Problems of security of commercial structures in working with personnel.

Andrey KRYSIN, professor

When hiring personnel

Recent practice shows that crimes and offenses of varying scale, consequences and significance are somehow related to specific actions of employees of commercial structures.

Conceptual approaches to ensuring security

Such measures include the following:

information and analytical intelligence activities to identify and predict possible threats to commercial structures;
counterintelligence measures to combat agent economic espionage, preventing the collection of confidential information by technical means, as well as through personnel in the environment of commercial structures;
ensuring the security of financial and economic activities from economic crimes, scams, fraud, abuse by its own personnel, partners, shareholders, third-party organizations;
regime and administrative measures to ensure the secrecy and confidentiality of internal and other commercial information;
physical, technical and «electronic» protection of buildings and premises of commercial structures and their employees, development and provision of access control systems, performance of security and patrol functions;
protection of senior employees of commercial structures, as well as persons arriving for meetings and negotiations from other cities, regions, including from abroad;
development and implementation of anti-crisis plans for the activities of commercial structures, providing for a way out of various typical emergency situations;
personnel-administrative, regulatory and special measures during the selection, verification, training, retraining, placement and dismissal of personnel.

Today, it should be emphasized that the desire of some heads of commercial structures to solve individual problems listed above without due attention to others, which constitute and form a holistic concept of facility security, does not, as a rule, yield positive results. According to Russian and foreign experts, only a comprehensive approach allows achieving a high degree of economic security for any commercial structure.

True, it should also be noted that in the activities of a bank (firm) there are sometimes special periods when one or another element that makes up a set of economic security measures loses its special relevance for some reason. And then a new, sometimes quite unexpected problem comes to the fore. But even in this case, all the above measures retain their importance and require due attention.

For example, several years ago, individual managers of Moscow commercial banks, trying to solve the security problems of their structures, paid increased attention and financed, mainly, measures to organize physical security and equip buildings and premises with technical means of alarm signaling.

At present, as evidenced by data from a number of surveys and interviews with heads of commercial structures, the problems of protecting commercial information, as well as ensuring the personal safety of managers and key employees, are increasingly coming to the forefront.

Methods of collecting information

An analysis of media reports and law enforcement reports on the latest acts of sabotage and terrorism against commercial structures in Moscow and other Russian cities allows us to draw an unambiguous conclusion about the high level of criminal awareness regarding the daily routine and dynamics of entrepreneurs' activities: victims were usually invariably encountered in the area of their residence or place of work, or intercepted on the highway with extreme precision in time and place. The main and alternate routes of businessmen were studied in advance. The criminals had detailed information about the family composition and relatives of future victims, the makes and license plates of personal and company cars, neighbors, etc.

Thus, it is obvious that any illegal acts related to the use of force against commercial structures are carefully planned and, therefore, consist of several successive stages, among which invasions, thefts, armed attacks are actually the final actions of the criminals.

In this regard, the modern system of security measures should be aimed at predicting and identifying signs of probable offenses, and especially crimes at early stages, at the stage of forming intent and developing plans for criminal actions by criminal communities, which allows us to warn and prevent such acts.

An integral component of any planned criminal action is the collection of information. It is possible to identify the following main methods that are currently used by criminals to obtain information about commercial structures:

surveillance, including with the help of mobile and stationary optical-technical means, covert photography, video recording; information extraction; theft of any internal documents by persons introduced or acquired in commercial structures who agreed or were forced to carry out the specified actions for selfish reasons, as a result of threats, physical coercion or for other reasons;
interception of information on various internal and external communication channels of commercial structures;
obtaining information by technical means through the use of various signal sources in the premises of commercial structures, both connected to functioning equipment (personal computers) and through specially introduced technology for covert information retrieval (special bookmarks, including remote control);
obtaining information about commercial structures through the use of a system of analytical methods (structural analysis, financial analysis, analysis of samples of scientific and technical products, etc.).

Currently, the use of employees of commercial structures as sources of internal information is considered the most reliable, fast and effective way to obtain confidential data. We also note that in addition to obtaining confidential information itself, such an internal source from employees of commercial organizations can be used simultaneously to obtain clarifying information that would supplement the data obtained by technical means.

