The Work Wire
SHRM CEO Johnny C. Taylor, Jr. and Bob Goodwin, President at Career Club, host a lively conversation on how the latest news impacts all things work-related.
The Work Wire
Background Checks - The Work Wire
Can background checks truly make or break the safety and integrity of your workplace? Join us for an insightful conversation as Bob Goodwin, President of Career Club and Johnny C Taylor Jr, President and CEO of SHRM, shares his eye-opening personal experiences that highlight the critical importance of thorough background checks. We discuss how these essential measures can coexist harmoniously with DEI initiatives, creating a balanced and secure environment where both safety and diversity thrive.
In this engaging episode, we navigate the fine line between offering second chances and maintaining workplace safety. Discover the nuanced art of individualized assessments over blanket decisions, especially when hiring candidates with criminal backgrounds. We delve into the significance of verifying educational credentials and the far-reaching implications of dishonesty, emphasizing the importance of empathy, understanding, and due diligence in informed hiring practices.
We also tackle the often-overlooked consequences of background checks on existing employees and the ethics of periodic evaluations. What happens when a top performer is caught in a lie about their qualifications? How do social media behaviors impact professional reputations? And, when is it appropriate to rely on informal background checks for deeper insights? Join us as we explore these compelling questions, stressing the vital role of trust, values, and comprehensive due diligence in hiring decisions.
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Bob Goodwin:Hello everybody, this is Bob Goodwin, with Career Club, joined by my good friend Johnny C Taylor Jr, the President and CEO of SHRM. Johnny, how are you?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:I am doing wonderful. This is first quarter. Things are good, the market's performing, life's good, yeah, if you only had more NVIDIA stock, right?
Bob Goodwin:How about that? You know where it's at right. No, it's so good to see you and thank you. As always, it's such a pleasure to be with you. So you know, the feedback that we've been doing this for a little bit here on the WorkWire and the feedback you know know that I get personally from folks is just really really positive, and the the opportunity for people to hear from you is, uh, very much appreciated. So, and I always enjoy being with you, so, thank you.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:I was gonna say wait a minute, I hear from us, by the way, and it's funny. I talked to someone the other day who mentioned oh yeah, I heard you on the work wire and I just love the fact that you all don't just always agree. I really like it, you take on time issues and I said, well, hold on, because you're going to see more of it.
Bob Goodwin:Okay, Since you just lit the fuse, let's go. So today's topic is really interesting. You and I were emailing a little bit on this, but it's about background checks. Now I don't know if you knew this, but I was actually with First Advantage for a hot minute, the company Mm-hmm Yep Back in the day looking after their retail vertical and also their nonprofit vertical Got it.
Bob Goodwin:Okay, and so it was really, really interesting to me. So I got to learn a lot about that, just the fact that when it's a regulated business it's protected by the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you know, and that companies can't just do anything. But anyway, the nature of background checks is, on one hand you hand they clearly serve a purpose, right, you want to protect your customers, you want to protect your employees, you want to protect your brand. There's a lot of safety. I mean, there's just so many good reasons to just make sure that we know who's coming onto the payroll and representing our brand and doing the work of our business. Having said that, there's also some things that, at least in the evolving talent market, workplace, you know, our background checks kind of keeping up with an evolving talent pool, an evolving talent pool, and then I want to weave in some DEI, ied kinds of issues into this. So that's our topic. We'd love to just start to get some top of mind thoughts from you as we think about background checks.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So let me just give you context of. Let me start with, I have a bias toward background checks, okay, so and and others can agree or disagree, and I understand all of the downsides, but no, no topic is clean, right it was easy.
