HireRight Employment Screening Report for Transportation Indicates Significance of Driver Shortage in an Improving Economy

IRVINE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Economic prospects for transportation companies are improving, but the struggle to hire experienced workers due to the driver shortage stands as the number one business challenge for a majority of companies. These findings from the Transportation Spotlight, a special report derived from the 2013 HireRight Employment Screening Benchmarking Report, highlights key developments in hiring and screening practices for the transportation industry.

“Finding qualified drivers with acceptable safety records is job one for transportation companies in 2013,” said Steven Spencer, vice president of transportation, HireRight. “The pinch is being felt more strongly than last year as a combination of regulatory, economic and social issues push drivers from the profession. Screening companies and other hiring professionals must focus their technologies and systems on finding qualified workers and hiring them fast, while enhancing the employer’s image through a positive candidate experience. It has to be a partnership.”

Sixty-one percent of those surveyed in the HireRight Transportation Spotlight named finding and retaining quality talent as their primary business challenge. This has increased from 54 percent in 2012. The challenge surpassed regulatory compliance (39 percent), managing risk (26 percent), and revenue growth (25 percent), indicating the complexity of the problem. While a huge majority of companies anticipate no decline in workforce in the next 12 months, the hiring expectations are modest with 34 percent predicting only a one to four percent increase, possibly due to the tempering influence of the driver shortage.

Other interesting and sometimes controversial issues are also covered in the Transportation Spotlight. Social media is used for sourcing by 45 percent of transportation industry respondents versus 54 percent of respondents across other industries. Transportation companies generally use social media less for both sourcing and screening workers than do other industries. This may be influenced by the belief that many transportation workers are not online as regularly as other industries, and may also reflect the already closely regulated nature of the industry as the use of social media for screening increasingly becomes a challenging legal question for employers. For social media screening, Facebook is the number one site referenced with Google+ a distant second.

The 2013 HireRight Transportation Spotlight covers a range of data including current trends in drug testing, I-9 Verification, background screening and more. The report is available for download at http://go.hireright.com/Transportation-Spotlight.

About HireRight

HireRight is a leading provider of on-demand employment background checks, drug and health screening and electronic Form I-9 and E-Verify solutions that help employers automate, manage and control background screening and related programs. Many companies, including more than one-third of the Fortune 500, trust HireRight because the company delivers customer-focused solutions that provide greater efficiency and faster results. HireRight also provides pre-integrated background screening services through applicant tracking systems from top providers such as Oracle, Taleo, Kenexa, SAP, PeopleAdmin, HealthcareSource, HRsmart, and SilkRoad. HireRight, Inc. is an Altegrity company with worldwide headquarters located in Irvine, California and offices and affiliates around the globe. For more information, visit the company’s web site at www.hireright.com.

HireRight is a registered trademark of HireRight, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective companies.

Strategies for HireRight
Lindsay Thompson
714-957-8880, ext. 128
lindsay@strategiesadpr.com

Source: HireRight

Released May 14, 2013