Second Chance, Second Look

Welcome to Know Your People from First Advantage, a show about trust in a changing world.

The rules, the technology, the way people work, what customers expect, all moving at once. Trust has to keep pace, and it’s two way. Organizations trusting the worker, the worker trusting organizations, and consumers trusting the provider, and it’s always changing. Trust is established on the first job and reearned on every job after.

This isn’t a show that hands you answers. We sit down with the people who live it. Trust and safety leaders. Those working in regulation and the experts chasing fraud.

The honest version, not the easy one. Let’s get into it.

Fair chance hiring is one of those ideas everyone approves of in principle and almost nobody has to operationalize at 100,000 workers a month. Today’s conversation is with two people who sit on opposite ends of exactly that problem. Angela Preston is deputy general counsel and senior vice president here at First Advantage. She spent more than two decades as a lawyer, most of it in background check screening. And she’s tracked fair chance from the first Ban the Box ordinances to the patchwork of state, county, and city law that employers navigate today. Very few people in this industry have watched that legal movement build from closer range.

And Ryan Bradley is an independent management consultant and the founder of Bradley Consulting Group, where he sits as chief people officer across a portfolio of companies and advises others on hiring, workforce policy, and employment risk.

He has spent his career on the operator side of the table, inside the company’s gig and rideshare platforms among them, are actually trying to accomplish when they bring people on.

He’s also watched Fair Chance grow up close in Philadelphia, one of the first cities in the country to adopt it and one of the furthest along since.

Angela, Ryan, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me.

Awesome. So I I… I’d love to start a little bit on kind of a timeline or a journey perspective where, you know, where is Fair Chance kind of historically operated and where it is today? You know, Angela, love your take. You know, Fair Chance used to be kind of a checkbox. You know, we we accomplished compliance and and, you know, we’ve we’ve checked that box. What does it become since? What have you seen today?

Yeah. So, I mean, taking it back, really, the the fair chance movement, if you will, stemmed from early ban the box initiatives.

And ban the box was sort of the catchphrase of a policy that arose from the belief that if you had a candidate check a box when they applied for a job as to whether or not they had been convicted of a crime, that that was preventing them from the opportunity to really be judged based on their qualifications.

So the the the initial policy movement was to take that checkbox off of the application because that checkbox was barring people who had some sort of criminal history, major, minor, long ago, recently, just sort of across the board, eliminating people from job consideration.

And then that that really started, like, way back in the nineties. Hawaii was sort of on the forefront of that movement, and other states followed suit. It was really, you know, sort of part of an anti discrimination movement of, you know, want… Not wanting to classify people who are more likely to have been arrested, certain, you know, protected class individuals who may be more likely to be arrested, who were, you know, on a broad scale being eliminated from job consideration.

But the the ban the box evolved into, you know, taking into account more considerations, like the timing of questions about criminal history.

When is it fair to actually ask those questions in the hiring process? Should you wait until post conditional offer?

Should you consider all of the other noncriminal elements first, and then you’re permitted to ask about criminal history?

It’s never been like a full scale prohibition on asking about criminal history, but it has been what can we do, what sort of safeguards can we put into place to give people a chance, give them notice, give them an opportunity to explain their criminal history, give some context, give some background. All of those things have sort of evolved into what we think of today as as fair chance. It’s quite a broad umbrella.

It is a patchwork of different states, counties, even municipalities. We’re gonna talk about… I don’t wanna steal Ryan’s thunder, but we’re gonna drill down a little bit into, you know, one of the the cities that has really been on the forefront of this policy movement. So that’s sort of just some context of where we’ve been with it and how we got to where we are today.

Yeah. And and, Ryan, from your perspective, how do you kind of see fair chance kind of in in your world and and how does it kind of come to ground for you?

Yeah. I think Angela did a great job kind of giving the oral history of how we got here. I think, from where I’m sitting, it went from this general rule about when you can ask and what you can ask and it really turned into a rule about how employers decide. And I think, you know, it’s it’s a…

It’s interesting when you have all these considerations and what you have to tell somebody before you turn them down. And and in certain cases, how long they have to actually come back to you with some proof of rehabilitation. Right? So I think a lot of employers handled what Angela laid out years and years and years ago. And I think a lot of them have either never gotten around or they’re just now getting around to kind of the second part of that.

