The City of San Francisco banned the
use of criminal histories as part of the pre-employment process. Several other
government jurisdictions have considered similar legislation. This trend is
born of the idea that criminal histories may be racist (because minorities tend
to be convicted at a higher rate than non-minorities) and that it exacerbates
the unemployment problem – especially among those with criminal records. OK –
so I am sympathetic to the whole concern about racism creeping into our
judicial system and I understand how that can correlate to unintended job
discrimination. But isn’t this more an issue that should be taken up at the
judicial level? When it comes down to our responsibilities as hiring
professionals, aren’t we the ones best suited to assess whether a person
represents a “bad hire” for our companies? If a person represents a real risk
to the safety of our employees or our customers or if the person could
potentially abuse their position to hurt our company and our shareholders
through fraud or theft or some other action that reflects poorly on the company
– shouldn’t we try and reduce that risk? Of course we should!
But for me the more interesting question (and more difficult
challenge) is how do we truly assess that risk and make smart hiring decisions
about people with previous legal or drug problems. Should they all be damned
forever and a day? Story ended. That would be the easy way to handle the
problem. No need to worry about complex hiring procedures or concerns that
people won’t follow the exact dictates of the company. We hire no one with a
previous conviction or a previous problem with drugs. Period!
We’re better than that.
A previous conviction does not have to be a permanent
sentence of unemployment. The real solution to the problem above is that
criminal history alone should not be the only reason for rejecting a candidate.
Yes – I understand (I am in the background checking business after all) that
there are very real circumstance that mean zero tolerance (access to vulnerable
populations like children or elderly for example) where the risk is just too
great. But that is what I mean when I say that a criminal history record alone
should not decide the hire/no hire choice. A criminal history record PLUS a
high sensitive position – should mean no hire. Other situations such as repeat
offenders, people with a pattern of multiple problems, a conviction along with
lying on your resume might all be reasons for rejecting a candidate. Patterns
and context should dictate hiring risk – not just single data points. Its
people we are dealing with and people can make mistakes and still move beyond
them. This is where our professionalism comes in. We use data to help make
decisions – we don’t let data make the decisions for us.
