It is staggering figures like those above that have made it imperative that companies undertake pre-employment verification of potential employees. I recently attended a seminar presented by Sally Mooney, the Managing Director of Australian Background, on the subject of resume fraud and the importance of pre-employment screening. Pre-employment screening is the first step in preventing fraud within your organisation, and effectively improves the quality of your hiring decisions to promote a corporate culture of integrity.

The potential cost and damage of making the wrong hiring decision can be devastating. Small businesses can go under and large business can experience damage to their reputation, poor performance, low morale and high staff turnover – all of which can result in significantly reduced profits. Who and how you recruit impacts on every aspect of your business, so confirming the facts about your potential employees is essential.

Whether undertaking recruitment yourself, or utilising an agency, it is imperative that thorough pre employment screening be in place, in order to safeguard your organisation. All aspects of every candidate resume should be thoroughly checked and information confirmed. Details to confirm: include dates of employment, references, qualifications, identification, and criminal record.

Australian Background statistics indicate the most common lies on a candidates resume include: falsifying employer history details, embellishment of job titles, and amending dates of employment to hide gaps or omit entire positions held, also falsifying educational qualifications and exaggerating previous salary figures.

There is increasing pressure to introduce legislation for Pre-Employment Screening, such as a 100-point identification requirement, and compulsory criminal check for all registered candidates. However, it is an area in which we need to tread very lightly and at all times consider the rights of candidates under the privacy act. For information regarding the Pre-Employment Screening practices employed by Discovering People, please contact your personal Recruitment Consultant.

Source: LIAR, LIAR! Resume Fraud, are your candidates lying to you?

A seminar presented by Sally Mooney of Australia Background

                                               Written by Gina Louise Jones B Science (Hons) – Office Manager