And and I think there’s obviously nuances to gig because with a lot of gigs, particularly now if they’re applying on an app, that box doesn’t even exist to begin with. Right? All these things are kind of run-in the background or they’re saying, yep, I’m agreeing to you running these things, but there isn’t that initial disclosure. So we’ll get into some of that later. But it’s it’s been a challenge and and it’s it’s very nuanced and changes are happening fast and furious all over The US.

So so Ryan, you you touched on a really interesting point. Right? No one reads the 30 page terms and and conditions before they they sign their life away. Right?

And then that goes for not just in the screening space, but, you know, almost everything that that folks do in real life. Right? But touching on gig, this this is kind of the spirit of the gig industry, right? Where individuals are given opportunity to work in, you know, short term hourly shift type opportunities.

They’re considered for roles and and shifts that they wouldn’t otherwise be maybe in contention for. And so when we think about kind of fair chance as a whole, you know, if, you know, either of you could kind of speak on what is the problem that, we essentially seek to solve with with fair chance? Is it equal opportunity? Is it is it allowing for folks to have a sense of trust or confidence in who they bring on?

Like, what is it really kind of stem from?

Well, I can jump in and take a stab at that. I think that the the idea is to create opportunity with fair chance and, you know, end any sort of, you know, sort of premature consideration of criminal history when it’s maybe not as relevant to the the job or the position. So I think that gig…

It’s interesting because gig…

There’s a huge safety focus around gig, wanting to make sure that in this economy that, you know, your your users are safe, that, you know, that they…

The service providers are safe going into an environment. You know, on both sides of the transaction, there’s a huge concern around safety. I think that a lot of folks think, well, this is relevant information. We wanna know if somebody has a criminal history.

We wanna know if they’ve been recently incarcerated or have some sort of a violent crime. So that’s where the tension comes in. And, particularly, I’ve worked with a lot of gig, you know, some of the biggest players in in the…

Pioneers in the gig space, and there is always an emphasis on safety and how do we navigate…

Do these laws… Should these laws even apply to us? Because we’re not employers.

We are, you know, a platform, and I… You know, I’ve been through those conversations as well.

So Gig really does sort of hit in that, you know, where where where the interests maybe aren’t always…

They don’t seem to be aligned or they seem to perhaps conflict. I think that we’ve come of our way in in resolving any potential conflict with that, but it still does create a huge burden for those folks who are, you know, having to follow these laws and keeping up with what’s going on state by state, even city by city, county by county.

Yeah. Yeah. And and you touched on kind of the scale here. Right? We have we have a statistic here. It’s it’s, you know, 37 states and over 150 cities and counties have some version of a fair chance kind of active today.

You know, how does anyone who is kind of operating across The United States think about a patchwork and trying to kind of fit the different use cases. Right? And both of you touched on the concepts where it does look a little bit different and, you know, on this per state or per county perspective. But, you know, Ryan or Angela, how how does someone kinda think about the national lens of of being able to kind of honor fair chance?

I’ll I’ll take a swing at that, I’ll give you another statistic. I I mean, I think we’re talking about seventy seven to eighty million Americans that have something on their criminal record. Right? We can debate what that is, summary offense, misdemeanor, or worse, but, I mean, we’re not talking about a niche group of people.

We’re talking about a massive population of the workforce. Right? And, you know, that problem is is so difficult for for companies to to grapple with. And I’ve…

Like Angela, I’ve I’ve worked with some of the the world’s largest employers. And, you know, they sit around tables and say, well, wait a minute. You know, should somebody somebody who is in a convenience store at 18 years old and did something stupid, you know, should that carry them into their thirties and their forties? And should that person be barred from getting a warehouse job or something.

Right? So I think we’re talking about a massive amount of of the population here. And I think these laws exist, I hope, to solve something that was treated like a permanent disqualification for a lot of those people. Right?

