After the disastrous 2020, businesses all over Australia see 2021 as the year when they get back on their feet and make up for all the losses they registered during the forced closures of the Covid-19 pandemic. Australian businesses look forward to hiring new people and restarting their engines, but, now more than ever, recruiting agents should pay attention to who they hire which basically shouts pre-employment screening.
Why Pre-Employment Screening
The costs of a bad hire
Since 2020 was a terrible year for most businesses, companies need to do a thorough check on any potential new employee. It’s a question of money and, at this time, few companies can afford the cost of a bad hire. High employee turnover costs money since you need to start looking for new staff, while vacant positions affect productivity. Human Resources managers must make sure they hire highly-qualified personnel, people who will become an asset and not a liability.
The importance of pre-employment background checks
Many people lost their jobs during the pandemic and are now eager to reenter the workforce. You can sympathize with those, but you need to keep an eye out for disreputable characters, like ex-felons. They need jobs, too, but at least you should know who you’re hiring. Decent people who found themselves unemployed through no fault of their own are far more deserving of a job than a guy with a criminal record.
At a time like this, a company cannot afford the risk of hiring thieves, people with a history of violence or a drinking problem. The Australian National Character Check website blog notes that making criminal history checks part of your hiring policy is a way to help keep your company safe and to try to ensure that a bad hire won’t cause disruptions.
Extending background checks to gig workers
During the pandemic, many companies were faced with shifting to remote working and this will be a trend for the foreseeable future. It makes sense economically as a business can vastly reduce overhead costs by using remote working and gig workers. At the same time, many of these gig workers have access to the company’s network and this presents a lot of risks. Someone with good computer skills might resort to diverting company funds, for instance, or stealing business secrets. Keep in mind that many companies are fighting for their lives so if you’re working on new products or services there will be many interested in stealing your ideas.
You need to protect against such a huge risk by asking even your gig workers to undergo background checks. It’s not such a big deal after all. This is what pre-employment screening is all about. If they work remotely, you can also do a criminal history check remotely by using the services of an online character check agency.
Ongoing background checks on all employees
Instead of just pre-employment screening, conducting background checks on the employees on a regular basis is a new trend in the HR world and it does have its merits. Remember that a police check is just a snapshot, it only tells you the situation of a person at the time that check is performed. If that was five years ago, a great many things might have changed in that person’s life.
By introducing regular police or identity checks, the HR department stays up to date with the events in their employees’ lives. Even if an employee is facing some minor charges that might affect their job performance. If you know it’s a reliable employee, a minor offence on their criminal record can easily be overlooked, but if there’s a major problem you might want to start looking for a replacement. Doing so will help your organization in in a very big way.