In addition, intelligence sources are increasingly being used today to exert influence on the strategy and tactics of the behavior of the heads of relevant commercial structures, as well as other persons making responsible decisions in the areas of taxation, customs policy, export-import quotas, land allocation, etc., which is beneficial to criminal structures and competitors.

The Role of Personnel in Ensuring the Security of Commercial Structures

It seems appropriate and necessary, in order to increase economic security, to pay more attention to the selection and study of personnel, checking any information indicating their dubious behavior and compromising connections. At the same time, it is also necessary to conduct significant explanatory and educational work, briefings and training on safety rules and measures, and regular testing.

It is necessary to clearly outline the personal functional responsibilities of all categories of employees of commercial structures and, on the basis of existing Russian legislation, determine their responsibility for any types of violations related to the disclosure or leakage of commercial information constituting an official secret in internal orders and instructions. In addition, Moscow commercial banks are increasingly introducing the «confidential» classification in official documents and, accordingly, various types of allowances for certain categories of personnel.

At present, many managers of Moscow commercial structures are becoming increasingly aware of the role and place of their employees in the creation and maintenance of the general system of economic security. Such an understanding of this problem leads to the introduction of procedures for careful selection and placement of personnel. Letters of recommendation, scientific methods of checking for professional suitability and various types of testing carried out by personnel departments, security service employees and psychological support groups created in a number of commercial structures are gradually gaining importance.

Despite, however, some positive examples, in general it must be acknowledged that the heads of the overwhelming majority of commercial organizations have not yet fully realized the need to organize comprehensive protection of their structures from criminal and economic crimes and improve the process of selection and placement of personnel.

Procedures for professional selection of personnel

As experience shows, the safety of the economic activity of any commercial structure largely depends on the extent to which the qualifications of its employees, their moral and ethical qualities correspond to the tasks being solved.

Features of psychological approaches to professional selection

If we objectively evaluate the existing procedures for personnel selection today, it turns out6 that in many banks and firms the emphasis, unfortunately, is placed primarily on determining only the level of professional training of job candidates, which is often determined by traditional formal criteria:

education;
rank;
length of service in the specialty.

This approach obviously proceeds from the increasingly outdated concept of limited financial liability of individual employees for the final results of their activities and confidential information.

In modern commercial banks, with a limited number of employees and rapidly increasing flows of information and management teams, each employee increasingly becomes a bearer of confidential information that may be of interest to competitors and criminal groups.

In such conditions, the requirements for the personal and business qualities of employees and, consequently, for job candidates are significantly increased. This circumstance encourages the heads of commercial structures to increasingly turn to the methods and procedures of scientific psychology, with the help of which it is possible to fairly quickly, reliably and comprehensively evaluate a possible candidate and draw up his or her psychological portrait.

Of course, it would be a mistake to assume that psychological selection completely replaces previous personnel procedures. Only with a skillful combination of psychological and traditional personnel approaches can we predict with a high degree of reliability the behavior of employees in various situations, including extreme ones.

From the point of view of economic security, psychological professional selection pursues the following main goals:

identification of convictions, criminal connections, inclinations;
determination of criminal inclinations, predisposition of the candidate to commit illegal acts, daring and thoughtless actions in the event of the formation of certain circumstances in his environment;
establishment of facts indicating the moral and psychological instability, inferiority, vulnerability of the candidate.

Functions of management organizational charts and job descriptions

Currently, leading commercial structures usually have strictly developed and approved by the management organizational structures and management functions. The most popular methods are those of drawing up organizational charts or organizational drawings, which graphically depict each workplace, spell out job responsibilities and determine information flows for an individual performer. With such a management and control scheme, it is extremely clear which area (department, service, department) requires a specialist of the appropriate qualifications and what information he should have at his workplace. Requirements for the business and personal qualities of employees are also determined and the modes of their preservation of commercial secrets are stipulated.

In addition, to make these procedures more specific, a job description is compiled for each job, i.e. a list of personal qualities that a potential employee should ideally possess. The content and depth of job descriptions may vary. This depends on the job they are compiled for. However, mandatory attributes of such documents are sections that reflect professionally significant qualities (psychological characteristics, personality traits, without which it is impossible to perform functional duties), as well as contraindications (personal qualities that make it impossible to enroll a candidate in a specific position). In some cases, it is necessary not only to indicate professionally significant qualities, but also to assess the degree of their expression, i.e. formation.

