Backchannel References Are A Must For Hiring

Never assume you’re getting an accurate picture of a candidate from their carefully handpicked references

Every industry has employees who bounce from company to company, leaving a wake of poor outcomes and ineffective leadership they manage to sweep under the rug. Whenever they share their new role on LinkedIn, everyone in the industry asks: “how does this person keep getting hired?”

Bad employees and toxic leaders get hired over and over because their new employers repeatedly make the same mistake: they don’t check back-channel references.

You might be reading this and thinking—hang on, my HR team always does reference checks. And I’m sure they do; they probably ask candidates to provide three references and call one or more of those handpicked people. 

This is such a flawed process that I cannot believe how commonplace it is.

Never assume you’re getting an accurate picture of a candidate from their carefully handpicked references. After all, pretty much anyone in the world can identify three people who are willing to vouch for them, especially if they owe them a favor. With a little leg work, however, you can get a thorough, unvarnished evaluation of a candidate and avoid a disastrous hiring mistake.

Why backchannel references work

A backchannel reference is when you reach out to someone who has worked with the candidate before but isn’t on their reference list. This could be the person’s manager, the head of their department or even an executive.

A backchannel reference can often provide important information that a direct reference wouldn’t offer. For example, imagine that a candidate’s manager gives a glowing reference, but their department head shares that the candidate often schmoozes with their manager but trashes them behind their back. In another common scenario, picture an executive whose peers sing their praises in reference calls, but whose CEO tells you they consistently get poor 360 feedback from their team.

Backchannel references don’t have to make or break your hiring decisions, but they’re a valuable data point. This is why the best leaders I know require them for high level candidates.

How to conduct backchannel references