Bob Goodwin:We wouldn't need to do this. We'd be talking about it on the work one right.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:But I uh, we owned for a while a company and a portfolio of companies I don't mean me, the company that I worked with and I was the head of HR we hired a guy who'd been convicted of rape. We did not do background checks. He happened to be African-American not that our African-Americans are rapists or whatever, you get my point but happened to be African-American Good guy. But we wouldn't have hired him if we thought he was a bad guy or whatever. You get my point. But happened to be African-American good guy. But all you know, we wouldn't have hired him if we thought he was a bad guy, actually a good performer, et cetera. We ran a 24 hour call center which was predominantly female, within a predominantly female population.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:One particular night, one or two people on the very, very late night shift, two women there alone. One walks into down the stairwell to go get some coffee from another floor and guess what? She runs into him and he rapes her. And then we learned that had we simply conducted a background check, we would have known not only had he committed this crime before, but we would have learned that he was a registered sex offender. We put our employee at risk.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Put aside what the settlement, the lawsuit cost us, it was the wrong thing for us to do. We could have still hired the guy, because everyone needs to be able to work. You know how I feel on second chances People have to find a way to provide for themselves and their families. But maybe we would have put in place certain precautions. Maybe we would have said he can only work when there are X number of people in the building. Perhaps we would have allowed him to work remotely, because it was a call center after all.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:There are so many things we would have done had we known to look back and realize that we put those women's lives at risk when we could have done something to protect them informs the way I think about background checks. You know I have a 13 year old daughter, I have two sisters, a mom like. It bothered me and still bothers me. So a little serious to start Right, but this is a serious matter. We as employers have a right to redo everything we reasonably can to provide you a safe workplace, and part of that, to me, doing your due diligence, is to conduct background checks.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Now we have to make sure that we're not just excluding people just because they've made a mistake in their lives and we can narrowly tailor the hiring decision so that if you wrote a bad check or you did something that was, yes, violative of the law, but not enough to put other people's lives at risk, got it. We cannot. I'm a huge proponent of anything that prohibits background checks, just generally, and there are certain crimes that I think we need to be able to go back for much further than the seven or 10 years that some states cap it at, because I want to know if I have someone in my workplace who's predisposed to put people really at risk. So I don't even get to customers, I don't even care about the company's reputation. Fundamentally, we in HR have an obligation to protect people where we can when we bring them into our workplace. So now, yeah, no.
Bob Goodwin:So I mean yes, I mean safety, physical safety is, you know, got to be like somewhere at the most basic level, right, that I can come to work and be safe. So you bring up a few things, though. One is there's various kinds of offenses. That's right. Right, Then we should probably just unpack that by itself. And then the second bit of it you just alluded to it is how far back can I go, how far back should I go? And then how do those? Is there a matrix between sort of those two things the seriousness of the offense and how far back we know we should be looking?
Bob Goodwin:yeah, I mean, I'll maybe kick this off a little please please is I'm very much a second chance person too and I've probably just in full transparency. Probably evolved over time in that one.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Hello me too, because I'm a law and order guy, you know I would have. My history was not always bring people. I was like if you committed a crime you should pay forever. I used to be there. I'm not any longer and I have definitely moderated on that.
Bob Goodwin:If we want a better society, if we want lives to be changed, we have to provide the opportunity for lives to be changed, and so, if this is like just a black mark on your record it's binary in out, sorry, you just opted out forever then how could you ever possibly? You, you've told them there is no other alternative, there is no other avenue for you to go pursue, so you're going to go back to what works, yeah, and so so that, that, to me, is just fundamental and and I think, yeah, I'm probably catching up society in this regard, like you know, we just need to be more forgiving. Yes, you talk a lot about johnny, about being an empath, and you know, and, and I think one of the reasons we get on well is we're both wired that way, but, but it's like it's, it's the right thing to do, it's, I think, the smart thing to do. And you know, if you think about somebody who has been incarcerated, and depending on what their background is like, where they grew up so I'm just going to be super stereotypical for a second say, like the south side of chicago, which has a reputation for not being the easiest place to grow up um, well, if somebody gets in trouble there serves time, and then they are blacklisted essentially from working, again serves time, and then they are blacklisted essentially from working, again Right, because background checks, and it's just. It is what it is.
