One of the reasons I have never had the nerve to tell off my boss, even when I am leaving a job, is that I never know when I will need a reference. Which gets me thinking, what happens if an unscrupulous boss agrees to give you a reference, and then gives a BAD reference? I would like to think that a fair prospective employer would inform the applicant, if not to give him/her a chance for a rebuttal, then at least so that they know not to ask that person for another reference in the future.
Has anyone ever had an experience with this, either as the applicant or the prospective employer?
Most employers don’t give ‘good’ or ‘bad’ references anymore. It’s almost standard fare just to confirm employment, time of service and position. And that is all.
Several huge lawsuits were levied against employers who gave bad references or weren’t fair in the amount of info provided about different employees. Bad references that are intended to harm or put the ex-employee in the wrong light can be big trouble, because the former employer is creating a subjective arguement and from and HR perspective, that leaves room for liability.
I’m sure small firms might not be HR savy enough to follow the name rank and serial number approach, but it is very common.
Here in my corp America job/company, I could get fired for kicking my boss in the nuts and I’ll get the same reference as anyone else - even someone retiring in great standing.
Amazingly, telling off an old boss - like burning bridges - always has a way of biting you in the ass later in life. ALWAYS take the high road and move on in good standing. It’s amazing how small the world is. Everyone is interconnected in ways you can’t predict.
When I am vetting applications, I find that lots of employers will answer general questions about an employee’s job performance, skill set, attendance, etc. They will also answer questions like “why did this person leave your employ?” and “would you hire this person again?”
A bad reference hurts. It may not be fair but it’s true. Many people believe that the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior. Again, maybe not 100% accurate but it holds true quite a lot of the time IME.
Philster has nailed it. In my experience the “would you hire again” question is used if the person reapplies at your company at some later date - which actually happens pretty often, especially after the dot com meltdown.
If you tell off the boss, it will just confirm in his eyes his already low opinion of you. It isn’t worth it.
There are services (for examples, google for “reference check service”) that will call your former employers/references and let you know what was said about you.
Philster, I had no idea that employees had such protection in the US. Perhaps the culture (but not the law of course) is different in the non-profit sector where I worked, but I had never heard of this. I suppose it is comforting to know we are protected so well, but on the other hand, it kind of makes a laughingstock of the whole reference practice, doesn’t it?
I had asked the original question because something along these lines happened to me a few years ago. I had gotten a reference from an employer in a non-US company, and had used it in one (fortunately not more) application. I actually got the job, but later my new boss told me it was in spite of my reference. Apparently the reference wasn’t outright negative, but the lack of enthusiasm seemed quite obvious. If my new boss hadn’t told me of this, who knows how long I would have gone on using that reference. Anyway, as a result of that experience, I have decided that if I should ever receive a poor reference from a prospective employee myself, I will definitely let the applicant know.
Zoltar7, thanks for the pointer to companies that do reference checks. I had never heard of such a thing and am very happy they exist.
You can definitely find companies that give out references, but the whole trend is moving away from that. Confirming only employment, time of service and position is becoming the norm.
Just fot clarification since you asked: It’s not a law to protect anyone. It’s a way for companies to minimize the risk from former associates who use their former company as a reference and then get inconsistent results, or results that have a direct impact on the job seeker’s employment and success.
It’s my experience also that many companies limit the amount of information that they give out, since they could have a liability if it is negative information. However, if the ex-employee did something to indicate he/she was a potential danger in the workplace, a company also faces an exposure for not giving a reference. So telling the boss he’s a jerk is in a different category from telling him you’re going to blow his head off.
I left my last job as the result of a layoff after 9/11 and while it was a layoff the boss and I had always been on tricky footing. So, had the layoffs not come, I probably would have been let go eventually.
It took well over a year to land another job. Granted, it was an extremely tough job market, but I couldn’t help wondering if this guy had perhaps ever given one of those lackluster recommendations. If it weren’t such an important reference I wouldn’t have used it.
I’d say, if I had ever found out, ‘by the way, this guy is bad mouthing you’, that I’d make a point of burning a bridge.
One option is to use a cow-orker instead of a superior as a reference. Philster is right though, with larger companies, name rank and serial number is a win-win for everyone.
A former co-worker of mine was asked by our former boss to never use herself and the company as a reference for future employment searches. So bad references fo exist but when the person feels bad/ is sick of ruining your future, they’ll bow out of the process. Needless to say, I don’t use her as a reference just in case.
What Philster said matches my experience, at least with companies of any size with assets to protect. However, there are subtle ways of getting a message across. Joe Doofus gets a comment like, “Sorry, I am not in a position to provide a reference. You may contact our personnel department to verify employment dates.” Joe Excellent gets a comment like, “The reason we let him go was that there was a budget cut and we were forced to reduce staff.” However, if I make a specific comment about Doofus’s poor performance, I leave myself and the company open to charges of libel. And if I go into detail about Excellent’s skill at a particular task, and then he screws up royally at his new job, we’re open to charges of falsifying something. Not likely, but possible.
The only time a company can give a bad ref is if they have a good record keeping department in HR. But there are constructive ways to give people bad references. And a lot of people don’t give any references now, because of the lawsuits. As it is damaging, it’s slander, which is criminal. The onus is on the one making the slanderous claim to prove it correct. One guy who was fired gets the standard “No one would be better for the job.”
I’m pretty sure that a position I was offered got taken away because of a lackluster reference from a former employer.
I use references that are separate from former employers (Tim Horton’s, Pantorama) , such as the former editor of the journal I freelanced for, and the director of the summer camp that I went to for seven years.
I’ll just point out that HR folks will notice if your former supervisors are not able to be used as references. Depending on the release you sign, they may be able to contact the supervisors anyway. You may be making the right choice to list other references, but HR folks will notice the lack of support from previous supervisors.
I use to work in the HR department of a large corporate company. One of my jobs was giving out references for previous employees.
We were trained to give out employment dates, hours worked per week, and rate of pay and only those three. Actually, let me rephrase that. We were trained to verify those three and only those three. We couldn’t tell them, for example, Big Bob worked from 1/1/00 to 1/1/01. They had to ask ‘Did Big Bob work from 1/1/00 to 1/1/01?’ and we were allowed to confirm or deny.
This was heavily stressed during training because of legal issues the company had at one point in the past. This would often cause problems in dealing with the person that was seeking the reference. The only thing we could do was tell them that was our company policy.
That was back when I worked at a big company with assets to protect (like MLS said). Smaller companies I’ve worked at saw no problems in giving out more detailed references.