There have been stories in the past months about candidates going for job interviews where the managers conducting the interview have openly asked them for login information to their Facebook profile.  Yikes!  On the spot without warning or remembering what is on your profile?  Some people gave the information and some didn’t.  For those that did and commented about it afterwards, they said they had absolutely nothing to worry about.  But then there were others that felt pressured, felt like they had no choice or were just desperate for work.

I’m very selective with what I post on my personal social media pages, but the problem is, others can post photos of me.  I did a little digging before writing this blog and found a photo with me tagged in it.  The photo was taken and posted by some people my wife and I met at a rock concert.  The one guy was visiting from Chile and attended the concert with his cousin who lived in Toronto.  If someone did a little digging past all of my tame photos with family etc., they’d find a picture of me holding up a concert T-shirt making a crazy face which is a stark contrast from the person my clients see on a daily basis. The simple fact is that a picture can’t show context or explain the truth of a situation (such as the beer bottles in the background – one could assume that they were mine but in reality they belonged to the people who took the picture of me and my wife). So, the question is, should a person’s employment really be decided by a photo which cannot explain the behaviour of the people it contains or the context?

Personally, I feel that asking for someone’s Facebook credentials can be a dangerous question. The candidate can be solely judged upon them agreeing or disagreeing to give access to their account. So what is the answer?? By conducting background searches on a candidate’s work history, criminal background, resume and education claims, credit history (if it relates to the position), and in-depth references from past employers is important.

I keep a closed and very secure profile on social media, but if connections of mine don’t, it could expose aspects of my life that could easily be taken out of context.

I watched a video recently that was absolute genius in the way the message was delivered.  It shows a clairvoyant reading the minds of random people that were asked to participate for a TV show.  The gentleman was incredible with the general information he can ‘read’ from the minds of his subjects.  The truth is – he has no magic powers.  Before the people volunteered, a team of researchers behind the scenes gathered some general information about them from online social media. It’s amazing what can be found.

What was the message?  Keep your social media and online presence locked up as secure as you can.

But wait!  If you are the subject of one of AFIMAC’s investigations for benefits fraud, insurance claim fraud, workplace theft or an undercover detail…please leave your profile open.  The investigations department wouldn’t be happy with me if that resource was no longer an avenue for their due diligence.  Social media investigations are conducted frequently for clients – Chad Hanlon of AFIMAC blogs about an example here.

Rock on!

Yes, you’ve read that title correctly.  Sitting on the steps of our home on a sunny Sunday afternoon while our daughters played on the front yard and rode their scooters and bicycles around, my wife and I had no idea that we were about to engage a threat.

Seemingly bored with racing up and down the sidewalk, the girls decided that they would put their climbing skills to the test and began scaling the sides of our steps along the railings, over the planter boxes and around the sides of the porch.  I wasn’t worried about them as much as I felt the plants were threatened to be squished by misplaced feet.

My four year old had made it around to the corner of the porch, holding on to the railings on either side of the corner pillar that goes up to the overhang.  She had one foot perched on a decorative rock, and the other on the edge of the wooden planter.  She was about 1 foot off the ground when she started to scream.

I looked and saw about nine to ten yellow jackets (wasps) either on or flying around her face.  To her, 1 foot must have felt like 10 feet because she was frozen with fear and didn’t let go to remove herself from the swarm.  I jumped to spring over the stair railing which would have been a straight line to her, but my youngest was in the way scaling the sides of the steps.  To avoid catching her with my feet as I cleared the railing, I jumped down the steps to the ground, then over to the corner of the porch.  In this time, my wife had also dashed to her – we reached at the same time.  I grabbed her under the arms, pulled her backwards releasing her grip on the railing, swung her around to put myself between her and the wasps (much like an executive protection agent should do to act as a buffer between a threat and a client), then stepped about another seven feet or so, which put us about 10 feet from the spot of the incident.  I brushed and swatted the remaining wasps from her.  My wife was at her side again now as well.  Once I realized that there were no other wasps on her and my wife was now aiding her, I jumped over to my other two daughters and removed them from the danger area.

