Florida criminal record check: Decoding the Legal Rights!

StrategyDriven Talent Management Article |Criminal Record Check|Florida criminal record check: Decoding the Legal Rights!‘You lose nothing in proving your innocence. However, you may lose trust and confidence by not!’

According to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE), in 2018, there were more than 80,000 violent crimes and approximately 485,000 property crime cases in the state. With such a high crime rate, it is not surprising that various people, especially employers, are demanding a criminal record check.

However, not many people are aware that they can quickly get access to the information of any person from the FDLE. All you have to do is request the information you need from the Division of Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) and pay the required fees. [ Section 943.053, F.S. ]

Needless to say, it is a commendable service provided by the FDLE to the public seeking crucial information.

But, we can’t ignore that laws can get complicated, particularly those related to crime. Generally, numerous questions surround the rules, and it is not easy to get the answer to each one of those questions. You require plenty of time and dedication to learn everything efficiently, which you might not have.

That’s why we have gathered some essential questions and provided their answers in simplified language. Are you ready to learn? Let’s get started!

Criminal record check and a background check: Are They Similar?

Let us begin with the basics. Do you think criminal record investigation and background checks are the same thing? If yes, then we would like to correct you. Both of these terms are different. However, just like you, several other people also use these terms interchangeably.

Confusing? Wait, let us clear your cloud of confusion!

To check someone’s background (which generally a company does before recruiting any person) means checking their credit history, driver record, or asking their previous employer and neighbor about them. In simple terms, collecting general information.

Perhaps, let’s talk about the criminal record check. It means investigating if the person has committed a crime, whether or not he/she has ever been arrested or if they have been involved in fraudulent activity of any kind. Basically, investigating every police record.

Also, keep in mind that it is a part of the background check and not the background check itself.

What does it include?

As per the Florida laws, there are two levels of investigation:

Level 1: It includes state records, i.e., local criminal history. It is based on the offender’s name and may also have a national sex offender registry or employment history.

Level 2: It includes the national records, i.e., based on the fingerprint and FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation). Moreover, according to section 435.04 F.S., it is mandatory to perform a fingerprint background check on the employees for every company.

Requirements for state history record check and national history record check
Now that you know about availing information from FDLE let us brief you about the requirements.

For state check: To get the information, you need to submit the person’s name request and fingerprint card. Bear in mind that you need to add a return address, the name of the person you want to get information about, age, race, sex, and social security number (if possible). You can submit the request using online mode and by paying the fees.

For national check: As per the law:

  • Only a government organization can get the receipt of history.
  • You need to sign the user agreement (meaning you comply with the FBI’s said terms and conditions).
  • Need to process the fingerprints from the state repository before requesting national records.
  • Need to submit specific documents and licenses as requested.

Who is allowed to request a criminal history check?

No other entity except the government can request for national history record investigation. On the other hand, for state history records, companies (both public and private) and citizens have the right to request information. To be specific, it includes:

  • Convenience store/ grocery store
  • Employees
  • Taxi drivers
  • Any organization employing a person for the care of children, elders, or disabled (as per the provision of the National Child Protection Act).

Why does the employer ask for a background check?

For every business owner, it is crucial that every person working for him/her feel protected. But how will you ensure the protection of your employees? One of the ways is by getting a background check. It will ensure that there are no threats in the organization due to any person.

Besides, the state laws also make it mandatory for every organization to get a background check before hiring any new person.

How can you seal and expunge your criminal record?

But, what if you had a criminal record in the past? Even if it were a false accusation, it would be in your record for the rest of your life. That’s why the experts at https://www.fighterlaw.com/practice-areas/criminal-defense/record-sealing-and-expunging/ recommend sealing and expunging your record when you can. However, first, you have to make sure that you qualify for the sealing.

If you qualify, you need to provide the court’s certificate of eligibility while applying for the petition. You can get the certificate from the FDLE, and it will be valid for one year only. Once the judge approves your petition, your record will be sealed or expunged.

What charges cannot be sealed or expunged?