Problems of employee capacity and performance

This study focuses on personnel security of business activities. Therefore, it seems appropriate to pay attention to a rather important feature that is almost universally ignored in job descriptions, since it is considered as if it were self-evident. In particular, we are talking about the level of legal capacity of job candidates. The problem is that even very experienced employees of personnel departments cannot always correctly, reliably and quickly assess the true psychological state of people who came to interviews. This is facilitated by increased anxiety, the tendency of individual candidates to biased assessments of the nature of the activities of some commercial structures, but especially — widespread and often uncontrolled self-medication of various psychosomatic disorders using in some cases very strong psychotropic drugs.

In this regard, leading Moscow commercial banks require candidates to provide health certificates or themselves issue referrals to certain clinics with a recommendation to undergo a full medical examination. This approach allows for a fairly quick and effective comprehensive picture of the health of a future employee, identifying chronic diseases inherent to him (pulmonary, gastric, vertebral-sacral, cardiovascular), diagnosing vision and hearing and, accordingly, planning his possible use in a specific workplace (driver-security guard, computer operator, collector, security officer, etc.).

Fundamental approaches to organizing professional selection

Returning to organizational measures, we note that after developing management schemes and compiling job descriptions, you can begin interviews and apply various procedures for selecting job candidates. As a rule, the problem of personnel selection arises for managers of commercial structures in two main cases:

creation of new divisions;
filling vacant positions.

The first case is usually characterized by studying a significant number of candidates, for whom a corresponding position is selected from a set of available vacancies. In the second case, from a limited number of candidates, the one who, in terms of his personal and professional qualities, best meets the requirements of a given job position is selected. The process of psychological professional selection has several stages, which are described below in the appropriate sequence.

Main stages and procedures of professional selection of personnel

FIRST STAGE. Preliminary interview

In this phase, a preliminary interview is conducted, which is implemented in several versions and can be either superficial or in-depth. In the first case, they are mainly limited to clarifying individual, most significant information and posing several very specific questions. Such an interview is usually conducted in cases of mass selection of candidates.

During an in-depth interview, a wider range of questions is clarified, first of all, some personal characteristics are clarified, the candidate's motivation for moving to work in this particular commercial structure, his professional orientation and some others.

Here it is necessary to especially emphasize that the initial contact with the candidate should be used as much as possible for educational and preventive purposes, for which it is recommended:

to draw the attention of the future employee to the characteristic features and mode of the upcoming activity;
to draw attention to the conditions of work with confidential information to which he will be admitted.

Even the first introductory interview should preferably be conducted in a standard formalized form, which allows for the subsequent computer processing of the candidate's answers and the fairly quick receipt of generalized results.

In business practice, there is also a tendency to use introductory interviews with persons being hired to obtain additional information about the relevant market, competitors, their organizational structures and financial capabilities. Thus, there is a clear desire by some personnel structures to give such interviews an exploratory nature, based on the results of which, in some cases, even separate certificates are issued for those organizations in which the candidate previously worked or continues to work.

At the same time, however, it should be remembered that the possibility of provocation on the part of the candidate cannot be ruled out, who, having taken part in such a conversation, can then officially declare, for example, through the media, about attempts to allegedly extract from him the protected commercial secrets of his «beloved company». Therefore, the task of the personnel departments and security services is to behave sufficiently sincerely and kindly and only in this way encourage the interlocutor to frank statements, which will largely prevent possible accusations of illegal use of other people's commercial secrets.

In order to avoid possible misunderstandings, it is recommended that at the very beginning of the meeting, it be clearly and unambiguously clarified whether the candidate has signed any internal documents at his previous place of work that would require him to comply with the non-disclosure regime of commercial, scientific, technical, financial and other information. If the candidate mentions these conditions, it is advisable to interrupt the conversation under any covert pretext until all other questions regarding the candidate's questionnaire and autobiography have been clarified.

STAGE TWO. Collection and evaluation of information about candidates

At this stage, a primary but fairly in-depth assessment of the personal and business qualities of the job candidate is formed. At the same time, it seems most important for security services to obtain information of an introductory and biographical nature not only on the specific person being checked, but also on his relatives, as well as to identify friendly and, especially, confidential official and family ties, sometimes hidden by the candidate from his entourage, or the true nature of which is artificially masked by some official methods and reasons. Such an approach allows for a sharp increase in the security regime of a commercial structure, but only on condition that the checks are regular and thorough.