But when you talk about, yes, jurisdictions, 37 states, hundreds of local municipalities, how do you start to paint, you know, policy that keeps you safe, that generally protects everybody? And I think most of the employers I’ve worked with, they they tend to find the strictest rule they can operationally live with. Right? And and then kind of apply it everywhere.

We can debate whether or not that’s the right approach, but I think nine times out of 10, that’s generally how you how you see it. I think from an operations perspective, you might have to live with and accept you’re you’re probably a little off in in some places. Right? And then when those things come to the surface, you know, you you you deal with them.

You you pick them off. I think, generally, that works fine.

These laws are gonna differ, but they change. They change all the time. You We’ll get into Philadelphia here in a bit, but in January, the look back period shortened significantly.

So it’s challenging, but I think when you start to build policy at the corporate level, you tend to build toward that tightest number, and you’re covered in most places, and then you adjust accordingly.

Yeah. It would be so easy if the federal government came up with a standard. But, you know… And in a way, they have. The EEOC spoke to this…

The discriminatory aspect of using criminal history and hiring.

You know, back in 2012, they updated the criminal guidance on the use of criminal information in hiring. So for employers, the EOC does have guidance on how long you can look back on criminal history, what you have to take into consideration, when you have to do a quote unquote individualized assessment. And a lot of these state and local laws have really taken that EEOC guidance and codified it and made it a little bit special. You know, they’ve added their own little flavor to it, their own take on it.

And the problem is they’re all different. You know, you have, like, an LA county that comes in and says, well, not only do you have to provide a written notice to the candidate about the potential for being disqualified, but you have to send it by mail and email.

You have Philadelphia coming in and saying, well, you can look back, but you can only look back this far. You know? They keep changing the rules on us. And while there are already federal rules like the Fair Credit Reporting Act that put into place notice provisions and notice requirements, and you have EEOC title seven guidance saying you have to do with the visualized assessment. A lot of these state and local communities are saying, we want to make our own rule because we have a particular interest in this, which that’s our… That’s how it works in in The US anyway.

So Yeah.

And and obviously, the highest office in the country also determines where some of these laws land and what side of the fence as well. And then that influences and follows suit on state level or city level. Right? So to Ryan’s point, we’ll get to Philadelphia in a second here. But I would love for us to talk a little bit more about… When we talk about these these gig platforms, there’s a little bit of maybe a sentiment of I’d like to understand how these fair chance laws apply to these types of platforms. You know, Angela, you talked about where it wasn’t really clearly set out because they have an independent contractor model or or they’re not doing traditional employment for hiring.

So when we talk about gig platforms that are trying to get as many people onto their platform as possible, you know, speed and scale is kind of the name of the game.

When we talk about fair chance requirements, kind of what’s the first kind of aspect that comes to mind where, you know, you’re trying to kind of balance that tension of applying fair chance and also trying to get as many people onto your platform as as possible? You know, what comes to mind first for you?

And I think that, first of all, when you’re operating at scale, and as you mentioned, Spencer, like speed to hire, getting people on the platform is critical, I think there’s a lot of pushback initially around the idea of what really applies to us because these are independent contractors. We’re not employers. All of these laws are great to protect the employment, you know, people from employment, but this is just really a platform.

You’re engaging as an independent contractor. You have to follow the rules of the platform, and and this isn’t… You know, we don’t have an opportunity to discriminate because we’re not hiring these people. They’re just joining and engaging in the marketplace, and we have a right to keep… A duty to keep the marketplace safe.

So that is, like, the threshold sort of approach. I think that what, you know, what a lot of litigation has resulted in, you know, sort of taking a step back and looking at that and saying, well, maybe technically under a wage in our perspective, we’re not employing people. But in the realm of, like, anti discrimination laws and allowing people a right to make a living, whether that be in a traditional employment situation or some sort of, you know, contractual situation, the same principles would apply.

