Posts: Recruitment

You have hired an employee who appears to be perfect on paper, only to later discover that they have misrepresented or deliberately withheld information about their qualifications, employment history or problematic past. A simple and often overlooked way of mitigating unfortunate surprises like these is conducting pre-employment checks to verify whether a candidate is as suitable, qualified and impressive as their resume or interview has portrayed them to be.

The first of our 2022 webinars focused on the employment 'life cycle'. This webinar will cover key legal and HR issues to consider throughout the recruitment process.

Discrimination in the workplace is unlawful under a number of Australian laws, including state and federal anti-discrimination legislation (such as the Age Discrimination Act 2004 (Cth)) as well as the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) (FW Act).

No employer operates in a silo – all employers operate in complex systems of interrelated stakeholders including employees, customers, other businesses, and regulators who enforce the laws that apply to the employer and their business.

As the functionality of HRIS increases and technology generally gets smarter, will an employer’s reliance on the recommendations or decisions of a HRIS put the employer at risk?

Employers are often required to exercise a significant degree of trust and reliance in job candidates, believing that they will be truthful in recruitment processes.

Conducting pre-employment and reference checks may turn out to be the most important part of the recruitment process, particularly for senior positions.

There are range of important considerations for those delivering references to take into account and often conflicting interests can creep into the equation.

Conducting a comprehensive induction for new employees is critical for compliance reasons but should also be viewed as an opportunity to connect new employees to the values and culture.

Job advertisements should be carefully drafted to ensure that they focus on the essential skills of the position and not any irrelevant or subjective factors.

Across the world, issues of equality and justice have taken centre stage recently. We are experiencing a time of increased awareness about the need to redress past discrimination and prejudice towards many minority groups.

During the recruitment process, employers want to present their best side to prospective employees in order to entice top talent to join them. Employers can potentially expose themselves to litigation for representations made or made on their behalf that are misleading and deceptive and later relied upon by prospective employees in the recruitment process.

One of the potential dangers to businesses in the recruitment and selection process is to omit an applicant with a name which may indicate their race, descent, national or ethnic origin from the selection process.

In an attempt to reduce the gender imbalance in Melbourne University’s School of Mathematics and Statistics, the University is now advertising three permanent positions exclusively for female applicants only.

It is all too tempting for job hunters to do: lie on a resume to secure THAT job. Employers may be left red faced however when their recent star recruit doesn’t actually have the qualification/s required or the previous experience as they claimed – and it is only discovered after they have accepted the job and commenced work.

It has recently been reported that a Melbourne man is about to be sentenced for falsifying accounting documents and obtaining property by deception. The 313 charges laid against the man related to his employment at an electrical store. The man had forged four of his character references to secure the employment.

Recently, the South Australian government announced that two of its employees engaged as carers were found unsuitable to work with children, following the introduction of a new testing and screening process involving psychological testing.

Consider the scenario of a CEO who has been with a company for over ten years. The CEO advises shortly before the end of the financial year that they will be leaving to join another company… How does a business respond to this scenario?

For the first time in history, there are five generations of Australians participating in the workforce at once, and whilst it’s widely acknowledged that Australia has an aging population, what is less commonly appreciated is the pressure for older Australian’s to remain in the workforce.

In the modern day workplace, employers are becoming increasingly reliant on computer systems and introducing new forms of technology and equipment to increase productivity and output. It is often therefore a requirement that employees be proficient in certain computer programs or, at least, that they undergo training to become proficient.

We’ve all heard of “blind” recruiting, particularly in the early phases of the recruitment process, but what about the opposite? Actively recruiting based on a visual medium? Look no further than the “Snaplication.”

Organisations have obligations to ensure the health and safety of their employees. One way for organisations to manage the risks is by making use of pre-employment medicals (PEMs).

The implementation and delivery of a work health and safety (WHS) induction program is an important part of the development of a positive workplace health and safety culture for an organisation.

Employers should not underestimate the importance of investing in workplace health and safety, including training for employees as well as ensuring that new hires or those promoted are qualified to perform the tasks of their new role.