Bob Goodwin:Well, not only said individual not get better, right, but his or her family doesn't get better, and then, by extension, the community doesn't get better. But communities are just the accumulation of individual lives and family units. However, that family unit is constructed. So when somebody is given the opportunity to pivot and change the arc of their life, it's not just them, it it's their family unit and then, by extension, the community becomes different. Look at what Bob. Bob used to be in trouble, bob used to be a gangbanger, bob used to be whatever. Look now. He's now working at this company, he's providing for his family and like they're just a completely different life path. Like who could possibly be against that? Except companies perceive risk and they're like. All I know is I think I know an employer might say is if, if I don't hire people who already have a checkered past, therefore perceived higher risk profile, why would I increase my risk profile if I don't have to?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Bob, can I let me just get on that. Our data at SHRM showed something that really shocked me. I could not believe it. More employers are willing to hire people who have committed or been committed crimes in the past than our employees. Say that again. Say that again.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:You have companies where our data says the HR leader, the CEO, says let's give people second chances, says just give people second chances. The person sitting next to that person says I get it, but I would just as soon not have my wife sitting next to an ex-con in the workplace. So the biggest pushback is that concept of NIMBY not in my backyard, like everyone wants you to be there, but oh, not the word next to me. Believe it or not? Work-wire audience. The biggest pushback is with people. So it's a great concept second chances until the person sitting next to you has just gotten out of prison for bank robbery. You're like, oh well, not that. Like OK, driving too fast maybe. But there are categories and I know we're going to talk about it where the people like I don't want that person. So it is the biggest hurdle.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:I have found it used to be employers didn't want to do it from a pure risk profile standpoint. Increasingly it is employees don't want to because of their fears. You don't have to do anything right now. You open any newspaper in any major city. Right now, crime is the topic, the biggest topic being discussed. People are afraid. So once I decide that I'm afraid of crime, I'm sure as heck not interested in you bringing people into my workplace who are from the criminal justice system, so okay.
Bob Goodwin:So let's unpack that a little bit. And this was actually for anybody listening to this was way deep in the origin story of the work wire. Yes, Right, you had brought to me somebody that was in Michigan, I believe, and had gotten their law degree while in prison and wanted to clerk for a judge. And the judge said, okay, that's cool. But the other people, the other judges, were like, uh-uh, it's kind of to your point. You're going to taint the purity of what we do by introducing this convict into our midst yep, yep, it's not as simple as we think.
Bob Goodwin:It is right but, but what struck me about this, and I had a very strong reaction like that's the dumbest thing I ever heard. And then you go yeah, bob, but what if this guy was a sex offender? Right, you still. And then, how long ago was it? And what rehabilitation has this person been through? So the guy that did bank robbery yesterday and sitting next to me today, probably not a fan of that idea, right, but but but it. It raises a really interesting point, one that I don't think that there's a definitive formula for or anything like that, but, but you know, I appreciate the sherm data that says, okay, because of fear. How can we educate people, or at least create some I'm probably getting used to wrong word, johnny boundaries but something that that provides them with that feeling of safety, right, while at the same time providing opportunity, diversifying the workforce, et cetera?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:It's complicated as is like most of these issues, they are really complicated, but I will tell you, at the end of the day, we have to. From a risk standpoint, say you got to protect the workplace, but I have to balance that. As you pointed out about opportunities for people, grace and mercy is a phrase, words that you and I absolutely embrace and I think most people do. Your point's well taken. We've got to educate people. I have found that. Once you have you know, if you ask me, I've got two candidates one who has a background, a criminal background, one who doesn't. Which one would I hire, assuming all things equal, the person without the background? Right, I mean, I get it. But if you educate me, if I got to know that person, if I, if I understood the circumstances around which, how long ago, to your point, what was the nature of the crime, et cetera, maybe I'd feel differently. But let me just challenge you.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:There are some crimes. It's easy, and the difficulty in saying let's pick the class of crimes, because, well, I could hire someone who wasn't engaged in a crime against a person, right, physical crimes scare you. But if Madoff was still alive, who would want to work next to him? Okay, purely, it didn't take anyone's life directly, et cetera. It was a financial crime. But who in the work where our audience would say, oh, I'd be cheering for Madoff to have a second chance had he lived and gotten out of prison? The answer's very, very few of us, very few.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And that was a purely crime, financial crime. So I just don't. It's not as easy, and I've lived in this HR world for a long time. Every time we've tried to establish the boundaries and lead with empathy, our own biases get pushed to the edge. Right? Do I want to hire someone who wrote bad checks or embezzled from their last company? Maybe, as long as it's not in finance, if it's not in HR, because you have too much access to confidential information, right? So my issue is not that you committed a crime, it's that I question if you are trustworthy.
