The 2012 Employers Background Screening Practices Survey was conducted at the 2012 SHRM Annual Conference held on June 25 – 27th, in Atlanta, GA at the exhibit booth of PreemploymendDirectory.com. Human Resource professionals that visited our booth were asked to participate in the survey and to complete the questionnaire. In addition, a post card mailing was conducted to the pre-conference attendee list which directed attendees to an online version of the same survey. We received a total of 325 people completed surveys.
While this survey does not rise to the level of being statistically significant we believe it offers some key insight on how background screening service providers from the end users perspective.
The range of responses to on this question have remained relatively steady over the five year period with the four surveys we conducted. We believe for the background screening industry to move beyond being view as a commodity industry the ‘extreme and very satisfied’ responses will need to exceed 80%. This is a steep growth curve. We believe the NAPBS Accreditation process will help move the scores in this direction.
W. Barry Nixon is the COO, PreemploymentDirectory.com the leading background screening information portal and online worldwide directory of professional background screening firms and Suppliers to the background screening industry. He co-authored the landmark book, Background Screening & Investigations: Managing Hiring Risk from the HR and Security Perspective. He also is the publisher of award winning newsletters, The Background Buzz and The Global Background Screener, and the author of the Background Checks column in PI Magazine.
In addition, Barry is a past recipient of the elite ‘Top 25 Influential People in Security’ by Security Magazine and past Co-Chair, International Committee for the National Association for Professional Background Screeners (NAPBS). He currently serves as a Global Ambassador for NAPBS.
You can contact Barry at 1-949-770-5264 or online at wbnixon@preemploymentdirectory.com