So I think that there’s been, you know, some recognition that, yeah, this this applies to us. And if if we’re if we’re having…

You know, if if we do want to protect that idea of giving people a fair chance and abiding by these rules that our our policymakers have put in place and our lawmakers have put in place, then how do we sort of create a system that’s going to approach this and not interfere with the speed and the need to get people on the platform? Where do we set our our bar and, you know, how do we approach it? I I don’t know that there’s a great way to do that other than, you know, adopting technology to kind of help you navigate, okay. This person’s in this area.

What do we need to…

How do we need to treat this particular person and kind of use tools to help you navigate that? That’s one of the things that we see with all of this great technology. We use it. We leverage it to help us manage the…

All of the different requirements.

It is a struggle. Right? You you talk about building to speed, building to scale, and a lot can break.

You know? And I think, Angela, you just touched on it. These are folks that they’re looking to pay rent next week and eat tomorrow. Right? And I think the reality for a lot of employers, it is the speed factor.

I think, at least most that I’ve talked to. And look, if if your check is gonna take four to six weeks because of this nuanced thing over here, they’re gonna go drive for the other platform or they’re gonna go work for your platform. Right? So I think that’s that’s a… That is a real struggle that, you know, these platforms are dealing with, particularly in in the the tech space where they’re trying to scale very, very quickly.

Yeah. It’s…

Are you trying to keep people out? Are you trying to bring people in? And I think Totally. Right.

With Gig, the answer is you you have to be bringing people in. But you do have to balance that with the safety considerations and how do you you keep your community safe. And how do you respect the, you know, the the competing needs?

Yeah. And we can talk we can talk all day about how supply demand and safety all kind of hit each other and and and where they they contradict in in this equation, right, because you’re trying to kind of optimize on how many people you can bring on while also trying to keep your your platform safe. There’s a component of if someone has a criminal history or or criminal background. What is the behavioral signal that you’re looking at other risks that they potentially pose to your platforms and and that affects your quality or reputation. But, you know, I I think where I’d love to to kind of ground us is, you know, one of the trailblazers in kind of fair chance in in Philadelphia has moved early and has continued to progress to more than a decade. So, you know, Ryan, can you tell us what’s what’s changed there? What’s hasn’t… Like, what’s the what’s the latest and greatest with Philadelphia in your in your read today?

Big changes in January. Angela alluded to a couple of them earlier on in the conversation. And and some of the biggest changes are more around scope than anything else. Right?

And and there’s a city ordinance now that covers anyone employed or that’s permitted to work for a private employer in the city. And it names independent contractors and and rideshare drivers specifically in those ordinances. So, you know, there’s, there’s some classification gaps that that closed, that that got narrowed. I I think Philadelphia is one of the only places in the country where gig work isn’t necessarily a loophole in in in some of these things.

Right? And I don’t think those things are widely understood, you know, outside of the the Philadelphia bubble that I’m sitting in.

Numbers got tighter. You know, that look back period historically had always been seven years. It went to four, so it was almost cut in half.

Summary offenses, can’t look at it all. Right? And notice requirements got a lot more specific. So I think their challenges here, people sitting in the the Philadelphia area and Greater Philadelphia area have really have have challenged them since January.

And as an employer, you have to name the actual convictions that you’re relying on to make a decision and hand over a report and allow that person to submit evidence of rehabilitation. And then there’s a ten day waiting period. So, again, it kinda all circles back to that speed versus, you know, this push pull. So employers have been very, very busy, you know, sharpening their pencils and and modifying their policies since the…

Since January of this year. There’s also some flags, though, post hire. And, you know, it’s one thing to get them in. It’s another thing to manage them and and keep them.

And now, I mean, if you hire somebody with a record and supervise them more closely than you would anybody else without a specific reason, that’s adverse action now. So, you know, there’s been this whole period of of not only pre employment education, but post employment education. So, you know, employers here have been very, very busy. I can say the the one thing that has not changed is the adjudication process.

I I think a lot of those rules got a bit sharper.

And I think some of the challenges to employers, they’re still running a category matrix that hasn’t been touched in 2026. Right? So I I think a lot of HR professionals are are starting to look like me and and kinda pulling their hair out.

But Philly has been very, very busy.

