How to Get the Truth from Reference Checking

 Research from CareerBuilder has revealed that 66 percent of U.S. companies experienced losses in business last year due to bad hires, a trend which is reflected throughout the world to a greater or lesser extent. This suggests that employers throughout the world are likely to be focusing on increasing the quality of hire and predictive validity of their selection processes.

While behavioral interviews and attainment/aptitude testing are considered to be one of the more reliable candidate assessment tools, references can provide an incremental increase in reliability if they are used alongside the superior selection tools. In fact, another CareerBuilder study found that 47 percent of employers had a less favorable opinion of a candidate after speaking to a referee and 23 percent had a more favorable impression. So, done well, references can help to improve the quality of the selection decision.

However, we live in litigious times and increasing numbers of employers are becoming less inclined to give out performance and character information in employment references. They prefer to provide a safe and indisputable reference containing a few benign pieces of information such as: name, dates of service, salary, job titles and not much more. Employers are afraid of giving truthful negative feedback for fear of reprisal; so, if you do get an answer from a referee, it is often likely to be neutral or positive.

So, what can employers do to get a more honest reference check, in order to get at the truth about the candidate, his/her character and the person’s competency? I have set out several steps on how to do this below:

1. First, remember there are laws governing references in most jurisdictions of the world, so make sure you check your local labor laws to ensure you have a legally compliant reference checking process.

2. Next, ask junior-to-mid career candidates for at least two referees and ask managers and directors for three to four referees. Check all the referees as the more you check, the more you are likely to establish reliable trends that support or refute what you discovered during the interview about the candidate.

3. Ideal referees should be someone that the employee has been accountable to for some time, e.g. their line manager (and not peers or colleagues) as line managers will be the source of the most reliable information about their performance.

4. Next, make a point of verbally requesting referees during the interview and with that ask the interviewee several associated questions, such as:

• Why they have selected these people as a referee?
• What kind of reference do you believe you will receive from these people?
• What will your referees say about your focus and commitment?
• What will they say about your ability to deliver?
• What will they say about your ability to do ‘X’, ‘Y’, ‘Z’

Now this is referencing by stealth as the candidate may become concerned about any weaknesses, which will be revealed to you by their referees, and so you may find that they try to get in first by giving you their perspective on any possible negative feedback from their manager. This is a good way to get to the truth about a possible reference, without even speaking to the referee.

5. Questioning the Referee: The previous step is, of course, not a substitute for reference checking and you should consult the referee, ideally with a phone call or face-to-face meeting, as this will give the feeling of being “off the record” and may encourage the referee to be more open and truthful.

Also, have the hiring manager do the call as a referee may feel more kinship with an industry peer (may see it as a networking opportunity) and may, therefore, be more comfortable giving more honest feedback.

Focus and prioritize questions to help confirm any concerns or key skills that became apparent during the interview. When questioning, start with basic fact checking questions to loosen up the referee. Then describe the context and culture, your business, team and your leadership style and then ask the referee to consider how well the candidate would fit in from a competency and attitude point of view. You might want to probe a little.

You may now want to move on to tougher questions, which really get to the core of the candidate, for example:

• Does the candidate possess any shortcomings that we should know about so we can provide additional support if he/she is hired?
• If the candidate is so good, why didn’t you try to encourage him/her to stay?
• What are the candidate’s three main strengths?
• What management style gets the best out of the candidate? Hands off, Hands on, etc…?
• Would you rehire this candidate if the situation arose?

This is just a small selection of potential referee questions and you will find plenty more penetrating questions on the internet, which will help you to get to the truth about your candidate.