Over the years I’ve received various training including each of Rob Shuster’s executive protection training courses. I’ve worked in the field for various protection details and been privy to many ‘out of class’ tips and best practices.  I credit all of this to my quick thinking and reaction.  Our daughters were our subjects to protect and my wife and I worked well as a team to bring them to safety.  In Shuster’s courses, he often discusses how you have to stay alert at all times when on an executive protection detail because routine can dull your senses.  A threat can happen when you least expect it.  How even at a subject’s home, office or any other location that is very familiar can be an area for a threat.  How true.

The threat in this case was a hive of wasps that had found a small space between the pillar and porch.  The pillar is hollow, so they were nesting there.  We never knew there was a hive there because it was to the side of our house, it was only a few days old, and the flight path (which I observed for a while after the incident) took the wasps away from our line of sight.

HR and security managers could use this story as an analogy for the daily routines of their teams.  For yourself and your executive team that are typically local or traveling within North America, I’d suggest self-applied protective training; either having someone with you or knowing what to do yourself can greatly reduce the risks.  If you have executives travelling to areas with a track record of kidnaps and crime like Latin America, I’d strongly suggest executive protection and/or security drivers are arranged for them.

As well, ensuring that you select a company that is experienced and well trained to protect your staff is crucial.  When an agent is deployed to protect an executive, they should always ensure the subject is the first priority – like a father allergic to wasp stings protecting a child.

My daughter escaped with two stings (one on her nose and one above her eye) which we of course treated immediately – and luckily she was not allergic as I am.  After treating the stings and giving some TLC, my wife and I applied some distraction techniques and she was fine (e.g. announcing we would all go for an after dinner ice cream treat because she was so brave).  After I watched the hive for a while to see how I had not noticed it previously, I destroyed it.  Our daughter was of course in shock and petrified when it happened, but the next day she came with us to look at the aftermath and climbed back up on the rock that she was originally stranded on to peer right into the space where the hive used to be – brave little girl.  Hopefully that helped lessen the odds of her having a lifetime phobia of yellow jackets.

After months of planning, AFI International and IMAC announced their merger to AFIMAC on August 1, 2012.  There are lots of things to consider when rebranding such as business cards, websites, old hyperlinks, social media pages, etc.  Everything seemed to have switched over smoothly.  I had even sent an email out to Peter Martin letting him know everything was alright around 2pm that day, mentioning that unless any unforeseen hiccups came up…we had nothing to worry about.

Well, there was an unforeseen hiccup – a BIG one.  Every outgoing email that was sent by any staff was ending up in spam filters and not reaching the intended recipient.  But why!?  Our IT and creative department got on it.

After drilling down, we realized that spam companies globally had flagged our new URL.  It had so effectively been keyword targeted that I’d class it right up there with emails that get flagged for ‘Free Viagra Pills’.  As best as we can pin point why, spam filters didn’t know our new URL until August 1^st, and so when we emailed the news of our merger to our large client database, it flagged it as spam – even though we’d never had issues sending mass email announcements previously.

So regardless of why, we had to make some major changes quickly.  The IT and creative team did an excellent job to get things corrected, but it was something that nobody reviewing our prelaunch could have predicted.  We were able to make massive change quickly because we had contingencies in place that if we had to completely go in a different direction, we were ready.  We didn’t think we would need it, but having that continuity plan in place was a huge benefit.

Having several backup plans was key, much like strike or disaster planning, but the real lesson learned was that we have no control over what rules and regulations spam companies use and even if we did, they can change at any time.

Even a community is susceptible to a tainted image during a crisis it seems.  Corporations look to media training prior to events that could tarnish their brand and image, or after a disaster to properly handle the crisis in the eyes of the public, but now a community is concerned with their image after a mass shooting.

Residents offered media training after mass shooting

TORONTO – Toronto officials are offering media training to an east-end community rocked by a mass shooting last week after they say residents complained about how they were being portrayed in the news.

Scott McKean of the city’s community crisis response program says residents in the Danzig Street area requested the training after finding their neighbourhood swarmed with reporters eager to interview them.

He says the residents “recognize that there are a lot of eyes on their community” and want to make sure they send the right message.

Read more…

I wish I could say that this story is unbelievable, but unfortunately it is real, and the workplace bullying a 68-year-old woman had to endure was as well.

Luckily social media played a part in bringing this too light.

