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Background Checks Criminal Records Economy Human Resources Miscellany preemployment screening Staffing Uncategorized

Decline Reported in Mass Shootings in the Workplace

Here is some good news for a change.  The number of mass shootings in the workplace has declined.  According to an article in the Baltimore Sun, employers have given higher priority to protect their employees against threats, harassment, and physical assaults.   Of course, there are contrasting perspectives as, recently, a disgruntled and fired  Budweiser employee shot and killed non employees before turning the gun on himself.

That being said, employers are conducting more background checks on their employees and installing security cameras on the premises.   The fired employee who shot up Hartford Distributors, in Houston, Texas, was caught on video stealing cases of beer.   This was at least one of the reasons he was discharged.

With a downturn in the economy and people in debt, stress is high in the workplace.  People live in fear of losing their jobs.   Things are not always so rosy in the home.   People tend to drink more. In fact, drinking is on the rise.  People take drugs.  Anything to relieve the stress.  None of it is good; a lot of it is stupid.  Nevertheless,  here we are with some employees feeling cornered.   They act out.  They become abusive.  The turn violent.

Employers, or the good ones, anyway, are taking precautions.   Employers not only have to deal with catastrophe on the job but most deal with the liability concerns, the public embarrassment–nobody likes to be on the news as the featured location of a shooting scene–and most importantly with the horror of knowing people were injured or killed in their place of employment.

Background checks will help weed out the potential violence prone job applicants to the ones with more common sense.  It is by no means the only answer, as there always is a first time for everything.   But at least you have a better chance of discovering who has a history of violence on their criminal records.  You can weed out the sex offenders and the thieves.

Everybody may deserve a second chance.  That being said, sometimes that second chance is just an opportunity to commit violent acts or thievery that are even worse than the time before.  Check them out before you hire.

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Background Checks Criminal Records Economy Human Resources Miscellany preemployment screening

Employee Theft Can Get Out of Hand

It is one thing for employees to steal office supplies. It is quite another for employees to steal sensitive proprietary data.  In a rotten economy with people in need of money, some employees  have become more adventurous in their desperation.   Employee theft is way up around the country.

According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, a husband and wife have been accused of stealing trade secrets from General Motors, which they allegedly intended to peddle to Chinese automotive competitors.   The sensitive proprietary information involved hybrid technology.   The couple has been indicted for conspiracy, fraud,  and a variety of other charges.  I would think corporate espionage may be among them.

Needless to say, this type of employee theft of corporate espionage can prove very costly to GM who has had its serious troubles and in this tough economy it is only now wending its way back to profitability.   Theft of such sensitive data about hybrid technology is the last thing it needs.  But then no business needs its precious information shoplifted by its on employees looking to make an extra book.  It is one thing to be moonlighting, but quite another to be committing corporate theft.

A series of background checks as part of you preemployment screening program is highly advisable.  I should caution that criminal records searches may not be enough.  An employer may want to consider county civil records searches to see what types of lawsuits and employment candidate as incurred.   Credit reports or at least bankruptcies, liens, and judgments background checks will help demonstrate what type of financial shape the job applicant is in.    While background checks cannot guarantee that an employee won’t steal from you, especially in an economic downturn when debt is piling up, it can serve as a good indicator of the shape of things to come.

So check them out before you hire.  And periodically conduct background checks to see if there any sudden surprises.

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Background Checks Criminal Records Economy Human Resources Miscellany

Cautionary Tales on the Social Security Trace Background Check

For pre-employment screening, one of the more essential background checks is the Social Security Trace.  This background check not only validates your job applicant social security number but provides their address history that assists in conducting the other background searches, such as criminal records and civil records.  The Social Security Trace is also a good way to assess where your employment candidate is eligible to work in the United States.   With E-Verify  or the I09 you first have to offer your candidate the job.  With the SSN Trace you can conduct the search as a pre-employment screening background check.

The Social Security Face is cost effective and has a rapid turnaround time.  But then every once in awhile you will see headlines like this where some agency public or private agency is vulnerable enough that hackers gain access to a whole bunch of Social Security Numbers.     Or in the recent case where no hackers are necessary as the public agency dropped its figurative cyber pants long enough to actually make public their database containing social security numbers.  Whoops.

Such is the case in Maryland where a state employee  from the Department of Human Resources posted some 3,000 social security numbers.   According to the Baltimore Sun, said these are from department for handling welfare benefits for needy families.  The employee was suspended.   But the social security numbers were made available to anyone with access to the Internet.

So what happens now.  As most employers request the social security number in order to confirm their job applicant is eligible, we will probably see a fair number of undocumented workers presenting these spanking newly released, lemon scented social security numbers showing up around the country.  Because that is how it works.  Somebody sells the SSNs or hands them out to their twenty nine best friends.  If you think I am kidding, we at Corra Group have been Social Security Traces with twenty-odd different names listed on them.

Which is all the more reason to conduct the Social Security Trace as a background check.  By doing so, we can usually verify the true owner of that social security number.  So check them out before you hire.

So

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Background Checks Criminal Records Economy Human Resources Miscellany preemployment screening Recruiting Uncategorized

Background Checks Address Violence in Healthcare Centers

You know you have some serious issues when you are a hospital and you are cited for not adequately defending your employees from workplace violence.    According to an article in Occupation Health and Safety, Danbury Hospital, in Danbury, Connecticut was cited after an OSHA inspection,  in response to employee complaints about dangers in the workplace.   There were incidents were workers were injured by violent patients.   There were twenty five cases during the past five years where employees went on leave or were put on restrictive duty after being injured on the job.

The citation carries with it a proposed fine of $6,300. OSHA issues citations  at this level when death or serious physical harm is likely to result from hazards about which the employer knew or should have known.   OSHA then demands that the employer clean up its act.     The organization issued a violence prevention program that incorporates the entire hospital.   The program includes a hazard/threat assessment, controls and prevention strategies, staff training and education, incident reporting and investigation, and periodic review of the program.

Background checks should always be conducted on employees.    Of course, when confronted with workplace violence on the part of the patients,  background searches on the health care personnel won’t do all that much good.    But in order to ascertain the potential dangers that may be inflicted by patients, perhaps conducting criminal background checks on patients being admitted to the hospital.   As more health care workers face dangers on the job, the idea of conducting background checks at least on patients doesn’t seem all that remote to me.  I have written about workplace violence and dangers in health care centers.  One such article was entitled, Workers Subjected to Workplace Violence.   The article discusses how health care workers are harassed physically and psychologically.    It has to be something to get up in the morning and go to work knowing that there are always the threats against one’s physical well being.  No one needs that.