
Reference Check Job Candidates - eladgil
http://blog.eladgil.com/2013/03/reference-check-candidates.html
======
RyanZAG
This seems like terrible advice. If someone tried to ask the same question to
me about a past colleague multiple times in an attempt to get me to say
something bad about them, I'd end the call very quickly.

In fact, the only information I ever give about a past colleague is either
that they were great to work with (if their performance was acceptable) or no
comment at all (if their performance wasn't). Badmouthing a past colleague is
just plain immoral and likely to lead to many closed doors for everyone
involved in the future when that past colleague is now heading up a billion
dollar company.

You contact references with only one question or you are making a huge
mistake. "Did So-and-so work there from X to Y in a position of Z? Was he
dismissed for any offense? Thank you for the information, good bye."

~~~
ambiate
I completely agree with you. In fact, in certain states/cities, there are
legal ramifications for calling businesses or references asking anything
outside the realm of 'Did they work there, yes or no?'

------
rm999
I do agree that a reference call can be very valuable, but up to 15 minute
calls? When you call a reference you are essentially making someone do a favor
for someone else, which is fine because the candidate asked for that favor.
But I also think it's proper to keep it short and simple so you don't impose
too much. It's your job to vet the candidate, not theirs. I used to use a
high-level senior VP above me as a reference, and 15 minutes of his time was
worth a lot - probably on the order of 50 dollars based on his compensation.

>If possible, find people who have worked with the candidate that the
candidate did not suggest you talk to.

 __NO __. This is beyond imposing, it is dangerous and unethical. People talk,
gossip travels, and some companies consider employees leaving a very sensitive
manner. If I found out a future employer did this to me I would consider
retracting my application, even if I had already accepted an offer.

~~~
RockyMcNuts
Maybe it depends on the industry. But I worked in a field where everyone knew
everybody if you'd been around for a few years. So it was an absolute no-
brainer to look up who you knew at the companies the candidate worked, pick up
the phone and ask what's the word on the street about this guy. And the guy I
was calling would typically consider it a favor to me, not to the hire. In
fact, failing to call, or to have a network of people who could help on hiring
references, purchase references, occasional technical and best-practice
questions, would be failing networking 101 and the real no-no at that level.
Of course, this would be when an offer was about to be made, and not to anyone
who wasn't supposed to know about the hire, or whose discretion couldn't be
relied on, and just 1-2 people.

Of course, randomly contacting a bunch of people via LinkedIn would have been
bad judgment and a reason for the candidate to question working for someone
who would risk putting them in an embarrassing spot.

Also, I don't really agree with the most direct in-your-face questions in the
post _unless_ you know the reference _really_ well. If I was the reference
those questions would make me uncomfortable and I would shut down the call
pretty quick. Would almost make me think the candidate had a buddy testing me
for what type of reference I was giving, which is not totally unheard of.

Also, my experience is the check is mostly to check for the red flag, make
sure their description of role was accurate, maybe confirm/fill in a gap about
something you might not get the full story about from the applicant, how much
were they really involved in X, circumstances of departure, basic strengths,
weaknesses, would you hire again. If you can't do the technical / cultural fit
yourself you're gonna have a bad time.

Other than that, I'm surprised at the pushback... for the most part this is
the way it's done.

~~~
rhizome
References are not an opportunity to engage in "networking 101." The advice
recommended in the post belies a poor screening and interviewing technique.

~~~
RockyMcNuts
Sorry if I was unclear. I did not mean it was an opportunity to build a
network. I meant, at least where I was, if you were a hiring manager and
didn't have the ability to tap your network and check through a back channel
if someone in the industry was legit, and take advantage of it, you weren't
really doing your job.

~~~
rhizome
Legit-ness should be sorted out WAY before references are checked.

------
wtvanhest
For the record, the fastest way to burn a bridge with me would be to find
random people at my last/current company I didn't give you permission to talk
to, and go out and talk to them.

If I find out a person at a company I am supposed to work for does this, I
won't say anything, I just wouldn't show up my first day or any day in the
future.

All relationships start with trust, and while I understand you are trying to
protect your business, you are also putting candidates at personal risk while
lowering the value of their network.

References are challenging, and I don't plan on relying on them any more than
making sure a person can come up with 3 or 4 people that will say something
positive about them. I don't care if they are not telling the truth, but it is
nice to know that the entire world doesn't hate them.

*In most cases, I have strong bonds with people I currently and previously worked for, and I am highly likely to get an email if you reach out to them. If they don't send me an email, I didn't know them and you won't get good information.

If someone ever calls me and does this, I will first lie to them, then second
I will pick up the phone and call the person who they are trying to get
references for.

