Welcome to the October 20, 2004 issue of The Total View

Your resource for cutting-edge news, tips, and tools to help you hire, manage,
and motivate top-performing employees.

If you are receiving this issue as a forward, and want your own subscription, visit
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/newsletter.htm

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In This Issue
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1. What evil lurks in the minds of men?

2. Perfect Labor Storm Alerts #266 to #270.

3. LIVE! Can't Get No Job Satisfaction? An interview with Ira Wolfe.

4. What Would You Do if You Could Get Inside The Head of Your Customers?

5. Complimentary Mini Behavioral Profile.

6. Analyzing Performance Problems - An Overview.

7. How Can Background Checks Be Made Simple, Secure, and Affordable?

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The Total View is written and published each Wednesday by Ira S. Wolfe, founder of Success Performance Solutions. (Yes, Ira writes every article, every week!) and is distributed with permission by The Chrysalis Corporation.

Ira S. Wolfe 2004 - All Rights Reserved. Reprints and other distribution by permission only.

To learn more about The Chrysalis Corporation or to read back issues of The Total View, visit our web site at http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/totalview_backissues.htm

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1. What evil lurks in the minds of men?
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"Smiling faces sometimes pretend to be your friend

Smiling faces show no traces of the evil that lurks within."

Smiling Faces Sometimes by Undisputed Truth

It was summertime in 1971 when the pop single, Smiling Faces Sometimes, hit the airwaves. Coming into popularity after the 60s, a decade of social turmoil and distrust, the lyrics resonated to listeners.

These same lyrics resonate today, but for a distinctly different audience. It's you - hiring managers, small business owners, human resources directors and generalists reading this newsletter - who understand what can be hidden behind a smile, a warm handshake and a friendly demeanor.

Consider the interview candidate who dresses well, gives all the right answers, and practically oozes personality. Everyone is bowled over and reference checks confirm gut instinct. You hire the person, and suddenly events start to spiral out of control.

A business that hires employees without screening them faces problems ranging from lawsuits to bankruptcy. The Association of Certified Fraud and Examiner's 2004 Report to the Nation on Occupational Fraud and Abuse, reported that the typical U.S. organization loses 6 percent of its annual revenue to fraud. This translates to approximately $660 billion in total losses. That's billion, with a "B." If you believe that kind of scandal is limited to the big corporations that make the news, think again.

Sure, Enron, TYCO and even venerable not-for-profit organizations such as the United Way and American Red Cross have come under fire. Sadly, that may be the tip of the iceberg. This is the view below the water line: Approximately 46 percent of the fraud affected small businesses, which the study defined as organizations with less than 100 employees. The median loss to these small business owners was $98,000. Industry giants may be able to take the hit of large loses and plummeting stocks. For most small business owners, that sort of body blow does irrevocable damage. Consider the sobering thought that one incidence of employee-committed fraud can literally put a company out of business.

The potential for fraud lurks everywhere, although position tends to affect the size of the loss. More fraud occurred among hourly employees at 68 percent; however, a dishonest manager costs the company 6 times more than the loses incurred by dishonest rank-and-file employees. When a business owner or high-level executive commits fraud, the amount of loss is 14 times higher.

It's clear why employers want proof about who lies and who doesn't. Finding the proof isn't so easy. Back to the prophetic lyrics . "Smiling faces, smiling faces, Tell lies and I got proof, Beware, beware of the handshake, That hides the snake, I'm telling you beware, Beware of the pat on the back , It just might hold you back."

Fear of libel or slander suits reduces most reference checks into little more than confirmation of the dates an employee worked for his employers and the last position held. What do you do when you can't rely on just gut instinct and reference checks?

First, rethink stereotypes. It's not always the young workers with different values about honesty and a strong sense of entitlement who deceive employers. Forty-nine percent of the perpetrators were aged 40 or more; one in six fraud perpetrators were under the age of 30. The amount of money lost is directly related to age, as well, with employees aged 60 or more causing losses up to 29 times higher than the losses incurred by younger employees

Nor is previous behavior a reliable determinant of potential for fraud. A mere twelve percent of the fraudsters reported by the AFCE study had a previous conviction for a fraud-related offense. Fraud-related behaviors transcend education. More than 50 percent of the men and women who commit fraud had a bachelor's or postgraduate degree. The impact of fraudulent actions was 6.5 times larger for highly educated offender than the impact of fraud committed by employees whose education stopped at high school.