Bob Goodwin:Challenge me on this one, johnny, because where my mind goes along with this is, you know, I would not want the argument to stop unless you can answer the edgiest of all edge cases, right. Right, so bernie madoff is fairly singular in american crime um, you know, murder. But if we just looked at the total distribution of people that have at some point in their lives been part of the incarceration system the vast majority of those people it's going to be drug crimes and things like that right, where and how long ago was it? So we can address a really big chunk of the problem without having to have the perfect answer. That doesn't exist for every other potential edge case that's out there. So I would be an advocate of just being at some level pragmatic and say let's do the parts that we can do and work on the parts that still require more thinking, without having to figure the whole ball of wax out first to be able to do good.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And that's what's happening in HR practices around the country and indeed around the globe is. The right answer is to do a case-by-case review, and you know there are all sorts of circumstances, even with some pretty heinous crimes. You know people who, as I said, committed sexual assault. One could easily argue well, I don't care how long ago it occurred and I don't care about the circumstances. That person should not be in the workplace and I'm suggesting to you, as I did at the outset, that maybe there's a different way to allow them to work and they just don't work under conditions where they could put people at risk. Maybe it's a fully remote employee, et cetera. So I think it's a case by case analysis. That is how most of us in the HR world practice now is to take a little bit more time to analyze it, to know all of the circumstances, because even when it appears clean, it may not be clean.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:What if you were a home health aid who actually stole from a 90-year-old person and maybe you're only stealing $500 a month from their pension? That's still a really bad crime and that's not exactly the person I'd want working next to me. You know what I mean. So we look at the circumstances on an individualized basis. That's the way to do this and therefore, to go all the way back to what we started with. I do believe in background checks. I think I that, not knowing that that person committed what appears to be a not a big crime $500 a month, $6,000 from a 90 year old person who had dementia you could justify anything and say so. Why do we need to know that? Because you do, and I think that's where I land is. Get the background check, get the information and strong HR professionals will look at it and, working with the hiring manager, determine how to hire the person, not just blanket decide not to hire them.
Bob Goodwin:Okay, let's pick up a couple other elements of background checks. One is an education check. So Bob says he's got an MBA from Harvard. He actually doesn't. In your HR career, did you ever have somebody that misrepresented their education credentials?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:All of the time and I don't. And I remember actually having this conversation with someone I had to fire from my own team who lied about their credentials. I said this isn't about you not having a degree. I actually would have hired you without the degree because personally I don't care if you have a degree or not. I'm going to fire you because I can't trust you. You lied about something that was of absolute no-transcript.
Bob Goodwin:So I think you just answered the question. If you had your chief marketing officer was amazing, doing a great job and somewhere you found out that you actually didn't have that degree Right Doing a good job, been there for five years, you would fire that person.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:I would Now I can't say anything blanket Like right Back to the case-by-case analysis. I know some of you all thought you got me, but really I'm like no, no, I would look at it, but probably particularly as a leader, and remember the values of our organization. Fundamental to everything is that we need to be able to trust you, and this would make me question everything that you do and say Now, that doesn't mean and this is where the second chances comes in that that person should forever be barred from working for any other company, any other organization in the world. They should learn that I have lost the trust of Johnny and Sherm, but that doesn't mean that Johnny and Sherm should prevent you from getting a job anywhere else for the rest of your world because you told that one lie. Just tell the truth going forward.
Bob Goodwin:Do you have a point of view on continuous background checks? So like we did it at the beginning of employment? But you know what we just like to do every other year, or some kind of a just make sure nothing's changed since our relationship began.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So I know some are not going to like this, but I absolutely do. I think it is just like random drug testing. I mean I absolutely believe that it's good hygiene. What if during the interim you were convicted of a crime but because the jails were filled or some set of circumstances, you're convicted but you're not incarcerated. You're only incarcerated on the weekends, which happens a lot, especially in financial crimes, when there are no crimes against the person.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So Monday through Friday you could be working in my finance department, a convicted felon for embezzling at your last job, but they didn't convict you until after I hired you. So you were fired, you were tried, all of this while you're working for me and I don't know. So I am a huge advocate of maybe call it random, maybe you call it periodic, whatever you want to do, but checking in to ensure that the person who works with you is in fact the person you think is working with you and has not made some really bad decisions that could impact the safety of your employees or the risk profile of your company. I'm okay with that. But again, you can't just blanket say and if we do a background check and learn that you have been involved with the criminal justice system. Since we hired you, we're automatically going to fire you. That is not something I agree with.