That’s right! Not every offense can be sealed or expunged. You must be wondering what these offenses are? Well, these are as follows:

  • Child abuse
  • Manslaughter (homicide)
  • Robbery/ Home invasion
  • Domestic violence
  • Arson (setting the property on fire)

These are punishable offenses, and it is crucial for any person with such allegations to stay far away from their loved ones.

What is the difference between a sealed record and an expunged record?

Generally, both of these terms are used to imply the deletion of the records. However, there is a significant difference between the two. To expunge a record means criminal charges are entirely deleted, both legally and physically. On the other side, to seal a record means that it will exist in the legal document and is accessible to the court.

Conclusion

Laws are complicated and need a lot of time. That’s why many people avoid getting into the details. But how can one forget that law is for our protection, and it is vital to understand them? Hence, to help you get familiar with Florida criminal law, we answer the most significant questions. So that you know what to do if you ever face any situation related to violating the laws.

Company Benefits That Every Skilled Employee Will Look For

StrategyDriven Talent Management Article |Employee Benefits|Employee Benefits That Every Booming Business NeedsIn the workforce, it is not just the employee who has to compete for a job position. Companies should also have the mindset that they are competing for a limited number of skilled individuals. As such, they need to give themselves an edge over others by offering desirable corporate benefits.

A skilled employee that knows their worth will surely jump to the employer that will give them a better future. If you want to make sure that you don’t lose talent, make sure that you are open to offering these corporate benefits.

Health Insurance

In 2019, the number of Americans that do not have health insurance was roughly 25.5 million people, and that number apparently grew by 1.9 million by the end of last year. An alarming number of people don’t have coverage so despite being something so basic, it can be highly valuable to employees.

Health coverage is not just something to attract new talent, but it also helps existing staff to increase their overall productivity. This protects them from injury or sickness that can hinder their performance. Medical care can be quite expensive for a lot of people. One accident can put a person in incredible amounts of debt without insurance.

As an employer, you can also benefit from this, especially if you are a small business. They are able to offset some of the costs of healthcare by getting tax deductions.

Dental Coverage

Unfortunately, dental is often not included in health insurance. That is why most would get it separately. In some cases, dental care can be expensive, and it’s not something that can be easily ignored. Ideally, people need to get their teeth cleaned every six months. While most can afford that, the real problem is when procedures have to be done. Root canal and teeth removal can be almost like taking a minor surgery.

Additional dental coverage can be seen as a huge benefit for many employees. That, along with vision insurance, are one of the most in-demand benefits. Studies from Harvard even showed that 54 percent of people heavily consider the availability of these types of benefits when considering jobs.

Retirement Contributions

The best workers are those that are career-driven and look to the future, whether it is related to work or personal matters. Many people want to be financially secured in the future, which is why they diligently contribute to their 401k and other similar plans.

While companies are not required to offer retirement plans, this can be a huge benefit that can help retain employees. The existence of a plan such as this will make them feel more secure for their future. Employees who don’t have them will feel more anxious about their finances and would likely switch jobs as soon as something good comes up.

Paid Vacations

Long gone are the days where people believe that working long hours is the way to live. The younger generation highly values their work-life balance, and companies need to adapt to this. Having paid vacations is a big asset for employees, and those that don’t offer this will lose to those that do.

Unlike the previously mentioned examples, vacation leaves are actually the more cost-efficient benefits that a company can handle. A lot of traditional businessmen believe that time not working is time wasted, but that is far from the truth. In fact, an employee that had ample amount of time to rest and recoup becomes more motivated and productive in the long run.

Student Loan Assistance

The total amount of student debt in the United States reached 1.6 trillion last year. Most individuals, regardless of age, have some form of student debt that needs to be paid. Some even reach up to their 30s and 40s and still have student loan debt. If given the chance to pay it off in a more convenient way is available, that will surely be a good deal for them.

As a result, there are companies today that offer the option to directly pay off the loan as one of their benefits. They will not pay the full amount right away, naturally. What they will do is pay a certain amount every month, which is separate from the income they are receiving. The employees themselves can also continue to make their own separate payments.