~~~
snate
This is the piece of "advice" which jumped out at me as being completely
horrible.

What if the job search is going out without informing EVERYONE at the
prospect's company? What if the prospect hasn't informed his boss that he is
looking yet? There is a real chance that talking to some random person at
candidate's current job could put their current position in jeopardy. You
could also happen to ring up some vindictive asshole who just wants to
sabotage the prospect's chances.

------
agilecoder
These are all wonderful suggestions, but personal experience in the US and
dealing primarily with candidates from medium to large companies is that
reference checks get referred to HR, and the policy is to confirm dates of
employment and positions only. Too much litigation risk in the US to say much
more.

~~~
moepstar
So that's the situation for the US - i wonder how other parts of the world
think about that practice, let alone if it's allowed by the law? Is there a
list somewhere?

------
xb95
This advise seems like it's suited for the business world and not well placed
here.

In the tech/startup world, I would advise against doing this sort of in-depth
questioning of references. Really, most of these checks are going to be done
by your HR team/recruiter and all they're really trying to establish is that
they are who they say they are. They're not trying to establish how awesome
the candidate is.

The "awesomeness" part is something you need to establish through the rest of
the process:

* interviews with the hiring manager and team

* code samples via Github or some other project

* a coding challenge that is reviewed by several people

There are some other things you can do. I for one am a proponent of the
"social interview" idea. I like to have candidates come over for some part of
the event where they aren't sitting in a conference room and you aren't asking
them technical questions. See if you can have a conversation with her, figure
out if he's friendly and interesting, decide if you're willing to spend the
next two years "in the trenches" with this person.

~~~
harryh
So you're saying that in the startup world, where companies are smaller and
each employee matters more, companies should do less work when trying to
validate candidates before making offers?

~~~
thedudemabry
I believe he's proposing that startups do more effective validation of
candidates, not less work.

The information reported by references (or cold calls) can be vague,
misleading, and limited by anti-defamation policies.

On the other hand, information gathered from their publicly shared code,
interviews, hanging out, pairing, coding problems, etc. is much more relevant
to your question. Will this person fit our startup?

~~~
harryh
He's saying that a particular avenue of information gathering shouldn't be
used at all. That's doing less!

Elad is saying that all of those things (interviews, hanging out, looking at
shared code, etc etc) should be done and ALSO reference checks should be done.

And of course the information from references can sometimes be vague and
misleading. All information about candidates can be vague and misleading. It's
the job of a good hiring manager to sort through all of this information and
do they best that can to form a complete picture. The more information the
better!

------
blindhippo
If I ever found out a potential hiring company went around my list of approved
references to find other opinions I would immediately cease negotiations and
start warning colleagues about that company.

It's rude. It's invasive. If you are incapable of determining if the person
sitting infront of you is a fit for your organization without serious spy
work, you shouldn't be sitting in the hiring chair.

References are doing a favor for the applicant. To cold call people randomly
trying to dig up dirt is sad and pathetic.

------
Glyptodon
I still haven't figured out how to find references who might not accidentally
leak the fact that I'm looking elsewhere to the whole office.

I tend to end up putting people from jobs previous to the current one to avoid
this, which probably makes the whole process somewhat pointless.

It's all part of the picture when it comes to explaining why the hiring and
job search process itself is more of a problem than the availability of hires.

------
sk5t
I once received a reference-verification call for a previous coworker and
friend which started to go in the direction of asking for more than
confirmation of employment and general pleasantness to work with, and I
wrapped it up as soon as possible with the old "hard stop." It's not my job to
pause my _actual_ work to sell you on a candidate. A job reference is not
analogous to a letter of recommendation. If my previous coworker was a
colossal jerk, I might say, "Hmm, I'm not really sure about that, it was a
while ago," and that's it.