You know, something you said there, Ryan, about the matrices and the adjudication of of how…

The criteria. I think that one of the things, and particularly maybe with Gig, is looking at what do we really care about. Like, what really makes a difference for our model, for our population, for our particular business or organization, if you will, if you’re a hospital or a nonprofit or a gig platform. You know, what is really the the criteria that you really need to be thinking about.

And if you have not touched your matrix or reconsidered it in years, it’s time to to dust that off and say, okay. Do we really care about certain lower level, offenses? Are there things that we’re okay with? Like, if this is, you know, not a driving position, why do we really care about any moving violations?

And and do we care about that in…

You know, even with… In the sense of safety? What are this sort of… If you if you bounced a check or or, you know, had some sort of a, you know, financial issue, is that really relevant to your ability to to go in and fix somebody’s sink or their… Do their repairs?

If you don’t have any violent crimes on your record and you haven’t had any history of any sort of felony or violent crime, is that okay? And those are things that I think really that that needs to be taken into consideration as the rules keep getting more and more sort of intricate and involved and and maybe burdensome.

I agree. I mean, I think there’s gotta be a compromise, and I I think a lot of employers are starting to realize that. Right? And and I don’t think…

At least a lot of the folks that I I work with and and and touch and consult for, I don’t think the fight’s between the employer and the law.

I don’t. I see a lot of the fight, and it’s exactly right. You you just touched on it. It’s what are we willing to live with? What compromises are we able to to make internally to keep this thing going and and bring great people into our organization that are gonna help, you know, propel us forward or provide that service or whatever.

And I don’t think either of those are necessarily at odds with the statutes. They’re kind of at odds with each other. Right? So…

No.

And where they get… Where you get kind of tripped up as the employer or the platform, you… If you open that nozzle, like you open the floodgates too wide and you… You’re and you’re opening it too far, there’s potential for negligent hiring or, you know, some sort of… You know, if something bad happens, then you have the litigation.

And that’s the other thing that we certainly see is, okay. You made a decision or your policies allowed for this, or maybe your policies didn’t, but your people, you know, didn’t apply it properly.

And then you’re on the hook for if, you know, when something if something bad happens in the workplace or your your worker in a home does something something bad.

And I think it goes back to that matrix, though. You know, what what are what are we agreeing to kind of auto adjudicate here versus, you know, what falls into a gray area that we’ve gotta discuss as a as a group?

And I and I think I see more employers moving in that direction now than sitting around a table and debating what we would accept five, six, seven, ten years ago.

I’d be remiss if we didn’t go a little bit further down the path of, you know, starting to think about what actually is the consequence of of not falling through with with these fair chance laws. I I don’t know, Ryan, if you wanna start us off with what what is Philadelphia look and then maybe Angela, you can talk more broadly about it. But I’d love to kinda hear, you know, for the audience, what… What’s at stake? Right? If we if we don’t kind of abide by these rules, you know, what’s what’s the cost to platforms, to users, all that kind of stuff?

Well, I’m happy to start, but I think Angela is much better placed on the litigation side than than I am. But I think the part I’d add, you know, a lot of this maybe doesn’t necessarily get important.

I think you have a lot of people falling out mid process who who never register as maybe a denial in the employer system. So I think looking at it from the employer side, there there may be a consequential cost to some people that dropped out that otherwise we should have accepted.

You know, I think from the recruiter or reviewer side, you know, I think a lot of these folks, and and when we talk about speed of hire, they’re working clearing a queue of requisitions as quickly as they possibly can in their world. That gets measured.

Right? And there’s there’s a cost to that both from a financial component standpoint. Again, it’s it’s just from a…

Are we hiring the right people? And are we denying the ones that we should standpoint? There’s a cost there.

You know, I think in in traditional hiring, there’s at least a manager somewhere who notices, you know, that good candidates are dying on on the vine that is your process. Right? And and that process needs to be tweaked, and they eventually raise their hand and complain about it. I don’t know that gig has that person.