Hiring managers resort to several screening and selection tools to recruit energetic, hard-working, and highly skilled employees. With lying and deception rampant among job applicants how can employers gauge integrity, as well as competence?

The combination of behavioral interviewing and validated personality tests so often favored by employers are impractical to screen the volume of candidates who submit electronic applications through job boards and email. A more pragmatic approach is the lower cost and equally effective applicant processing system, background checks, and pre-employment testing to weed out high-risk candidates. Then HR staff has time to focus on qualified and desirable candidates.

At The Chrysalis Corporation, we recommend a three-step process to weed out applicants who may be dishonest or unethical. First, have applicants use an online application processing system such as Total APS. This system can accept resumes and record the results of an employer-generated online "pre-interview" with customized questions on topics ranging from years of experience to how well the applicant resolves mistakes. The applicant completes the questionnaire when he or she submits a resumes. Each question is weighted and rated. Very quickly, the applicant is either qualified or disqualified for the job. An HR manager can log into the company account and scan the list of qualified and disqualified candidates without making a phone call or sending an email.

Next, qualified candidates are complete a pre-employment test. Our clients report great success with one or more of these three assessments: the Counter-Productive Behavior Index (CPBI), SELECT Associate System, and FirstView. CPBI is an excellent tool for assessing honesty and integrity. SELECT Associate System gauges a candidate's attitude toward dependability, honesty, aggressive behavior including sexual harassment, and workplace drug use. It adds another dimension by quantifying the candidate's work attitude for and energy to do the job. FirstView, our newest solution, is a cognitive and personality screening tool. All three assessments can be completed on paper questionnaires or online.

Third, employers must conduct background checks to verify applicant identity, confirm education and employment history, and determine whether there is a history of criminal conviction. Background checks are almost mandatory just to verify the person you are about to hire is really and truly that person.

There are more benefits to using this three-step system. In addition to weeding out high-risk candidates, which saves two valuable commodities - time and resources, these pre-employment products have high reliability. Each test has a validity check, a scale that determines when an applicant tries to fake out the assessment. These critical measures, also called good impression and social desirability scales, weed out applicants who may have tried to manipulate the test. Finally, the prescreening package includes recommended interview questions, providing consistency and legality to the interview process.

For more information about any of these products or services, click on any of the links below or contacting me directly by replying to this email.

Counter-Productive Behavior Index:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/first_view.htm

SELECT Associate System:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/select_main.htm

FirstView JobFit Indicator:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/first_view_jf.htm

Information Architects Background Screening Services:
http://www.ia.com/perceptre/affiliates/chrysalis.asp

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2. Perfect Labor Storm Alerts #266 to #270.
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Fact #266: Sixty-one percent of the human resource (HR) professionals surveyed said they find inaccuracies in resumes after carrying out background checks. (Source: SHRM Background Checks/Resume Inaccuracies online survey, 2004)

Fact #267: 80 percent of HR professionals reported that their companies did at least some criminal background checks on prospective employees in 2003, up from 51 percent in 1996.
(Source: Society of Human Resource Management, 2004)

Fact #268: And 35 percent looked at candidates' credit records, compared with 19 percent seven years earlier. (Source: Society of Human Resource Management, 2004)

Fact #269: The rate of unscheduled absenteeism has climbed to a five-year high of 2.4 percent, according to the findings of the 14th annual CCH Unscheduled Absence Survey, conducted by CCH INCORPORATED..

Fact #270: Last-minute no-shows are costing organizations an average of $610 per employee, adding up to more than a million dollars annually for large companies. (Source: CCH)

Do you sit on a program committee for your local civic, business or professional association? "The Perfect Labor Storm" is the perfect topic for meetings, conferences and keynotes. Schedule Ira Wolfe today. Find out what's ahead in employment trends and how it will affect career opportunitues, education, quality of life issues and more. Call 717.656.4632 for more information.

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3. LIVE! Can't Get No Job Satisfaction? An interview with Ira Wolfe.
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Live! on the web. Listen to Ira Wolfe's interview with Margot King, the host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show Job Talk. During this interview, Margot questions Ira about his new books "Understanding Business Values and Motivators" and "The Perfect Labor Storm"....plus his thoughts and advice on employee motivation, job stress, career changes and personality testing.

