Disclosure on Sex Offenders in Case Study

Therefore, certain jobs would require much more scrutiny than others, and would require employers to not hire, or possibly terminate existing employees who are sec offenders in such job roles.

Every organization's Human Resource department then has to deal with the sensitive issues in terms of potentially hiring sexual offenders, and how to handle breaking that news to other employees and customers. It is the burden of the HR department in any given organization to have to go through and actually check each application and each applicant's background. This has become a necessity within the context of the modern workplace. According to the research, "HR offices are weeding through more unqualified applicants and investing time and energy ensuring the accuracy of backgrounds presented on application materials" (Heathfield 2011). This process can be quite tedious, especially if HR does not take preventative steps to ensure they are promoting full disclosure within applicant populations. HR departments must facilitate the efficiency of the process by carefully designing application materials and questions that would force sexual offenders to have to disclose their offenses on the actual applications. Questions regarding such offenses should then be correlated to the actual application materials presented by the applicant. This will automatically point out applicants who failed to provide the necessary full disclosure of their crime under the law. If the applicant failed to disclose such information, it should be an automatic dismissal of any potential hiring with an organization, as it is both unethical and illegal on behalf of the applicant to do so. HR must "establish a no tolerance policy and track record" in terms of applicants failing to disclose any criminal histories, especially sexual offenses (Heathfield 2011).Yet, there are variations within the specific state laws that further complicate the role HR plays in terms of how to handle applicants that have been charged with a sexual crime. Each department must uphold the laws of the individual state in which the organization arises, and sometimes that does still allow for the hiring of sex offenders, depending on the nature of the position and whether or not they had disclosed such information at the time of applying for the position. When issues arise, it is also important for the HR department to step in and mediate the situation. It is the HR's responsibility to investigate any issues further, which could potentially lead to asking details about the crime itself in order to see if the applicant is still potentially open for the position even after disclosing their crimes......