This is an extremely valuable benefit as financial stress can have an income on employee performance and turnover. Individuals who have a lot of debt are often the ones with highly sought-after credentials, such as university degrees. It can be a way to attract these talents as well as encourage those already working to stay in the company.

Tech hiring platforms: need of the hour

StrategyDriven Talent Management Article |Tech Hiring Platforms|Tech hiring platforms: need of the hourWith the continuous advancement in the field of technology, everything is going online. This has further become more important in the current situation of a pandemic where most of the things and work has shifted from the traditional ways to online platforms. In such times, the technical teams of the organizations have got tough positions. One such innovation has been made in the field of hiring.

Many tech hiring platform have come up as a major solution to companies for their recruitment and hiring processes. Their main focus is to find the best of the talent and develop them in the best possible manner. They use cloud-based efficient platforms that focus on various key aspects that are involved in the hiring process. These service providing companies help in providing online test assessments, recruitment and L&D solutions, certifications, proctoring, conducting online exams and various other things. Their portfolio has a large variety of product offerings for their customers. These platforms are secure and provide best service experience to their clients. Here we will discuss the key benefits of tech hiring platforms that have also become the need of the hour.

  1. Increases the chance to recruit the best talent: The process of hiring is developed after proper research and development. These are cloud-based and very efficient in conducting all the test and interviews. They also help to get a detailed assessment of the candidates. Thus, this increases the chances of selecting the best talent. The companies can always develop their plans regarding the assessment in terms of skill, role complexity, time and other measures.
  2. Screening of the candidates: Such hiring platforms help to screen out the best candidates. They have the latest and very advanced assessment platforms. They also provide proctoring solutions in cases of conducting online tests and exams which further ensures the authenticity of the exams. One can also select from the vast array of the questions.
  3. Online interview of the candidates: this further helps to conduct the online interviews of the selected candidates most appropriately. This could be conducted in real-time. One can easily assess the candidate’s skills and knowledge using such platforms.
  4. Up skill and engaging the candidates: These service providers also have the training and development solutions for the companies. This can be used by the companies to enhance the skills of the candidates. They also provide a platform for new and existing employees for their better engagement.
  5. Hiring strategy as per your needs and requirements: The companies can always plan and strategies their hiring needs and requirements in the terms of cost, time, complexity and skill. They have hiring processes that are a mix of MCO’s and simulators. This helps in the filtration of the best candidates at the very first step. This further saves a lot of time, energy and cost involved in the hiring process. They also offer in-depth assessment analysis of the candidates for their advanced assessment. Further, after finalizing the candidates, interviews could be conducted online in a very simple and easy manner.
  6. Tech screening of the candidates using assessments and simulators: These tech hiring companies are very advanced in their field and provide the tech screening of the candidates remotely using assessments and simulators. You can choose from the vast portfolio available the type of questions you want to go for.
  7. In-depth analysis of the candidates: The hiring companies also give an in-depth analysis of the reports of the candidates. This also helps to differentiate the best candidates from the average ones. The companies can easily analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates. There are different reports for both of the knowledge bases assessments and application-based assessments. Companies could use this as the preliminary step for conducting the online assessment of the candidates.
  8. Robust proctoring software and technology: These companies provide a ready platform for conducting secure tests and assessments. They have well developed [proctoring software and technology and the candidate can be assessed even from the remote area. These proctoring software further help to develop the customized assessment of each candidate conduct the multiple assessments of different candidates at the same time. The companies can choose from amongst the AI-based proctoring or manual proctoring. They could easily get end to end screening results as well.
  9. Efficient hiring through innovative technology: The innovations and advancement in the field of technology have made everything much simpler. With the use of such technology, efficient hiring has become very easy. It also helps in the better engagement of the new and existing employees. Some service providers provide very advanced hackathon platform. This helps in nurturing the problem-solving skills, fosters better team collaboration among the workforce and fosters the internal innovation.
  10. Customization options: the companies have the option of getting everything customized as per their needs. They can get the tests, assessments, analysis and reports and everything else customized as per their needs and convenience. The tech hiring companies also provide continuous support services to their clients to ensure they get the best experience.

