Job seekers Reference check your EMPLOYER

Job Seekers: reference check your employer!

Are you looking for a job or a new opportunity where the “grass is greener”?

As a business we are there for candidates every day looking out for their interests. we also help companies find the best people for their job roles with filters and selection and reference checking.

So my advice to candidates applying for jobs is this: do the same checks!

The New Job Risk

Whether you’re the one recruiting or the one seeking a position, there is a risk associated with your new relationship. Job seekers need to have the same considerations as employers do when they’re looking for any sort of employment opportunity as if it doen’t work out then you have a lot to lose.

‘Reference checking’ your potential employers is one of the ways to get to a better decision and reduce your risk,

In the UK Small businesses make up over 99% of private businesses, and just under half of private sector employment (Nov 2014, http://www.fsb.org.uk/stats). Therefore, you are very likely to be end up joining one.

Unfortunately, small businesses also have a higher chance of failing than larger organisations. Given this, it is perfectly fair to engage in some reference checking before coming on board!

Small business owners take particular note: if you want to look attractive to candidates, address the following areas however some of the points below also apply to any size of employer.

How Can I Screen a Potential Employer?

1. You can start by looking at official record of the directors. This is easier than you may think. Simply pop the company name and the director’s name/s into google and you should find a few websites with their records. So what are we looking for?

Ignore the financials they report – they are often outdated or plain inaccurate. Look instead for the amount of companies the director has started and how many they still have. If you’re noticing a trend of start-ups that fail, it’s worth factoring that into your decision.

1. You can conduct a credit check on the business and screen them if the result is too bad. Just because a company is hiring doesn’t mean they are in a particularly viable position to take you on! Credit checks are a way of ensuring this is the case, and that there will be investment in other areas, like your equipment.

Use Social Media

Ignore business pages; find out what you can about the people themselves. So what are we looking for?

1. LinkedIn: search the director’s personal profile. Navigate to their company page and see if you can find any past employees. Now this bit is of course at your discretion, and how you would want to go about this, but here you have access to authentic voices from within the company and private messaging them could give you an insight that you could never achieve through a plain search – or even interview questions. This is truly flipping the candidate reference concept on its head.

View Their Public Face

1. Facebook/Twitter: This kind of public face is less useful for finding genuine working environment information on the business page. So, try and find the director’s personal profile.

This is all about personality and the kind of people you want to work with. I’ll leave the social media snooping debate for another time – but it’s worth saying that this is a perfectly valid method of finding out more about the people you might be spending a lot of time with.

Look for Regulatory Bodies

1. Dependent on the type of business, there may be external organisations that award certificates or oversee the industry; The Care Quality Commission, Financial Conduct Authority, Food Standards Agency & OFSTED to name a few. These tend to have public databases and you can learn a lot about not just where a company is at but where it’s been and what the trajectory is looking like. This can help you inform not only the quality of the business you’re joining, but the kind of professional strain you might be under. I’m thinking of OFSTED in that particular example – ‘under-performing’ schools tend to have a higher staff turnover!

Aligning Values

1. The ultimate question you’re looking to answer with this process is a question of values and quality. Has the company/director behaved sensibly – financially, socially, and personably? And this is not just a negative process. Going through these steps – even just one or two – gives you a better insight into the company you’re considering and equips you with plenty to talk about at interview – if you like what you see!

Please provide your views and comments and kindly share this post if you agree or have enjoyed this. Kindly also connect with me via twitter: @SafarazAli