Faculty & Research
The Truth About Integrity Tests: The Validity and Utility of Integrity Testing for the Hospitality Industry
Vol 7 No 15
By: Michael C. Sturman Ph.D. and David Sherwyn J.D.
Executive Summary: Although not commonly used for selecting hospitality employees, integrity tests can help employers determine which of their prospective hires are likely to engage in unproductive, dangerous, or otherwise risky actions on the job. Candidates are surprisingly candid in answering test questions about their workplace theft or drug abuse, but the tests also have control questions intended to indicate when an applicant is attempting to game the test. Moreover, the tests do not violate U.S. employment laws since they neither create adverse impact on protected groups nor violate provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Although tests represent an additional expense in the hiring process, a study of a large hotel chain found that the savings in screening out potentially expensive employees more than made up for the costs of conducting the tests.
Not only could the chain count on employees who were reasonably honest and drug-free, but it found a substantial reduction in costly workers' compensation claims among the new hires. In the course of a year, the hotel chain administered an integrity test to just over 29,000 would-be employees, and hired just under 6,100 of those applicants. These data, which were made available by American Tescor, creator of the test, set up the opportunity to compare the workers' compensation claims from the new hires with the claims of already incumbent employees. The screened hires experienced a markedly lower incidence of claims compared to the unscreened, existing employees. The average cost per claim for the unscreened employees was $3,446, as compared to $2,119 for the screened group. The annual average cost per employee for workers' compensation claims was $97.77 for the unscreened group, but only $31.02 for the screened group.
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- The Truth About Integrity Tests: The Validity and Utility of Integrity Testing for the Hospitality Industry By: Michael C. Sturman Ph.D. and David Sherwyn J.D.
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About Michael C. Sturman Ph.D.
Michael C. Sturman teaches undergraduate, graduate and executive education courses on human resource management, compensation and cost-benefit analysis. His research focuses on the prediction of individual job performance over time, the influence of compensation systems, and the impact of human resource management on organizational performance. He has published research articles in such journals as the Journal of Applied Psychology, Academy of Management Journal, Personnel Psychology, and Journal of Management. He has also published practitioner papers in the Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, International Journal of Hospitality Management, Lodging Magazine, Lodging HR, A.A.H.O.A. Hospitality, HR.Com, and The American Compensation Association Journal. Sturman is the Kenneth and Marjorie Blanchard Professor of Human Resources. He holds a PhD, MS, and BS from Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations, and is a Senior Professional of Human Resources as certified by the Society for Human Resource Management.
For more information visit http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/facultybios/faculty.html?id=96
About David Sherwyn J.D.
David Sherwyn (BS, JD, Cornell University) is an associate professor of law at Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration. He is a research fellow at the Center for Labor and Employment Law at New York University's School of Law. In addition, Dave is of counsel to the law firm of Shea Stokes Roberts & Wagner. Prior to joining the School of Hotel Administration, Dave practiced management-side labor and employment law for six years.
Dave has published articles in the Stanford Law Review, Berkeley Journal of Labor and Employment Law, Fordham Law Review, University of Pennsylvania Labor and Employment Law Journal, and the Cornell Hospitality Quarterly.
Dave teaches H ADM 387: Business and Hospitality Law, a required class with more than 100 students. In addition, each spring, Dave teaches H ADM 485: Employment Discrimination Law and Union-Management Relations and HA 481 Labor Relations in the Hospitality Industry. Dave received a Hotel School Teacher of the Year Award in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, and 2005, 2007 and 2008. Dave has been nominated for the fraternity and sorority teaching award twelve times and has won the award twice.
In 2002 Dave conceived of, organized, and hosted the Center for Hospitality Research's first Hospitality Industry Roundtable. Because of the success of the Labor and Employment Law Roundtable, the Center now hosts Roundtables in each of the disciplines that are represented in the School.
For more information visit http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/facultybios/faculty.html?id=72