With coming up the online coding assessments, combined with efficient and innovative technology, the future of recruitment has become very structured and well planned. The companies can get the best of the talent by using such platforms and develop them in the best possible manner. The companies should look for the best online coding platform to make their recruitment process more efficient and organized. These are developed taking into considerations several factors and after proper research and development processes. They also provide efficient, cost-effective, clear and transparent hiring platform to the growing companies. Everything from planning, screening, assessment and interviews could be done online. The proctoring software further ensures that everything is conducted in a secure and best possible way. So don’t just look, choose the best platform and go for a more efficient method of hiring. This will not only help in finding the best talent amongst the pool of candidates but also develop them in the best possible manner and ensure their better engagement.

How To Choose Your Company’s Staff

It is always said that the success of a company comes from its human capital. However, one wonders how the most recognized companies achieved such an efficient human resources department. Any entrepreneur should pay attention to this point because recruiting staff is a fundamental task in an organization.

StrategyDriven Talent Management Article | How To Choose Your Company's Staff

Finding the ideal professional for the position is often difficult. The reasons may be lack of experience or that the candidate does not have the required skills. Some companies have periods with constant staff turnover because it is difficult for them to locate the right employees, keep workers happy and satisfied with their work and wages.

Personnel recruiters must be specialists because they must know how to combine intuition with the ability to analyze, synthesize and evaluate, and involve quantitative scientific tools, which contribute to knowing what is not seen with the naked eye. The use of technological tools will help obtain greater accuracy and know the applicant’s scope.

Posting job advertisements in the correct places (according to the requested profile) makes the offer more attractive; therefore, the chances that the candidates will be fixed are higher. At the same time, the design of the ad also serves to attract attention. Take advantage of social networks, especially those of professionals like LinkedIn, so that you can learn more about people’s likes and interests in less time. It makes your searches more effective too and you can get a general overview quicker.

When conducting job interviews, it is essential to provide information on the specific skills and abilities. It is also valuable for the company to report what it has to offer by working there, for example, salary, hours, incentives, or rewards, and all benefits. Look at drug testing to ensure that you hire people who have no history of narcotics or drug abuse. You can look at stewarts drug testing for further information.

Look at the company’s goals.

Also, to have a good team that meets the company’s goals, we have some ideas that will help you select the candidates who are applying. Take note: Psychometric tests are part of job interviews. They are made scientifically, and it is an objective measure of the candidate’s behavior, which allows us to conclude the factors of his personality. They are easy to acquire and can be the first step in determining the applicant’s ability. You want to hire someone who has the potential for growth in the business.

When selecting people, use comments from their other jobs, who they worked with, colleagues, or previous bosses. Therefore, factual information is obtained on the skills and personality at work. At the end of the list of possible workers, it is advisable to carry out a socio-economic study and a personal interview. It will allow knowing the environment in which the candidate develops, how his family conditions, the place where they live, customs, habits, personal and professional information. With this data, unwanted situations can be avoided. You can certainly hire the best professional but the hard work is up to you.

Flipped Learning: The Trend for the Next Corporate Training

StrategyDriven Talent Management Article |Corporate Training|Flipped Learning: The Trend for the Next Corporate TrainingThe dynamics of the corporate world are rapidly evolving with growing industries and businesses. More and more people are relying on technology and advanced solutions to carry out their jobs. And all this is set in motion to maximize productivity and work efficiency on all fronts.

Flipped learning is the part of these trendsetting practices, the new way for professionals to adapt to their work. We all know how vital training and learning is to achieve the same service level throughout the company. People rely on it to get their workforce up to speed and upgrade their skill sets to add things to their platter. Without them, the staff would be clueless sitting ducks, even when they have work on their hands.

