Psst....Can you keep a secret?

Confidentiality –the key stone to many successful recruitment consultants. What’s said to the consultant ( not necessarily in Vegas) , stays with the consultant – and that’s more true for clients perhaps, than candidates. Have you any salutary tales about keeping secrets and confidential information? Have you ever been compromised, or conflicted out of working, by what you know? Is your discretion your greatest asset?  And what happens if you lose it?

It should go without saying that you have information about individuals and organisations which is not in the public domain and will be confidential – in both a legal or contractual sense and a moral context  ( yes, you heard me – a moral context!) Its important however that you see the difference. Have you considered your position in relation to the Proceeds of Crime Act for example? If you become aware that a client is acting illegally, or engaging in criminal or potentially criminal activity, and they are paying you will those ‘ill gotten gains’ – you could be committing a criminal offence. I know it sounds far fetched but it is possible.

That’s quite a leap from market intelligence, and performance or financial information that a client might share with you, to enable to you make a senior or strategically important placement. That’s also different to performance or networking information a candidate might need to produce to secure such a role – and might well share with you before providing it in interview or in some exercise to their prospective new employer.

Where that information is provided in writing or electronically it needs to be held in accordance with your data protection policy and dare I say it – your confidentiality policy – do you have one? Do you know what should be in one? You might have one but do you comply? Do your consultants take home paper files? Lap tops? Ever leave them on buses? Display them name outwards on the train? Do your linkedin connections raise issues of confidentiality – more on social networking in later blogs -  You only needed to read the newspaper once in a while to see how much trouble government departments get themselves in when laptops are left or hackers get into your website with client or candidate accessible files holding CV , salary or placement information.

Are you secure? Do you have a policy? Do you practice what you preach? Have you risk assessed and implemented the results? Do your candidates and clients have confidence in your personal discretion and the robustness of your policies and systems? Is your website compliant?
 

For more information on this subject, please contact dispute resolution specialist Heather Stanford or join the debate on in our eForum on Linkedin