Bob Goodwin:Got it. And then, where does I generally don't know this where does doing like social media and like following you on social media and oh, by the way, I find out that you're a white supremacist or you've got some other less than desirable quality, is that one? Is that legal.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And then two, is it practical? Well, it's a lot legal, especially if you put it out there, right. So people forget that social media is. You've essentially I might not go looking for it, it comes to me and what we've seen. You want to talk about white supremacists?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:well, we've seen people who've made some fairly anti-Semitic comments as of late and one of the big law firms withdrew the offer of a young African-American woman from NYU I believe it was law school just earlier last year, after October 7th, where she went on social media and literally made some really, really outrageous statements against the Jewish people. She should have that job, should have been rescinded, period, and that was. We realized it because that law firm was doing its own form of social media background check and people don't know this, but roughly, we've heard somewhere between 70 and 80 percent of the Fortune 500 companies regularly conduct background checks, and this is one not just at time of hire but during the process, and someone I've had people challenge me, Johnny. That's horrible. Well, let me say something. What if Johnny Taylor, the CEO of Sherm, went online? Call it Facebook. The CEO of SHRM went online, call it Facebook.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And, by the way, I'm not on social media. But if I were and I went onto a social media, you know, and I decided to trash women, my, my board should call me on that and I could argue oh, I was doing it on my own time. No, no, no, no. You're affecting the reputation of our profession and our, of our organization and we're not going to pay you and allow you to do it. Oh, but you didn't get my permission to do a background check. No, you put it out on blast, you put it on social media. So I remind especially the younger generation that you now have a permanent record that anyone can go find and review and make employment decisions, and so, yes, it's legal and it's actually one of the most dangerous areas for employees. As you think social media is not background checkable, you're wrong. We do it all the time. Sometimes we won't tell you, We'll just do it and exclude you from the highway.
Bob Goodwin:Let's talk about rank and file employees. So I'm a software engineer buried deep in the bowels of some company, coding whatever you know like. I'm not damaging the reputation of XYZ company per se because I'm not a high profile employee of the company or in the public spotlight, but I'm off, you know, doing misogynistic things or racist things or whatever the thing is Like. Should that person be called to account on that?
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Yes, and I feel very strongly about it, because you're low level, low, deep down into the organization until you're not, until it hits the phone right, and then I get dragged with you. Think about, and this woman by title was the vice president. Remember the woman who became the Karen?
Speaker 1:Right.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:She's out walking her dog and I hate that term right away, but that's what we began to know as walking her dog she gets into interaction with a black guy in the middle of Central Park and all of a sudden she loses her job with, and she lost her job before a criminal charge was filed. So even if they had done a background check, it wouldn't have shown up. She was on her own time, et cetera. But guess what? The company because she showed up on social media and in the mainstream media decided that we don't want that. And this was not notwithstanding, I think she may have had a vice president title, but everybody had a vice president title in our organization. She wasn't a direct report to the CEO or the CEO or anything, but they got rid of her.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So you are always, no matter where you are within an organization if you engage in behavior. So I'm going to say this real quick, because I was tickled. Someone challenged me on it and I said well, what if you found out one of call it the technologists, to use your example, low level coder within IBM was on the dark web spouting all sorts of negative things about African-Americans. Post George Floyd? After that, you'd be okay with that company. No, you wouldn't Stop it. Stop it, you know what I mean. You'd say that's not the person who holds up our values as a company, that's not the type of person we hire, and you'd be gone. So I don't think it's titled Now. Obviously, the more senior and public your role is, the even more sensitive you have to be. But wherever you are in the organization, if you don't live and uphold the organization's values, then you shouldn't work there.
Bob Goodwin:Okay, I'm going to channel Johnny Taylor for a minute. On the one side, freedom of speech. You want to go, do that, and it's not illegal. Go for it. Employment at will. But you want to work here? No, but that decision has consequences and you should be open to absorbing the consequences. If you want to go rant and be a weirdo and say whatever you want to say, okay, first amendment right, have at it. But that doesn't mean that we have to employ you.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And it's kind of that simple Decisions have consequences, right, and I'm glad you said that, because that is the dilemma. I remind people all the time yes, you have a right and the company has rights, and so we're going to exercise it. But back to background checks. I'm glad you pointed out their financial background checks, which is one area that I just in closing, want to say I'm very sensitive to. We talk about criminal background checks, we talk about social media checks and all of that.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:There was a period when a lot of companies and there still are some who do credit checks as a form of background check, and what we know is the data has suggested that that disproportionately impacts female employees. Women because so many of them at least historically and the math is changing were stay-at-home moms. Guy meets a younger woman, leaves you your credit's destroyed, and so you should not be foreclosed from getting job opportunities at the very moment that you need to get a job to provide for your family, because your husband was the breadwinner and you were a homemaker and now your credit is destroyed. So we're very, very careful. I am not a big proponent of background checks, on credit background checks, I I'm just not. That doesn't mean I'm right.