------
ChuckMcM
This is, as the comments suggest, a touchy subject. I generally advise people
to never respond to reference check requests with anything other than
confirming they were employed.

There is a risk that a bad reference will get you sued by the candidate, and a
good reference (where the candidate doesn't work out) gets you sued by the
company. Its a lose-lose situation.

That said, one of the really interesting things about the San Francisco Bay
area is that there is relatively high job mobility. So a lot of job motion (or
not) is from other employees who refer their friends, or suggest that the
company pass. Once someone has gone through one of the 'grinders'[1] they get
some visibility to other people who worked with them or was aware of them. In
my own experience I've met people who I won't work with ever again. And people
whom I would work with in a heartbeat. And a bunch of people in between. I'm
sure that I land somewhere on that spectrum for a bunch of people in the
valley as well.

It is more effective to look and see where a person has been hired and stayed
vs hired and bounced out again, to get an understanding of how they fit in or
didn't. And if they followed folks from previous jobs or sought out new folks.
Was their mobility increasing? (if so they are probably pretty good) or
decreasing? (then you might want to probe that, _with the candidate_ )

At the end of the day, digging up gossip on someone by seeking out back
channels cannot get you useful data on the candidate.

[1] A 'grinder' is a large 10,000+ employee tech company which is constantly
consuming new hires to fill roles due to a relatively high rate of turnover.
Examples have been HP, Apple, Google, Sun, Xerox, Cisco, Etc.

~~~
ekoontz
"a good reference (where the candidate doesn't work out) gets you sued by the
company"

Really? Has this ever happened with the plaintiff ending up winning in court?

------
niggler
FYI the word is "discreet" not "discrete"

I find that practice (trying to find someone else to give a reference) to be
deplorable. Suppose you do talk to a current coworker. If the candidate
ultimately doesn't join your company, you've basically messed up future
relations between the candidate and the coworker (and possibly the boss --
don't assume that the coworker will remain hush-hush).

------
joonix
This is pretty bad advice, sorry.

------
readme
> If possible, find people who have worked with the candidate that the
> candidate did not suggest you talk to. You need to do this discretely - e.g.
> don't call their current boss to ask how good they are thereby screwing over
> the candidate, or alternatively causing their existing employer to make a
> big counter offer.

You are not doing a security clearance background check on your future
employee. It's one thing if your friend bill worked at company X and you
casually ask him about bob when you have a chance encounter one day.

But it's completely unacceptable to engage in this kind of espionage. The
reason is that the candidate has not been informed of it, plain and simple.
What you're advocating is tantamount to spying. This person might not think
it's worth you digging through the coffers of his past just to work at your
company. Did you ever stop to think that?

------
njloof
Wouldn't it be easier just to ask for their Facebook password?

------
mrpickles
If a recruiter were to read this article and do something like this to me, I
would be totally pissed.

If I were to find out that a recruiter took the time to find extra references
by rummaging around my social networks and calling people I didn't mention, I
would feel some serious serious mistrust. This is the kind of thing that would
actually make me reject an offer from a company.

If you have found that this technique actually works for you, then what you
are actually discovering in reality is that you probably: 1) Have an
inadequate technical interview process. 2) Have inadequate tech recruiters.

------
elmuchoprez
"If possible, find people who have worked with the candidate that the
candidate did not suggest you talk to."

Would be nice if the article suggested how you go about finding these people
in a fair and responsible way.

~~~
kdazzle
Private Eye. I hear Jack Nicholson's real good.

------
kdazzle
5 references seems a bit overbearing...

------
seeingfurther
This is just plain bad advice.

------
tokenadult
This is good advice, and the first comments don't do this helpful article
justice. I have just been reading about reference checks in standard reference
books about hiring (as part of updating my differing FAQ about hiring
procedures before I post it to my personal website), so I can vouch for the
correctness and helpfulness of what is said in the submitted article. The
procedures mentioned are legal, and you are a chump if you don't use them.