You know, some do for sure. I I think a lot don’t. So, you know, I don’t know that in in the gig…

A lot of the gig world, there’s that requisition that nobody’s waiting on for a specific hire or nobody demands that candidate is is coming through and is reviewed, a bit differently or with the veracity you would somebody else. So, you know, I think from a a number standpoint, your funnels look the same whether you get it right or wrong, and and I think there is a downstream cost impact to the employer.

And I think, you know, there’s a reputation piece that that that certainly shouldn’t be overlooked here either. And and I think, you know, are you willing to be on the wrong side of a story? What does that look like? There’s a cost impact there for sure.

Yeah. Well, you know, first, I do wanna react to something because the those employers who kind of lighten the requirements and sort of open things up more are sometimes self selecting a population. You know, you go on Reddit and you say, oh, okay. We know that this company doesn’t do… Like, what kind of background checks does this company do? And there are job board or, you know, Reddit…

Subreddits dedicated to those topics, not to give anybody any ideas. But but I think that the other side of that is if if, you know, if you are applying the law and if you are complying with the requirements and and, you know, there are systematic issues that could trip you up. And it’s not just the litigation. It’s the regulators coming in and saying, you know, that’s where where where a lot of the action is.

It’s not necessarily the private cause of action, but it’s the state coming in and saying, are you following the letter of the law? Are you giving all of the right individualized assessment? Are you providing the right form in New York City to collect all of the mitigating information?

Are you doing every technical piece of the process that would, you know, potentially trip you up if you’re not super, you know, conscious and and on it and on top of it and everywhere that you’re hiring. But, yeah, the litigation piece is real too, you know, class action lawsuits. You have a whole population, and you have a couple of lawyers who say, oh, looks like they’re not following the rule across the board, and we’ve got… You know, we’re gonna put a a call out for people who have been wronged by Ryan’s company, and we’re gonna see how many litigants, you know, how many plaintiffs we can get and file a class action that you’re discriminating.

So that’s the other piece of it. You know?

Reputation plays into that also. Do you wanna be the company that’s reputationally on the hook for something bad happening in the workforce and and some… And not taking care of your employees?

So, you know, you… It’s… There are many considerations here from all sides.

I think that just from a practical matter, you have to look at what makes sense for your organization.

Where are your risks? Where are your pressure points?

Are your people trained on this stuff? Do they know what they’re doing and and how to handle it?

How are you updating your policies to adapt to Philly’s new rules? You know?

How far are you looking back at crimes? You know? It’s a lot to take into account.

Yeah. And and in the trust and safety space, we always like to say if there’s a…

If the actions that you’re taking and don’t wanna show up on, you know, the front page of the New York Times, let’s make sure that we don’t do it right from a reputational risk perspective and and perception. Let’s let’s make sure that… Yeah. If you don’t want it to be posted all over the Internet, let’s make sure that we don’t take that action. Right? So, you know, I I know we’re we’re kind of rounding out here, but would love a little bit of a lens for some of our more global audience or or folks that are looking to expand abroad. And, It’s not called fair chance per se in EMEA and some of these other regions, but how does the concept of fair chance kind of spread globally?

Ireland is an example, but maybe in The UK. Angela, can you speak to what fair chance looks like in more of a global context?

Yeah. Again, it’s it’s it’s the same concept. Right? It’s the idea that you’re gonna give people an opportunity to work without, you know, holding the… A a prior criminal history against them, consider their other qualifications first. And then if it’s relevant to the job, many, many countries have requirements that any consideration of criminal record is…

There’s a relationship to the job. It’s the job related tests. And that’s… You know, we’re seeing that sort of being maybe put more into the fair chance context outside of The US, but it’s it’s it’s the same idea. It’s… And it’s nothing new, really, across the globe. There’s always been some attention paid to that fairness element and that job related element.

Yeah. And I I have some clients overseas. And and, Spencer, you touched on Ireland. I’m I’m back and forth quite regularly. I I think one of the biggest differences that I’ve seen globally compared to The US… I mean, here in The US, I think we regulate the employer’s decision. And and the rest of the globe, they tend to regulate the information.