During this stage, based on the analysis of documents submitted by the candidate, as well as data received through the HR department and security service (questionnaire, CV, job application, personnel records, letters of recommendation, information about the place of residence, etc.) and the results of the preliminary interview, it becomes possible to eliminate those candidates who, according to formal criteria, clearly do not meet the requirements for future employees.

According to some data from foreign and Russian commercial services and agencies that carry out personnel selection, already at this stage, as a rule, 10 to 30 percent of applicants are eliminated.

THIRD STAGE. Test procedures and other methods for checking candidates

This stage is characterized, as a rule, by complex psychological testing. Recently, numerous testing methods and procedures have become very popular, since they are characterized by the speed of implementation and high efficiency. Each of these methods, of course, has its limitations, the violation of which can seriously distort the results obtained. It should be especially noted that many tests recommended even by well-known scientific centers are still very crudely compiled and do not stand up to criticism. In addition, not all methods can be recommended for use by people who do not have special training. Usually, test methods are divided into four large groups.

Personality questionnaires (questionnaires). Tests of this class are lists of questions that require subjects to express unambiguous agreement or disagreement with their content. After testing, the answers are analyzed using a special algorithm by a psychoanalyst operator. Based on the data obtained, psychological characteristics of the test subjects are formed.

Questionnaires can contain from several dozen to several hundred questions. Therefore, based on the testing results, it becomes possible to either evaluate several individual and most significant psychological qualities of a particular person for a given commercial structure, or to compile a fairly detailed psychological portrait of that person.

Typical questions that are usually used in surveys include, for example, the following:

Are you ready to help other employees of the company (bank) if they have urgent work?
Do you find routine, painstaking, everyday work with documents or other information carriers depressing?
Are you able to work on weekends or holidays if a crisis situation arises in your organization?
would you be willing to break some of your social contacts and connections if your organization's administration required it?

When implementing this method, one is captivated by the apparent simplicity and ease of conducting the testing itself, as well as the accessibility and speed of processing and interpreting the results obtained. But these supposedly short terms and simplicity of the procedures are very deceptive. With a careless attitude to testing, the employee conducting it, without intending to, can make gross methodological errors and thereby seriously distort the final results. Among the personality questionnaires currently used in practice, it is advisable to name the following main tests.

The SMIL test is clinically oriented and is designed to identify certain mental disorders and somatic diseases in test subjects. The test contains over 500 questions. This forces candidates to work with it for quite a long time. The test is most effective in cases where it is necessary to diagnose borderline mental states. Particular attention should be paid to the fact that due to, for example, low qualifications or haste of the test operators, there is a significant risk of incorrect interpretation of the final results. In this regard, it is not recommended to use this test for mass examinations.

The CATTELL test is more suitable for professional selection, as it is aimed at identifying the presence and degree of expression of the main 15 psychological characteristics and character traits inherent in the person being studied. The test is aimed at identifying such personality traits as intelligence level, tendency to quick mood swings, etc. Based on the test results, it is usually possible to compile a fairly detailed psychological portrait of the individual.

The AZENKA test contains 57 questions and allows you to identify such personal characteristics as the degree of extroversion and introversion, the level of emotional instability. In combination, the listed characteristics allow you to draw a conclusion about the temperament of the test person.

The RSC test is a lesser-known questionnaire that allows you to determine the extent to which the test person is inclined to take risky decisions in extreme situations.

The KU-sort test has about 50 statements, by the reactions of the test person to which it is possible to judge the degree of his dependence or independence from the small social group being studied, determine the level of his sociability, identify the presence of his need for self-affirmation within the framework of a small or large social group (department, division, commercial structure) or the desire to avoid any aggravation and conflict situations.
A characteristic feature of this test is that it allows obtaining information about the candidate being tested both during direct testing (the person being tested answers all the questions themselves) and during remote testing (one of their relatives, friends, colleagues, or family members answers the questions as if on behalf of the person being tested).

The THOMAS test helps to clarify, and in some cases, predict the behavior of the candidate in acute conflict situations and emergency situations.