Besides, everyone has seen how the outbreak of COVID-19 has hit this world and influenced lives. With schools and offices closed, hospitals cramped, and people fighting the battle of their lives, the only option was to work from home. Businesses had to overcome several environmental and technological challenges to adopt this idea. But luckily for the users of flipped learning, this change was convenient because most of their learning resources were already online.

The experiences of a Flipped Classroom are close to those of live interaction. People learning from it can go through the instructor’s notes, find examples, ask questions, get ideas, and much more. These things let you better understand and grip over your work and function better as a team. Perhaps that’s also why companies feel inclined and interested in flipped learning more than the conventional methods.

If you haven’t been introduced to it yet, here are some features to get you excited. These should allow you to grasp the complete concept behind flipped learning and might even motivate you to try it yourself.

1. Video Tutorials & Lessons

Starting from the basics, instructors can use video tutorials and lessons to cover concepts and subjects. They can go for live streaming sessions with their audience or record their notes in advance for their batch to review as they continue working. That allows both parties to function independently without causing any delays.

Besides, having a video lesson is more helpful, as it offers more details about how to perform a task. There’s minimal risk of making an error, and people execute their jobs more confidently. So companies are achieving more than just top-notch teamwork and cohesion when they bring flipped learning on board.

2. In-Video Picture Notes

A problem with learning from anyone online or face-to-face is that you have to take notes unless you have a photographic memory. Switching between paying attention to the speaker’s words and writing things down, people fail to extract a lesson’s essence. They are unable to multitask at this pace, and therefore, leave with an inadequate understanding.

With flipped learning, that is no longer a problem for individuals. They can listen to the instructors attentively and find all their notes attached to the relevant areas. That allows them to access these resources once they have understood the concepts and principles of a job. And what’s even better is that if they have a portable device with an internet connection, they can access these from anywhere.

3. Search Inside Video

A problem that most people complain about with video lectures is that they struggle with finding the relevant content within a video. An hour-long lesson covers multiple concepts and various examples but has no way to navigate the video efficiently. If they want to find something specific, they will have to skip it manually until they stumble upon the right section.

For the users of a flipped classroom, that is not a problem at all. Its ‘search inside video’ option allows its users to jump to particular sections they need to review. They can find the content relevant to their work at an instant and use it to their requirement. That’s what makes it a far efficient method.

4. Cross-Platform Access & Usage

Another one of the perks of a flipped classroom is that its users can access it from any internet-connected device. It’s compatible with various platforms and browsers, making it easier to switch, access, create and edit content as per the user’s convenience. Instructors can communicate with their audiences more conveniently that way and work from their home, office, or anywhere else.

Similarly, the people learning from it can do the same and learn things on the go. They won’t have to worry about missing a lesson or asking questions due to an environmental hindrance. That minimizes absences and promotes convenience for both parties, making the overall practice more productive and fruitful.

5. In-Video Assessments

The next aspect that should spike your interest in flipped learning is that it offers online assessments against its teachings. Instructors can add quizzes and exercises for their audience to make the lecture interactive. It will allow them to measure their students’ skills and knowledge and gauge their teaching effectiveness.

Besides, it can also help keep the learners attentive as they will expect a review of their learnings. They will foster a competitive spirit through these lectures and would want to display their growth. It will improve the overall outcomes of these classes while keeping everyone engaged in its contents.

6. Remote Access

Lastly, the highlight of using a flipped classroom is its ease of access. Anything with a decent internet connection and the necessary details to log in to a portal can do so without experiencing any difficulty. Multiple devices and browser compatibility aside, most of the contents on any subject get hosted on its servers. They are available as resources for anyone to review, as the holdings of a library. That eliminates the need for people to carry all their notes and lectures everywhere they go. All they need is a portable device with nominal computational capabilities. Anyone who is a part of this service can enjoy this and more, making a flipped classroom all the more attractive for its users.

Summary

These were the primary features and highlights of flipped learning, a trendsetting method for corporate training in the industries—people who have already signed up on its benefit from its tools and resources. At the same time, others are in the queue to get on board. Suppose you haven’t heard of it already. In that case, you should explore your options with this service because delaying this opportunity will only cost you more in the long run.