Bob Goodwin:It means that the theory is is that if your finances aren't in good shape, you're potentially a theft slash, embezzlement risk to shore up your lacking financial situation. Last question, though, on background checks, is what drug laws are changing in the United States. Pretty quickly they're liberalizing marijuana obviously. You know, when I was at First Advantage, you know this drug panel was very common and marijuana was definitely part of the drug panel. You know there's the well, it's not legal in my state yet, but you know I kind of acknowledge this is the reality and the train's left the station. It's just a matter of time till it gets to me.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:How would you have?
Bob Goodwin:employers think about drug testing.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:You know that tough one because, frankly, anything that alters your mood, if it's alcohol abuse, drug abuse, prescription drug abuse, right, any of those things are probably not good for business. So the general rule around that is, and we can't forget, marijuana is still not legal under federal law Correct under federal law, correct. So, no matter what your state says, you still have that as an issue. That people you know, someone I know, thought they could just walk into the airport and, like you do, know that that's federal grounds, even though it sits in your state and you can be arrested for bringing marijuana onto an airport grounds.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So anyway, I think that, personally and professionally, my opinion is that where it is necessary, if you're using a vehicle at work, if you're using major machinery that could cause death to yourself or injury to others. So I think there are some circumstances where it is totally appropriate, and these are not small, like if I don't want my physician, I want my physician and my nurse to be drug tested. I do just fact because you know I do for the reasons that all of us want to. So to a blanket, everyone is drug tested is probably not a good idea. But a blanket, no one is drug tested because even if it's legal in your state or your jurisdiction, that doesn't mean certain roles require an enhanced level of safety, and that's why I would use background.
Bob Goodwin:Well, which is also to your earlier point on random drug testing. So I know how to prep for the test and do whatever and gain the system. But so on some random Tuesday afternoon it's like Bob, can you come over here for a minute? It's like, oh crap, I wasn't planning on this. So I think that, back to baseline safety for the individual people that they're around, their customers, like I don't know how you could be against that. Last, last, last thing, and this is actually how our conversation got started Last last, last thing and this is actually how our conversation got started.
Bob Goodwin:We've been talking about kind of all the official channels for doing background check, but there's the whole back channel thing and that can work in both directions, right. So as a career coach, like if somebody was going to be interviewing with Johnny Taylor, I would be telling well, first of all, they could call me and say, bob, tell me what Johnny's like. He's great, you're going to love him, you know, whatever you know, go check you out on social media and do all these things. And I'd be like you're an idiot to not prepare and do your due diligence on the hiring manager, the executive team, whatever, but like, yeah, you should be doing your due diligence.
Bob Goodwin:On the flip side and this is where it got contentious on a LinkedIn post the other week was is it cool if the hiring manager sees that Johnny's connected to Brenda and he calls I'm going to hire Brenda. Hey, johnny, tell me about Brenda Like good egg, should I hire her? Anything I need to know about? And that kind of lit a firestorm To me. It's reality. It's like why are we doing these official background checks? Because we're trying to get some sense for who is this person that we're bringing in the organization. People hire people. You know this person. I don't know this person as well. What can you tell me? That to me is just like massively obvious, but not everybody would necessarily see it that way.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Well, and listen, I get it. All of us have enemies, all of us have haters, people who you've not done anything to in the world, who would just as soon hurt your job chances or whatever, just because they're unhappy in their own lives, whatever. Right, envy, jealousy, whatever. So it is employers who do it, and we do it a lot. We do it in part because if I call 99% of the companies in America to do a background check, they're going to give you what we call name, rank and serial number. Is the person eligible for hire or not? That's all. We will not give any context. The person could have fought their boss in the middle of the lunchroom. I mean, we've seen this right. But if I talk to you know Neymar Mary, who was at the company at the time, who witnessed the fight, she will tell me what happened, right, and so, almost out of necessity, employers are relying heavily on these sorts of background checks that you can remove fact from fiction and people's own biases. So I've done it. I'll check and say and you know what, bob, come on, listen.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:When you and I first met and I considered doing a show with you, I called around hey, is this guy a good guy Like am I going to get a gotcha question? Is he an ethical person? Like he doesn't have to agree with me, but I got to make sure person. He doesn't have to agree with me, but I got to make sure. It is the normal way that we unofficially background check. It's the norm we look at without even talking to someone. I sometimes can look at you.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So who are you connected to? My quality? People are questionable. Like that's just the way the world happens. You called it. It's reality. I would just encourage all of you listening today Be very careful. Keep know that everyone has. If you've worked more than a year in corporate America, call it that or anywhere. There's someone out there who will say something negative about you. You can't, you've got to take the totality of what you hear. People will speak negatively about Bob because they once worked for Bob and maybe that person should have been fired. But they're forever going to say Bob was a bad manager.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:So you got to make sure you figure out what truth is if you're going to make hiring decisions based upon these unofficial backgrounds.
