As all hiring managers know, for every one thing within your control, there are likely several things outside of your control.
The key to efficient hiring is understanding what can be controlled and refined, and adjusting until improvements are made. Working with large pools of candidates and relying on third-party vendors can be tricky. However, the biggest hiring titans in each respective industry tend to have more than a few things in common when it comes to creating efficiencies.
This article will focus on creating efficiencies within the background screening process. Employment screening can either be a helpful, meaningful part of your hiring process or a complicated struggle. The good news is that which of those realities you encounter is largely up to you.
Here are five employment screening considerations that can help you reduce time-to-hire, onboard strong talent, and even retain your employees for longer.
1. Choosing Your Vendor
While some organizations, particularly those in the public sector, have the resources to conduct their employment screening in-house, most will seek a third-party CRA.
For any organization, the power of screening control begins here. There are thousands of background screening companies in the U.S., and different vendors are suited to different needs. Choosing the right vendor from the outset and not engaging in a years-long “round peg, square hole” conflict will pay dividends.
Here are some important questions we encourage organizations to consider during their vendor selection process:
- What is our current level of support?
- What level of support do we need?
- What factors, if any, should be considered above price?
- What are our current and future technology needs?
- How important is candidate experience during the screening process?
The key to finding the right screening vendor is knowing what you want and need in a vendor. Are you focusing too much on the superficialities and numbers during your search, or are you focusing on finding a capable, dedicated, all-around screening partner?
2. Define and Outline Your Protocol
Many would be surprised to know that it isn’t uncommon for large companies to have confusing, ill-defined screening practices and protocols. This, of course, leads to inefficiency.
To address any potential problem here, we would encourage you to ask yourself the following questions:
- What screening products will you be using, and for what positions?
- Do you have drug and/or health screening needs?
- Will you be implementing any ongoing or reasonable suspicion processes?
- Are you familiar with ban-the-box and other laws in every state you have a location?
- Are you familiar with the drug-free workplace laws in every state where you have a location?
- Is your pre-hire screening protocol recorded, archived, and routinely reviewed?
3. Consolidate Your Screening Efforts
As organizations get larger, their screening needs often get more varied.
We frequently encounter organizations that do all of the following:
- Name-based criminal background screening
- Fingerprint screening
- Pre-hire drug screening
- Random and ongoing drug screening
- DOT screening
- Occupational Health Screening
- Verifications
- And more
Moreover, many of those organizations think they need two or three vendors to cover all those services or get reliable results.
The truth is that Peopletrail and many other vendors have considerable experience providing all the solutions listed above and can save organizations significant time and money by consolidating all those efforts into one streamlined process. Here is an article that touches on this further.
4. Decision Consistency
As we always say, consistency is key in employment screening.
When screening hundreds or thousands of candidates in a single bound, a clear qualification criteria, followed consistently, can introduce a world of efficiency for hiring teams.
Many screening companies even provide automatic dispositioning tools that can disposition a file according to client-specific criteria.
The more variability and bias removed from the process, the more efficient it tends to be. However, human discernment and consideration will always be crucial to any hiring effort. That’s why human resources is so named, and AI is unlikely to infringe too much.
5. Pre-Adverse and Adverse Action Management
Compliance saves a considerable amount of time.
With background screening, there are compliance responsibilities that both the CRA and the employer own; you can learn more about those specifics here.
Pre-adverse and adverse action protocols fall entirely on the employer’s side and, if not handled properly, can cause bottlenecks and even lawsuits. Many screening vendors can assist with these responsibilities and even automate them so compliance doesn’t have to be a nagging concern. This can ultimately reduce confusion, miscommunication, and legal retaliation– all enemies to efficiency.
Final Thoughts
You may not have too much control over background turnaround times, the responsiveness of your candidates, the results of their reports,and many other things. However, you can control several important screening process factors, such as:
- Choosing a screening vendor with a dedication to customer support
- Defining your processes and creating clarity and transparency from within
- Consolidating your screening efforts and internal technologies
- Establishing consistent decision criteria to save time and remove biases
- Carefully observe and automate compliance processes
- Proper and deliberate internal training
When focusing on these things, you can quickly button up your processes and considerably improve the hiring health of your organization.
For any and all screening inquiries, feel free to contact us today.
