Industry

Unlocking Efficiency: Insights from Konfir Konnect

Konfir Konnect recently brought together industry leaders to discuss the future of employment and income verifications.

In July - Konfir Konnect brought together industry leaders to address the future of employment and income verifications. If you missed it, you can read the write-up of the event here

The first breakout session of the day was focused on how organisations can harness new data sets to automate their operations. Through this session, we ran a series of polls aimed at gathering insights from the attendees, who represented over 20 different organisations, on various topics related to verification processes, team roles, and challenges within their organisations. Here's a summary of the main themes and findings:

1. Verification process efficiency

Participants were asked to rate the efficiency of their current verification processes on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent). The responses indicated a mixed level of satisfaction:

  • Average Rating: 3.7
  • Most Common Ratings: 3 and 5

This suggests that while some participants are satisfied with their verification processes, others see significant room for improvement. The discussion suggested a focus on automation and in particular, automation of international checks were key focus areas.

2. Role responsibility for scouting new verification technologies

A single-choice quiz asked participants which role in their organisation is responsible for scouting new verification technologies. The roles identified were diverse, but the majority of votes went to the product team:

  • Product: 79%
  • Operations: 16%
  • Other Roles: Spread across various departments (IT, Compliance, Finance, and others)

This emphasises that product teams are most commonly tasked with this responsibility, but it also highlights the cross-functional nature of verification processes, with various other roles contributing to scouting and then implementing new technologies.

3. Challenges in verification processes

Participants also shared the challenges they face with their current verification processes. The key issues identified included:

  • Manual processes: High reliance on manual checks leads to inefficiencies
  • Integration issues: Difficulty integrating new verification technologies with existing systems
  • Cost concerns: High costs associated with advanced verification technologies

A key issue facing the industry is a historic lack of investment and focus on technology. This issue is still relevant today however most businesses are now in a transformation phase focused on becoming more product and data-led.

4. How organisations are positioning themselves to employers

One of the final questions posed to the room was, “how is your business transitioning from being a data provider to being a decision provider?” which initiated an insightful discussion. There was a clear 50/50 split of organisations either seeking to provide their clients with an understanding of the real risk of applicants (i.e. a recommended decision), versus organisations simply wanting to help equip their clients with the facts for the client to interpret risk themselves (i.e. provision of data). 

Taking Employment Screening as an example use case, the ‘decision providers’ often work with employers that are more sensitive to risk, such as employers in Financial Services, Education, and Healthcare. They are also likely to give more time back to the HR teams of their clients.

Conversely, half the room planned to continue positioning their organisation as a ‘data provider’ because they and their clients view verification of employment history as more of a ‘tick box exercise’, to meet minimum compliance requirements. These organisations typically leverage ‘Instant Verifications’ to speed up referencing processes and often work with employers sensitive to speed in industries such as Recruitment and Retail.

5. Future Priorities

The end of the breakout session was an open discussion on what is most important to participants and their organisations over the next couple of years. Regardless of how organisations position themselves (i.e. as a decision provider, or a data provider), there were three common focus areas:

  • Automation: Increasing automation to reduce manual efforts and to identify and account for errors and discrepancies
  • Integration and development capacity: Enhancing integration capabilities through additional resources and technology to streamline workflows
  • Cost management: Seeking cost-effective solutions without compromising on quality

For more information about streamlining the employee verification process across your organisation, speak to one of the Konfir team today at: sales@konfir.com