Dear Barb:
You asked me to share my story for this column but for obvious reasons, I’m going to sign this anonymous. We are involved in a discrimination lawsuit because someone in our reception room took a video on how our receptionist was answering her phone,and treating candidates who came to our office. We are accused of treating women and certain groups of people differently.
We are a light industrial, clerical staffing firm and also place engineers. Obviously, there is a different process between an unskilled light industrial candidate, and a degreed, experienced engineer. We found it extremely suspicious that this person was videotaping activities in our reception room.
This has cost our firm thousands of dollars and we’re far from any type of settlement. There were some very negative comments put on various social media sites, which will have future job seekers and clients possibly question our reputation. We have done nothing wrong; this has become a nightmare for our team and our company. Our receptionist ended up quitting. Not sure what advice you would give to other owners, I would not want this to happen to another owner.
Anonymous
Dear Anonymous:
This owner called me shortly after this happened and I’m grateful she is willing to share her story.
There are several lessons to be learned here:
- What is said on the phone and in person by everyone in your company must be consistent.
- As an owner you must invest in errors & omissions insurance,
- You must provide resources to 100% of the people who contact your business for assistance.
- Negative information about you or your company on social media sites can damage your reputation, word of mouth advertising, and will reduce referrals,
When we conduct surveys with job seekers who utilize staffing or recruiting firms, it is interesting to discover that 100% of them expect you to find them a job. When you think that our profession places less than 5% of candidates we attract, this is a reputation buster just waiting to happen.
You need to implement the first three suggestions above as soon as possible to protect yourself and your business. This is a conversation you need to have with 100% of the individuals who work in your company. If you do not have time to provide a resource for everyone attracted to your company, we have developed something for you. Go to www.happycandidates.com and set up a customized career portal that will provide job seekers with 100% of the resources they need to find a job. This career portal will be customized to look like your firm developed this resource for them, and it takes less than 15 minutes to set it up.
There is no down side to the resource. Offering this type of resource not only improves the overall candidate experience, it generates passive income for your firm. The ROI is almost instant.
If you don’t set up one of our career portals, you need to develop resources for candidates you will not place so everyone has a positive experience with your company.
Barbara J. Bruno, CPC, CTS