Bob Goodwin:Okay, so just to go down the ladder here, it is legal. Okay, so just to go down the ladder here it is legal. Yep, ethics is in the eye of the beholder, but in your view, there's nothing that is glaringly unethical about an employer doing that Yep. Then it comes down to kind of judgment and discretion and realizing that to your point, I can't imagine Johnny Taylor has any haters. That, to your point, I can't imagine Johnny Taylor has any haters. But just for argument's sake, that somebody would potentially say something negative and to do that, as you say in the totality, like, like, well, dip, dip the stick in the water in more than one place. You want to find out what the water's really like. So right, so, and we're talking about this? Because, like, like about this? Because my comment on social media is like, maybe my moral compass is on the fritz right now, but I don't even know why we're talking about this.
Bob Goodwin:I call it due diligence, but for some people in fairness, because I want to be respectful to not everybody sees the world the way that I do some people really thought of it as being unethical because of the opportunity that that you're going to find that hater and now I'm not going to get a job that I should have gotten because somebody's got a vendetta, an agenda whatever against me. And that didn't feel fair to some people. And let me just say this in short and that didn't feel fair to some people.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:And let me just say this in short violently agree with the people raising. I saw that same post and all of everything. But I will say this If you've gotten to the point where I'm doing a background check on you, I want you as an employer, so I'm not.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:Even. If one person says something negative and I now have eight people who said positive things, something negative, and I now have eight people who said positive things, I'm going to put that in perspective as a hiring manager and say maybe this person just doesn't like him or her. They have an ax to ground. Whatever what we're talking about is, we're trying to identify. Are there things that we need to be aware of that may not quite have risen to the level of criminal liability? I'm going to tell you something that you're wrong, but we have an employee.
Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.:We had an employee at an organization in which I worked who stole blindly from us tens of thousands of dollars Because the local prosecutor was backed up with serious crimes and this is not where I currently work as a former employer. The prosecutor said I just don't have the resources to go after this employee this now former employee, so this person does not notice I'm protecting gender, everything so that you can identify them, but this individual therefore has no criminal record but without a doubt, they stole tens of thousands of dollars. So new prospective employer, who happens to know me, called and said what do you think about X? And I said well, off the record, let me tell you you're not going to find, and this was, and the person who you get this from trusted me. That's why they called me. That's how you get unofficial background checks Right. So I'm a big and I we would. My friend would have hired this person into a very senior, sensitive role without having gotten the information from me, because a criminal background check would have not indicated anything. There you go.
Bob Goodwin:All right. Well, as is we usually do, it's a complex. Everything of this is complicated. It requires judgment, discretion, you know, thought, but. But I appreciate the opportunity to discuss hard topics with you, johnny. I know, as I said at the beginning, our audience appreciates the ability to kind of walk around some issues that aren't always easy to understand. There's usually not one right answer to things, so with that, I appreciate you, as always. So, thank you. Come on WorkWire All right. Thank you everyone for listening today. We hope you have a wonderful and blessed day. We'll see you on the next episode of the WorkWire. Thank you everyone for listening today. We hope you have a wonderful and blessed day. We'll see you on the next episode of the WorkWire.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Johnny. Check out Career Club for personalized help with your job search. Visit SHRMorg to become part of the largest human resources organization worldwide.
