Reference Checking as an Employment Practice
fact that only half of reference checking organizations offer their reference checkers
some kind of training in the process.
20
Under conditions of low standardization and
training, reference checkers might well be more successful in eliciting simple facts
from reference providers than in obtaining more complex or sensitive information.
The second issue concerns who conducts the reference checks. SHRM has
consistently found that many organizations delegate refer
ence checking to HR
personnel.
21
Survey research conducted with human resources specialists who check
references has found that many of these individuals do not believe references
provide credible information.
22
This perception of limited usefulness may result in
reference checking being given a low priority. When reference checking is a low
priority, it may not be done, or may be done in a perfunctory and ineffective
manner. Unstructured, inconsistent, and unreflective reference checks may not
produce useful information. To practitioners who are unfamiliar with best
practices, this poor return may seem intrinsic to reference checking as a method.
Agency Reference Checking Also Varies. In the Federal employment
arena, as in the workplace generally, there is also considerable variation among
agencies in reference checking practice. OPM, the Federal Government’s central
human resources authority, provides little direct guidance on the topic of reference
checking. The Delegated Examining Operations Handbook
23
advises agencies to
verify information provided on the job application or resume, but does not specify
how this should be done. OPM’s Strategic Human Resources Policy group
reinforces the status of reference checking as an assessment and emphasizes agency
responsibility to use valid assessments, but currently provides no detailed guidance
for best practices in checking references.
24
MSPB gathered information about reference checking by Federal employers in a
recent governmentwide survey.
25
Results indicated that most (76.5 percent)
supervisors who had hired a professional or administrative employee included
reference checking as a component of the hiring process. Reference checks were
20
SHRM 2004, op. cit., found that 52 percent of organizations surveyed offer reference checkers training
in “detecting red flags” and only 44 percent offered general training in conducting effective reference checks.
21
SHRM 1998, op. cit., reports that 67 percent of surveyed organizations delegate reference checking to
HR personnel. SHRM found that 15 percent of employers contracted reference checking to outside
contractors and only 14 percent had reference checks conducted by the individual who would manage the
candidate in the new job. This trend persisted in 2004 (SHRM 2004, op. cit), with 61 percent of reference
checks conducted by HR personnel, 17 percent by managers, and 17 percent by outside contractors.
22
“Trends in Reference Checks for Professional-Level Employees,” op. cit.; Lawrence S. Kleiman and
Charles S. White. “Opinions of Human Resource Professionals on Candor of Reference-Givers,”
Psychological Reports, vol 74, no 1, pp. 345–346.
23
Delegated Examining Operations Handbook, Washington, DC: U.S. Office of Personnel Management
(OPM), 2003.
24
Some agency personnel misunderstand the distinction between reference checking and background
investigation and as a result contact OPM’s investigations unit, which does not provide official guidance to
agencies looking to improve their reference checking practice.
25
For a description of this governmentwide survey, see The Federal Workforce for the 21st Century: Results of
the Merit Principles Survey 2000, Washington, DC: U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board, September 2003.
The results reported here are from a subset of 311 Federal managers with recent Federal hiring experience.
Reference Checking in Federal Hiring:
Making the Call
8