Emotional, widespread reaction to harassment of 68-year-old bus monitor

By Greg Botelho, CNN

(CNN) — Karen Klein is likely not the first face that comes to mind when you think of a poster child for bullying.

Yet there she was, sitting in the back of Bus 784 as it rolled through the streets of Greece, New York, on Monday afternoon. Four middle school boys barraged her with verbal abuse, jabbing her about her weight, attacking her family and chuckling as they made violent and graphic threats. Except for a few even-keeled retorts, the 68-year-old bus monitor brushed sweat from her brow and remained quiet, peering up front and out her window seemingly waiting for her hellish ride to end.

Her suffering may have gone unnoticed, had not one of the young teenagers posted a 10-minute video of the harassment on YouTube.

By Wednesday, police were interviewing Klein and her alleged verbal abusers. And by the next day, as the video began going viral, she had become a cause celebre.

Her torment became a prism through which total strangers, the world round, characterized her experience as symbolic of everything wrong with modern-day parenting, children and more. Beyond anger, some expressed sadness for the seemingly defenseless older woman who, they felt, bravely suffered the slings and arrows flung at her for no good reason at all.

Read more and watch video…

It’s evident that brawling has become a part of international soccer tournaments regardless of the security put in place.  I really enjoy the competitive atmosphere of international play and would attend an event if the opportunity presented itself, but would I take children or my parents?  Probably not.

Riots can quickly escalate at these events and unsuspecting and/or people that are not participating can quickly find themselves being targeted – journalists, volunteer stewards and innocent fans have all been victims of violence at Euro 2012.

Understanding security for overseas travelers can definitely assist with preventative medicine and keep you away from potential hotspots, but with rolling riots and brawls, extra attention definitely is required to recognize potential issues before they even happen.

By: Ohio Chamber of Commerce

When the International Management Assistance Corporation was founded in Marietta, Ohio, in 1983, it offered only support and security services for companies that were experiencing a labor dispute. Whatever the challenge was, from protecting assets to protecting executives, IMAC could handle it.

Over time, the company has expanded and in addition to its original premise, has become a turnkey operation to help a company that is facing any type of business impact — whether it is a natural disaster, industrial accident, plant closure or temporary labor service.

But one matter that hasn’t changed is the company’s home state. IMAC is located and headquartered in Strongsville, Ohio.

“We are trying to drive the kind of ‘buy Ohio’ initiative needed and keep the money in the state of Ohio,” says Senior Vice President Joseph Schollaert.

Customers, though, come from across the globe. More than 5,000 have been assisted since the company was founded.

“We’ve also just recently launched IMAC Global, which provides our services in South America and Mexico,” Schollaert says. “We also have a Canadian operation, AFI International, that is headquartered in Toronto and handles any Canadian work for customers.”

As for the majority of IMAC’s customers, they come from the manufacturing sector. A number are Fortune 100 companies, but IMAC serves both small and large clients.

“A company can contract with us on a per-event basis or have a North American agreement that covers multiple locations where they could engage our services based upon a specific event,” he says. “Our efforts have helped these companies prepare for business disruptions caused by labor disputes that threaten to shut down daily operations, potentially forever.”

IMAC can provide mobile kitchens, dormitory units, shower units and laundry facilities. “We have the capabilities to prepare meals — we have prepared meals for not only labor dispute situations but also natural disasters and environmental situations,” he says.

One of the added values of working with the company is it follows trends and reports them to clients so they can better know what issues may be ahead.

“We as an organization have to understand the needs of our customers and what is driving them for the next two to five years down the road — for instance, what legislative items are out there that are going to impact our customers,” Schollaert says. “This is one of the best ways for us to stay in tune with what is happening, not only in the state but with our clients, and help develop proactive solutions. And with that, we also are able to provide the Ohio Chamber with an additional resource for their members by being a member.”

As a member of the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, a company will receive preferred pricing from IMAC.

Another of the core services IMAC offers is supplying temporary workers to assist during an event.

“We can provide an organization that might be experiencing some type of business interruption and/ or temporary production spike with workers to continue to operate their facility — skilled trades as well as unskilled personnel,” Schollaert says. “There is a shortage right now for skilled trades, and we’ve got a large database of personnel that we have accumulated over the past 27-plus years.”

