factors pertaining to criminal records, bankruptcy and sex offenses reports need to be included in the final report. This is because relative information is critical in enhancing public safety and security.

References

Nadell, B. (2004). Sleuthing 101: Background checks and the law. USA: Barry J Nadell Publishers.

Nixon, B. & Kerr, K. (2008). Background screening and investigations: managing hiring risk from the HR and security perspectives. USA: Butterworth-Heinemann

Rosen, L. (2008). The safe hiring audit: The employer’s guide to implementing a safe hiring program. USA: Facts on Demand Press.

Rosen, L. (2004). The safe hiring manual: The complete guide to keeping criminals, imposters and terrorists out of the work place. USA: Facts on Demand Press.