How to Prep Your Candidate’s References

By Diane Skullr

More and more employers are checking references on potential new hires now more than ever before. There are a huge number of unemployed and underemployed candidates who are applying for multiple jobs each week. What this means is that friends, co-workers and past employers of these candidates are getting called multiple times per week for reference checks. Multiply that by the time spent with each telephone call and these friends, co-workers, and past employers are spending countless hours each week on reference checks.

Generally, people are happy to give references when they think they are helping someone. But, many are now saying enough is enough. Some of these friends, co-workers, and past employers are asking that their names NOT be given out unless a job offer is imminent. That creates quite a problem for recruiters who need to know that their candidates are as good as they look on paper. Recruiters don’t want to be spending their time and effort on someone only to later discover that their candidate has no references or that the references are terrible. After all, a recruiter’s reputation is based on the quality of the candidates they are presenting.

Solution? Reference surveys.

Revise your reference check forms and design a basic reference survey form. Ask your candidate to distribute the form to their references in advance or offer to send it to their references yourself. Once completed, have these references sent to you. As an added value to your services, allow the candidate to keep a copy for themselves and then they can use these forms, preferably with your company name on them, to submit to other prospective employers if the position with you does not work out or if you don’t have a position to offer them.

You may need two different forms, one for their past employers and one for their post-employment personal references, the people with whom they worked. Include all the standard questions that are always asked in a reference check.

1. The reason for leaving.
2. Character traits.
3. Attendance.
4. Discipline problems.
5. Strengths and weaknesses.
6. Their ability to get along with others.
7. Are they eligible for rehire.
8. Job performance.
9. Work ethic.
10. Overall opinion.

You may also want to let them know on the form that you will be calling them to ask position specific questions, if the candidate progresses through the interview process. You could even include a list of questions that you may be asking if/when you call that are job specific. Not every reference will answer every question on your form and that’s OK because you can ask them again if/when you call them.

By completing the reference survey the friends, co-workers, and past employers will reduce the frequency of the reference check calls as only serious, job-pending, inquiries will be made. They do want to help and this will give them the opportunity to help without being personally overwhelmed.

Encourage your candidate to discuss the position with their friends, co-workers, and past employers so that they can include the candidate’s strengths related to the new position into their references. Help them to understand what to say to demonstrate how well they fit the job.

Having this conversation will help the candidate to imagine themselves in the new job. When they can do that, they will answer their own interview questions more confidently. They will put more emphasis on what they will be doing for the new employer rather than on what they’ve done in the past. If you’re worried about anything negative from an old job, this will go a long way towards eliminating that.

Be sure to get a complete list of references from your candidate so that all of those references can be prepped using your new reference survey. No surprises.

Giving people a heads up and giving them time to think about how they want to discuss your candidate is both thoughtful and will likely benefit your candidate should the prospective employer decide to call on the references themselves. Everyone is prepared.

Two different sample copies of a Reference Survey can be found as FREE downloads off the Infoployment website at http://www.infoployment.com/Recruiters.html They are in word format so that you may make whatever changes you would like to.