How Staff Hiring Practices Can Put Your University at Risk

February 13, 2019

In 2005, the University of California (UC) opened a new campus in the San Joaquin Valley just outside the city limits of Merced, California. UC Merced quickly grew to be one of the largest employers in the rural area. The success of this new University was built on the pioneering spirit and “get it done” attitude, which was instilled in the campus by its first employees.

This rapid “policy-free” growth resulted in a risk that few people anticipated. After a decade of operations, the campus whistleblower hotline was bombarded with complaints of discriminatory hiring practices. The overall theme of the complaints was that you had to know someone to get hired at UC Merced.

While it may be typical for unsuccessful job candidates to complain of unfair recruitment processes, the campus’ inability to disprove allegations of discriminatory hiring practices was ultimately putting the growth of the University’s research at risk. Recruitment documentation in the hiring system showed an incomplete picture of why a particular candidate was hired. More specifically, recruitment documentation often did not adequately explain the following:

Why particular candidates were considered qualified or unqualified for the position
Why some candidates were interviewed while other qualified candidates were not
Why a candidate was hired while other candidates were passed over

But how were staff hiring practices putting UC Merced’s research at risk? The Department of Labor has an enforcement arm called the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP). The responsibility of OFCCP auditors is to evaluate the personnel practices of organizations that receive federal funding. Discriminatory hiring practices can put a university at risk of fines, penalties, and even debarment from federal funding. Hiring documentation should show that candidates from protected categories received the same opportunities as other candidates. To prove this, documentation should show that hiring decisions were based upon objective selection criteria (e.g., the candidate’s education, work experience, skills) rather than relying upon subjective criteria (i.e., the candidate was a good fit).

Discriminatory hiring practices can put a university at risk of fines, penalties, and even debarment from federal funding.

Campus leadership took the issue very seriously. For the long-term health of the university, the growing campus would need more and more qualified candidates and could not afford a reputation of rigged recruiting. One problem for UC Merced was that the Human Resources department was understaffed and campus departments became accustomed to managing their own new employee recruitments without much oversight. Compliance requirements and documenting the hiring process were not priorities.

To bring the problematic hiring practices to light, Human Resources, in partnership with the Office of Compliance, requested help from Internal Audit. After putting together a test plan similar to an OFCCP evaluation, Internal Audit first focused on the hiring practices of two campus departments. Further requests from leadership eventually increased the scope to include staff recruitments in all campus divisions.

During the audit, a large number of staff recruitments were reviewed to determine whether objective criteria was used to select which candidates would be interviewed and hired. After comparing resumes with job requirements, the audit identified instances where qualified candidates were passed over for unqualified candidates. Department hiring managers would sometimes skip over more qualified candidates for a candidate familiar to them and claim that they already knew the candidate was a good fit for the department. Poor hiring practices were identified in many campus departments and it was apparent that these practices had become part of the overall campus culture.

The results of the audit confirmed what was already suspected—drastic changes were needed! Internal Audit, Compliance, and Human Resources worked closely to come up with solutions. Internal Audit presented the audit results to campus leadership, including all Vice Chancellors and Deans. Detailed reports were written for Vice Chancellors, which highlighted issues identified in their divisions. Compliance communicated the risks and potential fines resulting from the hiring issues. Human Resources proposed new staff hiring policies and procedures. Additional Human Resources recruiters were needed to provide adequate oversight.

Realizing the risks and potential long term impact of poor hiring practices, campus leaders eventually became supportive of the proposed staff hiring changes.

The main obstacle to change was that campus departments were used to handling their own recruiting process without Human Resources’ involvement. Without considering the risks, department managers expressed concerns that involvement by Human Resources would only slow down the hiring process. Realizing the risks and potential long term impact of poor hiring practices, campus leaders eventually became supportive of the proposed staff hiring changes.

After many months of communicating the proposed new hiring practices and working closely with department managers to come up with workable solutions, new staff hiring policies and procedures were formally issued and implemented. Internal Audit later completed a follow-up audit to verify that the new processes were mitigating the risks related to discriminatory hiring practices. Change takes time at universities. Since the first discussion with Internal Audit, implementing new hiring procedures and the eventual follow-up spanned more than two years. In summary, to begin changing UC Merced’s hiring culture, collaboration between the three groups (Human Resources, Compliance, and Internal Audit) was necessary, as well as working across the university’s functional divides.

About the Author

Todd Kucker

Todd Kucker has been the Director of Internal Audit at UC Merced Director since 2011. Todd has ten years of experience in Higher Education Internal Audit as he was part of a two-person audit staff at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California before becoming Director at UC Merced. He has more than twenty years of internal audit and accounting experience that have included E&J Gallo Winery, Safeway, Del Monte Foods, AAA, and as an Audit Manager at an RSM McGladrey network firm. Todd holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley and a Master of Business Administration from Texas A&M University. Since 2005, he has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in accounting and finance.

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How Staff Hiring Practices Can Put Your University at Risk