I've received a recent string of requests regarding my last post on employee files. It seems a lot of businesses realize the importance of keeping good records, but some have occassional problems actually keeping them. One of the other struggles is employee applications.
A lot of companies get content with accepting resumes from individuals that "highlight" their achievements. These are fine, but the real "meat and potatoes" comes from an employment application. Whenever you're hiring for a position, you must get an application.
The employment application offers a treasure-trove of information. First, a completed employment application gives you a layer of security. The application should contain the necessary information for you to perform effective background checks. You are performing background checks on your prospective hires, aren't you? Remember, although your application cannot ask questions that would reveal or discriminate based on age, sex, religion, or other protected statuses, you still have a lot of useful information to accomplish your desired task. (Note: here's a resource to distinguish legal between illegal types of questions.)
Second, your employment application acts as a backup resource, if your resume lacks the necessary information. Your application should give you relevant, alternate contact information for your employees. Think about this: who would you contact for each employee, and how/where would you contact them, if there was an emergency? Sometimes, despite our "family-like" business, the only real thing we know about our employees is what we learn at work.
Your answer to the simple question should be like this: I would call [name of employee's contact] at [specific number]. If you can't answer this, go get the information from your employee.
Finally, after all of the vetting you performed, employment applications offer a layer of protection. In general, outsiders are more lenient when systems "fail." If you happen to hire a bad egg, despite your diligence, your application and the "truthful" information provides a protection against retribution. After all, at some point there's a stop-loss mechanism that relieves a person of liability. However, if you fail to utilize your resources, juries and the courts will punish you.
It's certainly a good idea to regularly update employee information. If you don't have any external information, then you're in a great position to establish a new, diligence routine for vetting harmful individuals from your pet project.
If you're interested in discussing your small business's employment practices, don't hesitate to contact me. Our firm offers multiple small business options for keeping your legal. We offer annual outsourced legal packages to give you access to an attorney at a discounted price.