My Best Course - Safer Hiring

Safeguarding training often covers good practice once a concern has been identified, but do settings do all they can to stop an offender from entering to begin with?

A course from Hempsall’s training consultancy aims to ‘enable staff to identify the key features of staff recruitment that help deter or prevent the appointment of unsuitable people’. Attendee Debbie Brown, senior manager at Bush Babies head office in Leicester, says, ‘A DBS check is only as good as the last time it was done. As a result of the course, when we send out our application forms and job description we are now adding a copy of the safeguarding policy. It sends a message about our priorities and may put off some people who might otherwise think we are complacent about safeguarding. It’s putting more barriers in the way.’

As well as giving advice on references, the course aims to develop an awareness and understanding of offender behaviour. The group heard a series of six real-life scenarios, one of which was a man working in a school who developed a relationship with a young boy, giving him extra attention and openly sharing his views with his colleagues. ‘Because he worked at a school when he started volunteering at a youth club, they thought he wouldn’t pose a risk,’ says Ms Brown. Offenders ‘can be very confident and seem to be very open. Sometimes they give colleagues information to keep them quiet or get them to back off. Sometimes it’s only when you have the bigger picture that you see the importance of sharing small things,’ she says. ‘It’s to make people understand that everybody has to play a part.’

She says the tutor-led training also involved providing example answers to interview questions indicating potential ‘red flags’ from candidates. Now, as well as sending out the safeguarding policy on application, Bush Babies has added more interview questions to test for such red flags.

www.hempsallconsultancies.com