The USK test allows establishing the level of subjective control of the person being tested over the development of events in situations that are vital to them.

Blank methods. These procedures are sets of tasks of varying degrees of difficulty, which are presented to the test subject on cards or forms. The candidate must find the correct answer, choosing it from the options offered to him, or offer his own individual solution to the problem. Such tests are used primarily to assess the so-called «intelligence index», or the degree of development of individual psychophysiological functions.
Such methods primarily include the RAVENA, WEKSLER, AMTHAERA tests, the compass method, the SCHULT tables, etc. Some of them are very complex in processing and interpreting the results, as a result of which they have very limited application in the practice of professional selection in commercial structures.

The above methods are used mainly only when the job description, for example, of a bank contains very strict and very specific requirements for certain psychophysiological qualities of a future employee.

Projective methods. These procedures are an even more complicated type of tests. The results obtained with their help can be reliably interpreted only with rare exceptions by specialists with extensive experience in working with these methods. This group of tests includes the LUSHER color test, RORKHAN spots, and the ROSENZWEIGH test.

Instrumental methods.

These are complex procedures using sophisticated technical devices that are designed for a comprehensive assessment of the psychophysiological characteristics of test subjects. In Russian practice of professional selection of candidates for work in commercial structures, such methods are still rarely used, since their implementation requires special premises and the presence of a group of specialists — psychophysiologists in the personnel department or security service.

It should be noted, however, that recently there has been a tendency to involve third-party experts to implement instrumental methods. In such cases, this requires, of course, the adoption of special security measures and the preservation of confidentiality, since third-party specialists actually gain access to closed internal information of commercial structures concerning personnel issues.

Use of a polygraph. When studying the scope of application of instrumental methods, it should be noted that in recent years, employees of the Department of Psychophysiological Problems of the All-Russian Research Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation have been conducting extensive work on the use of a polygraph («lie detector») in operational-search activities, to identify extraordinary (psychic) abilities of some individuals to solve crimes, as well as for the comprehensive development of a psychological portrait of a suspected criminal. In a number of works, employees of this institute managed to create a very probable forensic model of a suspect.

Some studies of job candidates are also carried out by individual Russian commercial structures using both domestic and imported equipment. In some cases, rather complex mathematical programs are used to process the results obtained, which, naturally, significantly increases the cost of such work.

In some computer systems, the answers of the person being tested are assigned a corresponding score, of course unknown to the candidate. In other tests, the answers are subject to analytical processing and, as a result, textual conclusions are prepared about the personal and business qualities of the applicant.

In any case (evaluation-point system, analytical version) the probabilistic characteristics and orientation of the studied personality form the basis for the preparation by the personnel departments or security services of commercial structures of specific individual questions that will be asked of the candidate during the second face-to-face interview.

Methods for checking the readiness of personnel to act in emergency situations

It should be noted that in the context of a sharp increase in the crime situation in the city, some Moscow commercial organizations are already introducing special tests aimed at identifying the ability of candidates to act actively and productively in difficult, crisis conditions and emergency situations, for example, in the event of a fire, threat of attack, under the influence of the risk of sabotage and terrorist acts (the likelihood of shootings, seizures, kidnappings, violence, etc.).

In fact, today we can already state the existence of mandatory multi-level psychological testing in order to identify the true abilities of candidates to act clearly and without panic in extraordinary, extreme conditions. For this purpose, very complex technical systems and complexes are used, with the help of which the nature and extent of the stressful psychophysical state of the individual are identified.

Thus, on the one hand, testing provides an opportunity to receive answers to questions related to the psychological characteristics of the candidate, which is an important circumstance when making the final decision on his/her employment. On the other hand, it is necessary to exercise sufficient caution and caution in using tests, since there is a possibility of distortion of the results in the process of their processing and interpretation.

Organizational and personnel approaches to the formation of psychological support groups

One of the most effective options for solving this problem could probably be considered the introduction of professional psychologists into the staff of commercial structures, who, along with issues of creating a favorable psychological climate, resolving conflict situations in teams, and developing approaches to psychological management, would also deal with issues of professional selection of job candidates.

Another option for professional selection could be the use of automated systems and psychological testing complexes using computer technology. In this case, it is obvious that there is a need to establish contractual relations with specialized firms and psychological support centers, which, however, in this case receive access to very sensitive information of a commercial structure, which must be taken into account when developing the analysis mode and subsequent use of test results.