In addition, about a year ago, IMAC started offering physical and online training.

“We have an online training site that is geared toward security and human resources professionals that hosts a myriad of different topics,” Schollaert says. “About 30 different training modules are on our online training academy where someone can log on, purchase the online training module and take it at their own pace. They also get continuing education credits for completion of those modules as well as certification once they have completed the training.”

An excellent article on workplace violence.  While the article references three of the top industries, the excerpt I’ve inserted below clearly shows that no one industry is immune to workplace violence if there are one of the four components involved – criminal, customer of client, co-worker, domestic violence

Workplace Violence: A Scourge Across Diverse Industries

By Laura Scott, Esq.

Security Magazine

Read full article here…

Although certain industries attract more than their share of workplace violence, its characteristics affect every sector of business. The hazard has been defined by the Department of Labor as “violent acts directed towards a person at work or on duty.” There need not be actual physical contact: it can include threats of assault, harassment, intimidation or bullying.  So the Department’s classifications of workplace violence situations apply pretty well universally:

•  Criminal: The perpetrator has no legitimate relationship to the workplace or its employee and essentially is committing a crime in conjunction with the violence (i.e. robbery).

•  Customer or Client: The perpetrator has a legitimate relationship with the business and becomes violent while being served (ie. customers, clients, patients, students, inmates, etc).

•  Co-Worker: The perpetrator is an employee or past employee of the business and attacks or threatens another employee.

•  Domestic Violence: The perpetrator, who has no legitimate relationship with the business but has a relationship with the intended victim, threatens or assaults the intended victim at the workplace.

Read full article here…

The IMAC conference from May 10-11^th in Arizona was a tremendous success.  The itinerary looked promising, and the expert speakers delivered on that expectation.

• Jack Toner had an extremely informative presentation on the NLRB
• Richard Levick was energizing speaking on public relations and crisis communications
• Joe Schollaert from IMAC uncovered some excellent points of consideration discussing how to prepare for a strike
• Dr. Michael Corcoran delivered a wealth of information on workplace violence considerations
• Steve Cabot relayed some great real examples to illustrate his topic of employers rights
• Michael Sherrard pulled some references from each of the other topics to wrap the conference up nicely with his topic of the globalization of unions

It was an excellent learning experience and the participation of all is greatly appreciated.

I’m already looking forward to next year.

The State of Florida recently signed a bill to allow drug testing in the workplace – The Drug Free Workplace Act.  The test can be done randomly every three months and include up to 10% of a company’s workforce.  Positive tests can result in immediate termination.

While this may assist companies with on the job usage that could cause potential safety risks (e.g. forklift drivers or other machine operators), it doesn’t address other drug related issues that may be going on in a workplace.  There are cases where drug dealers have applied for employment with companies to open themselves to a new clientele in a relatively ‘safe’ zone free of police patrols like they would encounter on the streets.

To investigate possible drug activity like dealing, which can lead to workplace violence if deals go bad, an undercover investigator would be suggested.  Undercover investigators will document who is involved and where the violations are taking place.  This can also include video and the company can take appropriate action with the evidence collected.

Drug Free Workplace enacted in Florida

By: By Maggie Rooks | Special to the Floridan
Published: April 19, 2012

Gov. Rick Scott recently signed a bill into law that allows Florida state agencies to randomly test workers for drugs.

The Drug Free Workplace Act will let state employers test up to 10 percent of their workforce once every three months. The first time an employee tests positive, he or she will be fired.

The testing was first proposed in the 2011 Florida Legislature session but was passed in the state House of Representatives and Senate during the last week of the 2012 session, according to a press release from the governor’s office.

Previous Florida drug testing laws only allowed for the random testing of state workers in “safety sensitive” situations and treatment options instead of automatic termination on the first positive test, according to the statute.

Victoria Mock, 20, has never been drug tested for her job as a student worker for the Leon County School Board. However, she isn’t worried about the new statute.

“I wouldn’t find being tested inconvenient because I have nothing to be worried about,” Mock said.

For the purposes of the Florida Drug Free Workplace Act, the term “drug” can refer to alcohol, prescription medicines, narcotics, hallucinogens, amphetamines, opiates and any other addicting substances.

Read more…