Management - Theft, business espionage or embezzlement: about 10% of employees are dangerous to the company they work for
We want to assume that the employees next to us are law-abiding people who will never hurt a company that pays them a paycheck, but the reality is more like a scale where even the most decent employee can feel disgruntled and take action that can do business harm. Can it really be prevented?
Recruitment of job applicants in the business sector usually involves interviews, recommendations, and professional assessments. Unlike the recruitment process in the public sector, business owners usually do not conduct in-depth investigations into the potential for criminal damage that the job candidate may cause for business. Making sure a job candidate's recommendations sometimes look like one small link that can be waived, but wrong or incomplete examination can lead to the hiring of the wrong candidate, which can hurt the business. "Every company that employs a large number of people is exposed to many risks from its employees," says Ronen Zirin, a corporate security expert.
Leakage of information to competitors, product theft, money embezzlement, transferring information to burglars on security arrangements, selling products in the store to associates without charging money on some of the products or assuming they are ineligible, theft of trade secrets to start a competing business, transferring information on how to transfer Encryption for a factor that wants to penetrate the computer and impersonate - these are all part of a series of significant risks to be expected from employees in the business sector. When the extent of the damage to the business is significant, it was revealed in many ways, as in the case of Eti Alon, who stole over 250 million from the bank for trading and led to its collapse. But there are quite a few embroilment's, thefts and leaks in business that remain behind closed doors so as not to damage the reputation of the company.
For example, in a large pharmaceutical company that employs hundreds of workers, every job candidate undergoes research before being hired. Several months ago a large project was conducted and the company had a lack of transport drivers. Because it was under pressure, the company turned to an outside haulage company, and the drivers did not investigate like the other employees. The result was that one of the contracting drivers stole goods for hundreds of thousands of dollars. "In retrospect, after an investigation by the driver, it turns out he had criminal cases and he went bankrupt.
Even people whose definition is not bad can do a bad thing
In 2016, more than 5,000 job applicants' investigations were conducted, which found that about 9% of applicants had real potential for criminal activity, which would cause direct financial harm or reputational damage to the workplace and owners. The companies that the candidates tested are business companies in the fields of pharmaceuticals, logistics, car importers, cosmetics and more, all of which share a large number of employees ranging from 150-1,200. It is important to note that pre-employment investigations are one action in a variety of actions to be taken in corporate security management and are intended to predict criminal danger on the part of the employee.
According to the principle of Gauss Bell, at one end (10%) "bad people" that should not be accepted to the company - these are people who even if the employer is good to them, they will always hurt the company. At the other end (10%) are "good people" - those who want to hire them, and these are people who, even if the employer takes care of them, will never hurt the employer and the business. The remaining 80% are those predicted by negative activity only as a result of employer behavior. The better the employer is for the people, the less negative events he will experience, and the more supervisory and supervisory actions he will take, the less negative events will be.
"However, there are circumstances where people who are defined as 'bad' will do no harm," explains Turin. "For example, if they work for a company that has very tempting products like a smartphone or cosmetics. In a case where the company does not monitor and in combination with external circumstances such as the need for money to a person's close cure requires expensive medical treatment, even a person who does not define him as a bad person may Do a negative thing. There was a chance that Etty Alon would go through the screening tool, but the circumstances of her life created triggers that led her to do the deed: the family values, the father's and brother's pressures. "
How to deal with it? "Depending on the job and its degree of agency, each particular period of time is necessary to sit with the employee and understand if something has changed in his or her life circumstances," adds Tsirin, explaining that pre-employment research includes frontal questioning of the candidate, conversations with past jobs and colleagues (even if not communicated) By candidate), network mining and in some cases polygraph testing.
Does the fact that the workplace is private or public affect the risk?
"There is a difference, but it is not material, but is a small addition to the complexity of the employee's feelings. Because a public body is amorphous, and the money supposedly belongs to no one, it is easier to overdo it with public body money. That is, the public does not see it as theft, on the other hand in the business Private if the business owner is training employees, the motivation to steal maybe revenge and be greater than taking from a public body. "
Some companies take a "bring a friend" recruitment method, can that reduce the risk?
"It's a good way to recruit people, but it does not reduce the risk. Companies reward employees with great motivation, and the employee will avoid pointing out his shortcomings, like the recruitment companies, so they naturally don't pose a problem for the candidate."
Distribute the money - and stole 3 $ million
At the end of the past year, supply pressure was created for customers of an entertainment electronics business. The business owner contacted a fraud detection expert and told him that he had lost goods worth hundreds of thousands of shekels. "We investigated the matter and in the course of the investigation, we saw some undercover cameras stealing goods and loading transits. In a questioning we did one of the employees who admitted stealing, it turns out he had not even been investigated at work. He knew he was making a mistake, but he couldn't help it."
The fact that nowadays everything is networked does not reduce the dangers?
"The danger has not diminished because the cameras are recording unusual activity, they are not a camcorder that cooperates with the driver and gives him more goods than he is supposed to take, as well as money embezzlement at the cameras that can not be taken with the camera. About a month ago security company employees stole money bags of 3 million dollars While they were distributing the money, and it was not possible to take pictures, the main basis for preventing the wrongdoing in the organization is the avoidance of bad people's income - cameras, supervision, internal intelligence, inventory counts, regular investigations, computer monitoring software are all means that help Monitor criminal activity, but we prefer to prevent it in the first place."
Are there certain areas where the employee is more at risk?
"Any company that has a large number of people, and no matter what it deals with, is expected to have these kinds of problems. Banks - money launderers, manufacturing and retail companies - product theft, high-tech companies - commercial information, etc."
And what about the size of the company, is the risk similar in small or family companies?
"The smaller the company, the company owner can control every employee. Although the danger exists in small businesses, they face it alone, because of the relatively small control the owner has over the number of employees. As the company grows, control decreases and recruitment is more problematic. The need to hire a body to help manage criminal dangers."
What steps should be taken to ensure that the job candidate may not hurt the business?
"Frontal questioning the candidate, questioning previous jobs, and not necessarily people whose candidate gave their name, but knowing reaching people who knew him, searching open public databases like Google, can sometimes find people who have been tried or questioned by the police, or people who have financial problems (Execution, lawsuits, etc.) Human resources departments are usually under the pressure of job placement, and when under pressure you are in a structured conflict and conflict of interest, and you are not always thorough and determined enough to pinpoint problems with the candidate. Another professional who is disconnected from the job recruitment process Sky, many people have degrees and jobs rig or hide completed jobs in a negative tone, or invent jobs that worked there, and it is desirable to examine the things through."
These are the warning lights that indicate the level of risk that a business employee poses:
1. Theft or embezzlement in previous workplaces
2. Discipline problems or negative behavior in previous workplaces
3. Gambling regularly
4. Occupational instability resulting from criminal-related elements
5. Low Deterrence Threshold - A normative person should be afraid of revealing his name as a thief
6. The perception of the financial situation - no matter how much money a person has in the bank, but how he perceives what he has or does not have
7. Bankruptcies or financial pressures
8. Problematic worldviews and bad moral aspects
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