So, at the stage of psychological testing the following important task is solved — obtaining a set of psychological characteristics of the candidate, which will be used in the future to assess his professional suitability. In addition, testing allows us to assess the presence and degree of formation of such fundamental character traits as honesty, sincerity, loyalty, readiness to obey internal rules.

In addition, experienced specialists using test methods strive to identify the following negative character traits of the candidate: excitability, irritability, suspiciousness, anxiety, increased sensitivity to comments and recommendations, inflated self-esteem, unfounded arrogance, etc. It is clear that the noted negative aspects require a more thorough and in-depth analysis in the future.

STAGE FOUR. Study of test results

This phase involves processing, interpretation and comprehensive analysis of test results. In the work of HR departments and security services of commercial structures, this stage is the most important, since the success of all previous work depends on it. Currently, in leading Moscow commercial banks, such materials are processed mainly on computers, which significantly speeds up this process and allows avoiding errors and inaccuracies, reducing the likelihood of subjective assessments.

Objectively and comprehensively assessing existing test methods, it is necessary to emphasize the following: their specificity today is such that it is still not possible to obtain an unambiguous answer about the reliability of a future employee. With the help of testing, it is only possible to formulate a very complete set of characteristics for the candidate being studied. At the same time, their depth and accuracy largely depend on the package of methods used, as well as on the thoroughness of the operators' compliance with the testing instructions.

Procedures for selecting candidates based on testing results

After receiving psychological characteristics of the candidate, it is advisable to carefully compare them with the corresponding job descriptions. It is obvious that the main emphasis should be placed on selecting those individuals who are as close as possible to the predicted ideal of the future employee.
When comparatively analyzing candidates, it is recommended to adhere to the following sequence:

identifying among candidates those individuals who, according to their psychological parameters, are clearly not suitable for the planned work; — identifying among the tested contingent those individuals regarding whom it is possible to express very reasonable suspicions about the presence of some mental disorders or character traits, close to borderline states;
recording those candidates who do not possess qualities contraindicated for hiring, although their professionally significant qualities have not yet been formed, or have been formed, but to an insufficient degree;
selecting from the group of candidates those individuals who, according to their psychological characteristics, fully or partially meet the requirements of the job description.

Thus, all candidates can be divided into four groups according to a number of formal characteristics. Further work with the test subjects who fall into the first group is obviously not advisable. A similar conclusion can be made regarding the persons in the second group. From the third group of candidates, those whose psychological characteristics allow us to assume the rapid development of professionally significant qualities in these persons can be invited to interviews in the future. It is recommended that members of the fourth group be allowed to participate in a repeat interview almost without exception.

STAGE FIVE. Final interview

The final interview is the main content of the final phase of work with the candidate. As experience shows, it is at this stage, surprisingly, that HR staff and even heads of commercial structures make the greatest number of mistakes. Their main reason is that the very fact of the interview is usually treated formally. This refers to the special circumstance that by this moment the decision has either already been made in general or has been formed by approximately 90—05 percent. That is why the final conversation with the candidate often comes down to clarifying only a few minor issues and, sometimes, to the final agreement of individual points of the employment agreement (contract).

Features of the strategy and tactics of conducting a final interview with candidates

Taking into account the recommendations of modern psychology and procedures for comprehensive personnel study, it is advisable to approach the second interview with the candidate more seriously and strive to make the most of this meeting to obtain any additional information that can influence the final decision. Before the start of the final interview, it is advisable to draw up a rough plan of the conversation, which usually includes the following main points:

highlighting the main issues that require mandatory additional clarification and explanation, the results of which can influence the final decision on hiring a candidate (true motivation for wanting to work in this particular commercial structure, difficult to explain deep awareness of the nature of future activities, criminal or questionable reasons for leaving a previous job, etc.);
defining key, fundamental points in the structure and dynamics of the interview, including the sequence and degree of frankness of the questions asked, the nature and duration of their discussion, various options for ending the interview;
forecasting and modeling the probable behavior of representatives of the HR apparatus (security service, management), if new and unexpected circumstances are revealed during the interview, calling into question the possibility of hiring the candidate;
choosing the optimal time, duration, and location of the interview, which should be convenient and acceptable for both parties;
formulating psychological approaches to conducting the final phase of the interview, which, as a rule, is of an official nature, but should simultaneously encourage free communication and a certain level of trust.