To listen to the interview, follow this link:
http://www.super-solutions.com/radio-and-tv.asp#jobtalk

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4. What Would You Do if You Could Get Inside The Head of Your Customers?
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Have you ever imagined how valuable brutally honest feedback from your customers would be to your company or organization? I'm talking about no B.S. feedback about how your customers REALLY feel about your products, services, and support. What would it be like if your clients provided you with suggestions that actually increased your profits and bottom line and eliminated the "hit and miss" approach to sales and marketing? Stop imagining and start knowing!

The easiest and most cost-effective way to get this information is to conduct a survey. A survey eliminates the psychological pressure for clients to tell you what they think you want to hear. Some people, regardless of how unhappy they are with a product or service, refuse to voice their dissatisfaction with a company because it makes them feel uncomfortable. They simply "vote with the feet" and tend to go away without you ever knowing the reason why. The end result -- you lose business without ever knowing the reasons why. Surveys neutralize a potentially awkward and uncomfortable situation for clients by providing a way for them to provide you with honest and direct feedback in an anonymous manner.

We have taken all the stress and hassles out of creating, deploying, inputting, and analyzing survey results.

Contact us today to learn about about real-time e-mail and web based surveys. No more hassles with entering results and creating presentations. Let us do the work for you. We can help you write, set-up, distribute (electronically), process and present in less time for less cost than you can imagine.

For more information about the survey solutions we can provide you with, including our Rapid Survey Option, follow the link below and type "Surveys" in the comment box. You can also contact us by phone at: 229-257-0665:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/contact_us_surveys.htm

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5. Complimentary Mini Behavioral Profile.
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Each week we get many requests from our readers asking if we have a quick, no-cost behavioral profile that they and their co-workers can experience -- WE DO! Follow the following link to respond to a mini DISC based profile. It will take you less than 30 seconds to respond, and the accuracy will amaze you.

Follow this link to respond to our complimentary Mini Behavioral Profile:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/behavioral_profile.htm

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6. Analyzing Performance Problems -- An Overview.
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Dealing with poor performance is one of the most dreaded activities a manager has to do. On top of that, there are dozens of traps managers fall into. Click on the link below for tips on "Analyzing Performance Problems"

"Analyzing Performance Problems" is just one of hundreds of pages of reproducible facts, tips and sample evaluation forms included in Janus Performance Management System.

Follow this link to download a one page excerpt from the Janus Performance Management System that will help you Analyze Performance Problems:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/pdf/Janus_Samples/178_Analyzing_Performance_problems.pdf

To learn more about the Janus Performance Management System and view additional excerpts, follow this link:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com/janus.htm

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7. How Can Background Checks Be Made Simple, Secure, and Affordable?
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The Chrysalis Corporation is please to announce a new strategic partner -- Information Architects, a leader in the world of Background Screening Services.

Information Architects has produced a Background Screening Service specifically for companies who are seeking an intuitive and intelligent way of performing background screening services. Their product is one of the leading background screening services in the market. It was developed using direct input from private and government agencies utilizing the newest technology available for secure Internet collection and delivery of sensitive data. Current clients include the Department of Justice – Bureau of Prisons, Kellogg’s, Marathon Oil, and Comerica Bank and Cabela’s to name a few.

What separates their Web-based product from our competition is the ease of use, the simplicity of utilizing a Web Enabled Application, and our services and reports that are unmatched in the industry. Please understand there are NO MONTHLY FEES, NO SOFTWARE TO PURCHASE AND NO CONTRACTS, you simply pay as you go. They offer a user interface and order fulfillment system which streamlines the collection of vouchering/security background information as well as the integration of an online dynamic interview process.

Included with their services are toll-free technical support, online customer service, chat and e-mail support.

We are proud to welcome Information Architects as one of our partners. Whether you are looking to implement background checking for the first time in your company, or if your current provider is not meeting your expectations, we invite you to take a look at the services that Information Architects brings to the table.

During the month of October, any company that establishes a new account with Information Architects will receive a $250 assessment package from The Chrysalis Corporation, with our compliments. This offer ends promptly at midnight, October 31, 2004.

To learn more, follow this link:
http://www.ia.com/perceptre/affiliates/chrysalis.asp

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Contact Information:

The Chrysalis Corporation
2001 Hammock Drive
Valdosta, GA 31602
229-257-0665

To learn more about The Chrysalis Corporation, visit:
http://www.chrysaliscorporation.com