So so what is what is shared? Right? And I think, you know, in in many of those instances, the the state decides what an employer is even allowed to see based on the role to Angela’s point. So it’s it’s very narrow before anybody makes a judgment about anybody. Right? So I I think it is incredibly narrow, incredibly fact based, and I think they they have pioneered the idea of, is this relatable to the job?

Really, truly, is it relatable to the job? And and, you know, I think they ask another question is, you know, should the employer even have been holding that record in the first place?

So, you know, you…

In The UK, they have the the, what do they call it? The ROA, which is the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act. You know, essentially, it’s it’s…

If you did the crime, you did the time, then it’s it’s it’s done. It’s over with. Right? And and that doesn’t even come into play in the the employer’s decision.

So it’s it’s really, it’s interesting to see how they they do things. But philosophically, I I think philosophically, they’re very much aligned that, you know, we should be fair. We should be as equitable as as humanly possible and and get people to work.

Right. And and the nuance also comes in in exactly what we touched on the beginning of the episode is is the complexity with which charges are reported based on where you are. Right? In The UK and Europe, it’s a little bit more in my understanding of a binary system where, you know, a criminal record, it could be, you know, you have one or or you don’t essentially and then that factors into hiring versus here, there are summary offenses. There’s different categories of charges, right, that need to be adjudicated in a specific way and it doesn’t… That allows for fair change to kind of flow through. But… Yeah.

I’ll go I’ll go one step further to your your example, absolutely, in terms of a binary thing. I mean, Ireland does something based on an act that they’ve enacted in ’20, I think, ’16. When you ask for a copy of your own record, they completely bifurcate it.

So it it is, you know, here’s you and here are your convictions and they’re completely separated out. You don’t need to give your convictions to your employer if you’re if you’re clear and and, you know, serve the time. So they build a whole thing around, I think, disclosure rather than the decision, which I think is instinctually a bit different than how we did it here in The States.

Awesome. Well, I I think we’re we’re coming to an end here, but I I really wanted to kind of in closing, you know, to each of you ask, you know, for someone running screenings or onboarding programs at a platform level right now, you know, what’s one thing that they should do differently, you know, starting today or Monday morning of next week? And and I’d love to hear from each of you on on that one thing that they should kind of consider.

Surely, there is such a benefit to getting sort of a a cross departmental, you know, view of how you’re approaching these things as an organization. Have your, you know, stakeholders across the organization who have a different motivation and or view come into the conversation and say, okay. Have the legal department, have your HR, your your trust and safety people, you know, and have those folks kind of come together and decide what’s best organizationally and then and then put your your policies in place, put your hiring matrix in place, talk to your outside counsel, your legal advisers to get ideas. Talk to smart people like Ryan to get, you know, practical guidance and and talk to your background screening company because they’re dealing with this across, you know, the board with many, many different sectors and segments.

Yeah. I I couldn’t have said it better myself. I think I’ll I’ll go a bit granular to something that Angela touched on there. And and I work with a lot of a lot of HR practitioners, specifically human capital management practitioners.

I think for some of those folks, I would tell them to go pull their adjudication matrix immediately and just find out when the last time it was changed and and and have that start the conversation that, you know, Angela just alluded to. And and I hope, you know, for all companies that makes its way around the c suite table somewhere eventually.

But I would… In my experience at least, a lot of those, they’re like employee handbooks. They got set up once and kind of forgotten about. Right? And every once in a while, they’re dusted off. But I think, you know, these laws, they they are so nuanced and changing so rapidly. I’d be willing to bet that probably nine matrices out of 10 probably need some type of a a bit of a refresh at this point.

Yeah. And shameless plug, work with your screenings company or work with, you know, companies like Ryan and see if there’s opportunities for us to help you out and address what’s going on through adjudication matrix. I think that’s a huge…

You’re not alone in having to figure out how to make changes. Right? Because there’s a lot of nuance as we touched on during the session. So Yeah. Angela, Ryan, thank you for your time and participation here.

Thank you. Thanks for having us. Yeah. Good. Good. That’s it for this episode of Know Your People.

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