Recycling some electrons, here is an adaptation of a comment I made on Hacker
News about a year ago:

There is an art to checking references. Even if a company has a policy of
giving bare minimum information, find out a TELEPHONE NUMBER of someone in
that company who knows your candidate and start a conversation. I was given a
specific script of questions to ask back in the 1990s when I was a community
volunteer for my local public school district, doing reference checks on
superintendent candidates. A consultant advised the school district (and
through the district, me) on how to do this. If you talk to someone directly
by voice, and have a good list of specific questions to ask about the
candidate, you will be AMAZED at what people say, policy or no policy. Company
policies don't keep people from sharing stories with curious listeners. The
key is to learn what questions are legal to ask and reveal the most
interesting stories about the person you are thinking of hiring. There are
consultants who can advise you about checking references, and, as people who
have had actual hiring authority for important jobs will say, checking
references is a lot less expensive than making a wrong hiring decision. Once
you've learned the questions, you know what to ask.

I've just asked my consultant Google, and he suggests several sets of useful
questions to ask when checking references:

[http://hiring.monster.com/hr/hr-best-practices/recruiting-
hi...](http://hiring.monster.com/hr/hr-best-practices/recruiting-hiring-
advice/job-screening-techniques/reference-checking-questions.aspx)

<http://www.drgnyc.com/list_serve/Jan24_2005.htm>

[http://www.acadweb.wwu.edu/hr/Employment/InfoForHiringOffici...](http://www.acadweb.wwu.edu/hr/Employment/InfoForHiringOfficials/HiringPersonnel/Exempt/TelephoneReferenceChecks.pdf)

[http://www.best-job-interview.com/reference-check-
questions....](http://www.best-job-interview.com/reference-check-
questions.html)

<http://www.k-state.edu/hr/employment/referencecheck.htm>

[http://pbsbo.ucsc.edu/personnel_payroll/staff/recruit/ref_ch...](http://pbsbo.ucsc.edu/personnel_payroll/staff/recruit/ref_check.html)

[http://www.bridgespan.org/Publications-and-Tools/Hiring-
Nonp...](http://www.bridgespan.org/Publications-and-Tools/Hiring-Nonprofit-
Leaders/HiringTools/Reference-Check-More-Than-Formality.aspx)

[http://jobsearch.about.com/od/referencesrecommendations/a/re...](http://jobsearch.about.com/od/referencesrecommendations/a/refercheck.htm)

AFTER EDIT: My comment on the initial response to this comment of mine is that
I am on record

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5227923>

as saying here on HN that if you want to hire a good worker, you should give
the job applicant a work-sample test. Research tells us that, and wishful
thinking can't make that untrue.

But if you are relying on anything said implicitly by someone's references to
decide whom to hire, you had better check the references. People lie on their
reference lists. They do that a lot in industries where the custom is not to
check references. (We have read some stories about that here on HN over the
years.) If your work-sample procedure for hiring is airtight enough, checking
references may not add much to your hiring procedure, but it is legally safer
to check references (to avoid employer legal exposure for negligent hiring)
than to not check references. You prove you are a gentleman and a good sport
by letting the honest people be discovered as honest when you check their
references. Engaging in wishful thinking on this issue protects you neither
legally nor practically.

~~~
mfringel
_Even if a company has a policy of giving bare minimum information, find out a
TELEPHONE NUMBER of someone in that company who knows your candidate and start
a conversation._

So, now you're going to get someone who is dumb enough to respond to what
could conceivably be a social engineering call, and asking them for personal
information about a third party.

I can see no way that this will end up with useful and/or actionable
information.

~~~
tokenadult
_I can see no way that this will end up with useful and/or actionable
information._

You haven't actually done this. As I mentioned in my parent comment to your
comment, I actually have. That was very helpful to the public school district
where I was serving as a community volunteer for knowing which superintendent
candidate to hire. By the way, the personnel director of our public school
district reported to the school board last year that when teachers leave the
employment of the district, he almost NEVER hears reference check telephone
calls, which he would be happy to answer, from any subsequent employer of
those teachers. He thinks that is seriously weird. Don't people want to be
careful when they hire teachers of young children?

~~~
numbsafari
Yes, that's why they have criminal background checks performed and are
licensed by the state.

The risk of a defamation lawsuit is a very serious and real thing.

------
michaelochurch
I'd flag this, but the OP is getting lots of deserved hate and that would stop
the pile-on process, so I won't.

Thanks, HN.

