The Questions Every Charity Manager Should Ask a Job Seeker’s References

JOB MARKET

By Alison Stein Wellner

All of the résumés have been reviewed, the candidates have been interviewed, and you think you’ve got just the right person to fill that open spot at your charity. So is it time to offer the job? Not before you check your ideal candidate’s references.

Reference checking can be tedious, but it is essential. Up until this stage of the search process, most of your information has come directly from the candidate’s mouth. Checking references provides “corroborating evidence,” says Arlene Vernon, president of HRx, an Eden Prairie, Minn., consulting firm that works with many nonprofit organizations. “You want to make sure that a person hasn’t made up everything they’ve told you. A ridiculous amount of résumés are falsified to some extent. This gives you the opportunity to hear from someone else that they can be trusted, that they can do what they said they can do, and they’re not going to blow up your organization, morale-wise.”

Even if you do nothing else in a reference check, you can verify the basic outline of the candidate’s career path, and confirm your decision, says J. Damian Birkel, executive director of the Professionals in Transition Support Group, a nonprofit organization based in Winston-Salem, N.C. And if you check carefully, you’ll develop a well-rounded, nuanced picture of the candidate’s future at your charity.

Laying the Foundation

The basis of a successful reference-checking process is set during the interview itself, says Pat McCabe, human-resources director at the Appalachian Mountain Club, in Boston. “I have the candidate’s résumé in front of me as I’m interviewing, and I keep a running list of what I want to ask the candidate’s references,” she says.

During the final interview, ask the candidate for his or her references’ names and contact information. You don’t have to settle for only those the job applicant provides, says Ann Christen, chief operating officer of the Charles and Helen Schwab Foundation, in San Mateo, Calif. She advises asking for a range of references that fits the position being filled, including a board member, supervisor, and subordinate who have worked with the candidate.

Sometimes nonprofit employers ask that job candidates provide more than just names and phone numbers for their references. Joan Pierson, director of human resources at the Children’s Health Fund, in New York, requires that candidates provide three written references, at least two from people they know professionally rather than just personally. This gives her a starting place when she follows up with each reference by phone.

Before you begin gathering information about job applicants, be aware of your legal obligations to them. Although many employers neglect this duty, you need to get written permission from candidates to conduct reference checks, says Neil Martin, a Houston employment lawyer who counts many nonprofit organizations among his clients. This requirement is spelled out in the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act, which covers any inquiry into a person’s background, character, and reputation. The act also states that you must advise candidates of their right to know about negative information you have turned up — but only if that information prevents you from hiring them, says Mr. Martin. (The rationale: A person has a right to know about negative information that is hampering their employability. If that information is inaccurate, the job seeker would then have a chance to correct it.)

If you don’t comply with this law, Mr. Martin says, you could be liable for fines or even a lawsuit. He concedes that it is rare for suits to be brought on these grounds — most job candidates aren’t aware of their rights in this regard. But legal action is not out of the question, he says, and the real danger comes not from the possibility of an individual lawsuit but from a class-action suit about your organization’s hiring practices. If you haven’t maintained good records that indicate why you rejected each and every applicant, he says, it could be difficult to prove that you have rejected job candidates for legal reasons.

Create the Script

In general, much of the same advice that applies to developing interview questions applies to developing reference-check questions. In fact, you’ll probably want to reuse several of the same questions. (For pointers, see the Philanthropy Careers article “Nonprofit Managers and Recruiters Offer Tips for Interviewing Job Candidates.”) Some questions, though, should be fresh: Ms. Christen says that she meets with everyone who was involved in the interviewing process, and asks each person for specific areas of concern that she can probe when talking to a candidate’s references.

Before calling a candidate’s references, it is a good idea for an employer to write a script for him or herself, says Bob Sellery, managing director of Robert Sellery Associates, a Washington recruiting company that specializes in nonprofit organizations. You don’t have to follow the script exactly, he says, but such notes help you stay organized so you can get all the information you seek in one phone call.

When calling references, says Ms. McCabe, it’s a good idea to try to make appointments to speak with them. “I want them on the phone longer than five minutes,” she says. She says she finds it helpful to start her interview of references with a description of the position, and asking how well the candidate fits the job. She’ll ask for the reference’s advice about supervising the job applicant. If a candidate is coming from the for-profit world, she’ll often ask about his or her reliance on support services like administrative assistants, which are not available at her organization, or at many small charities.

And there’s always one question she never fails to ask: “Would you hire this person again?” “If I only get five seconds of someone’s time,” she says, “that’s what I want to know and why.”

Careful listening is crucial, says Ms. Vernon. Most people are reluctant to give a blatantly bad reference, but hesitation or careful selection of words can speak volumes, she says. “If a person pauses more, is thinking about their words more, I can hear it in their tone,” she says. “They’re thinking, ‘How do I turn this into something nice? ‘ When a [candidate] is very strong, boom boom boom, [the reference] is quick to provide an answer.”

If you’re hearing a lot hesitation or what sound like euphemisms from the reference, says Mr. Sellery, ask for specific examples of the way the candidate works. Ask the reference to describe what weaknesses the candidate might have, Mr. Sellery says: “If they can’t tell us some limitations, we get worried.” In cases when no one will say a discouraging word about a job applicant, he says, other local nonprofit organizations may produce an unvarnished opinion of the candidate. “There’s a high probability that I know someone who knows this person — someone who will give me a straight answer,” he says.

Nonprofit employers should be sure to ask about a job applicant’s capacity for collaboration and creativity, says Mr. Birkel — particularly if the candidate comes from a business, where the office culture may not prize or reward those traits. Resource-strapped charities often require employees who are flexible about taking on tasks not covered in their official job descriptions, he says. Mr. Birkel says charity managers should also ask about a job candidate’s ability to handle stress — something that affects nonprofit workers as much, if not more, than it does for-profit employees. Because nonprofit workers must answer to a lot of constituencies — not only their bosses, but board members, donors, and volunteers — it’s vital, he says, to get a sense of how candidates might handle those pressures.

Whatever questions you have asked of each reference, it’s usually a good idea to add a final query: Is there anyone else that I could contact as a reference? Sharon A. Vigano, president of the Dallas investigative firm Cluso, which counts nonprofit organizations among its clients, calls this technique a “double-tiered reference check.” “I think this is more effective than asking the direct person that the applicant gave you to talk to,” Ms. Vigano says. “The second person may not be as prepped.”

This method requires discretion, Ms. Christen warns. “It isn’t always wise, particularly if you’re recruiting an executive director, for example,” she says. “You can’t just call around to staff in that person’s organization. It’s important to understand the person’s situation and what level of freedom you have in talking to the people in their life.”

As you call to check up on a job candidate, you may run into references who will only confirm the most basic facts of the applicant’s employment history — simply that the candidate worked at a particular place, and the dates of tenure. Don’t assume that this reticence signals that something is wrong with a job candidate. In these litigious times, many lawyers and human-resources directors direct employers to provide nothing but these facts when giving references, to prevent candidates from suing their references if they are rejected for jobs, says Ms. McCabe. But that taciturn reference might be willing to send you to someone more candid, says Ms. Vigano: “If a person feels that because of political reasons at work or [an organization’s] policy that they can’t say anything negative about the person, it gives them a way to divert the questions to a person who can answer freely.”

Background Checks

In some cases, a nonprofit employer will want more detailed information on job candidates or volunteers — from calling the registrars at candidates’ alma maters to verify their academic credentials to checking for criminal records.

How much a charity scrutinizes candidates depends on positions being filled, says Ms. Vigano. For someone who is going to be handling an organization’s books, for example, a credit check may be appropriate. (If you acquire written consent from a candidate, a credit check at this stage of a hiring process is legal. The company that provides the credit report, says Ms. Vigano, will produce a version designed for employers, which won’t include unnecessary, sensitive information, such as credit-card numbers.) In jobs that require working with children or other vulnerable clients, charities sometimes run identity checks to make sure candidates have given their correct names and Social Security numbers, which helps in checking for any criminal activity in their pasts.

Fees for those investigative services vary, but generally range from $5 to $120 depending on the nature of the request, says Ms. Vigano. Background-check companies can easily be found on the Internet or in local Yellow Pages under “Investigators.” While there is no national certification process for such businesses, some states do have licensing requirements. The best bet is to check with your state attorney general’s office and the Better Business Bureau before hiring any investigator. It is also smart to ask the investigator for references and sample reports.

Whether or not a charity manager goes the extra step of conducting background checks, it’s a false economy to ignore candidates’ references, says Ms. Vernon. “It might be that only one in every 10 reference checks saves the day,” she says. “But it’s worth it.”

What are your favorite techniques for checking job candidates’ references? Share them on the Job Market online forum.