Initial stage of the interview

In such a conversation, the initial phase of communication between the HR representative (security service) and the candidate is of great importance. Therefore, it is advisable to strive to establish a reliable psychological contact with the partner, which will allow the interlocutor to overcome the feeling of his dependent position. In addition, a certain trust and friendliness towards the candidate allow him to relieve his anxiety, reduce the level of alertness and constraint.

It should also be borne in mind that the interview subject is usually aware of his lower level of awareness of the commercial structure that is testing him. This gives rise to natural stiffness, slowness of reaction in answers even to banal questions, inhibition in exchanging opinions on familiar professional problems.

It is recommended to start the final interview with a discussion of neutral topics and conduct it not in an official workplace, for example, in the office of the head of the personnel department, but in a conference room in armchairs, showing maximum attention to the interlocutor, considering him as a very likely candidate for the job.

The duration of the introductory phase may vary depending on some characteristics of the interlocutor. It should also be taken into account that communication at this stage implies a process of mutual study. Following this rule, it is recommended to inform the candidate, of course, within the appropriate framework, about the main tasks and nature of the activities of the organization where he seeks to get a job.

As a rule, such an approach allows to strengthen mutual understanding between the interlocutors, to increase the candidate's trust in the commercial structure. At this stage, it is also advisable to familiarize the candidate with some official documents (annual reports, advertising materials, prospectuses, media reports), which would allow him to form his own idea of the given organization.

The introductory part of the interview usually ends after the interviewee has fully adapted to the situation. This can be judged by his relaxed posture, even breathing, adequate response to relevant questions, absence of tremors (shaking of hands or feet), smooth movements, calm facial expressions and balanced gestures.

Structure of the content of the central part of the interview

The main part of the interview is, naturally, the most important. It is best to structure it in such a way that the candidate answers the questions posed in detailed sentences, reflecting in them those aspects of his biography that seem important for this commercial structure. The most significant questions of this phase of the interview traditionally include the following:

the main motives for which the candidate decided to offer his services to this bank (company);
the candidate's long-term plans, with which he connects his work in the bank (advanced training, learning foreign languages, mastering computer technologies, expanding business and personal connections, material factors, etc.);
negative aspects that arose at the candidate's previous place of work;
personal and business connections, the nature of relations with managers and employees at the previous place of work.

When evaluating the candidate's corresponding answers, it is necessary to pay attention to the argumentation, intonation, accents, facial expressions, gestures, and expressions that he uses to support his conclusions. As a result, when analyzing the answers, it is usually possible to assess the thoughtfulness, stability, and finality of the candidate's decision in sufficient depth.
In addition, by evaluating the reaction, remarks, answers, and sometimes the lack of comments, one can judge not only the thoughtfulness of the decision, but also the level of the candidate's intelligence.
For these purposes, the following system of criteria has been developed, which is recommended to be followed during the interview:

obvious lack of consistency in what the interlocutor says about himself;
superficial analysis of the circumstances of the problems under discussion;
unfounded conclusions that do not follow from previously discussed issues;
expressed primitiveness of conclusions;
contradictions to one's own premises and theses, on which the interlocutor initially built a chain of reasoning and argued his own conclusions;
unfounded categorical statements or denials;
obviously absurd conclusions and findings on the issues under discussion that do not correspond to generally accepted views;
inability to understand, perceive and convey the figurative meaning of jokes, proverbs, individual allegorical expressions and statements;
excessive conflict and touchiness over minor issues;
ambition, stubbornness and inflated self-esteem when defending one's own views and beliefs.

Obviously, the more of the above-mentioned signs a representative of the HR department (security service) observes in the interlocutor, the easier it is to make a reasoned conclusion about the candidate's level of intelligence.

Problems of ending the final conversation

If during the interview it was not possible to identify any facts that would make the question of hiring the candidate questionable, it is recommended to proceed to the final stage — signing the employment agreement (contract, agreement). It is advisable to conduct this part of the conversation in a formal setting, for example, in the workroom (office) of the HR representative. The job candidate should be given the opportunity to carefully familiarize himself with the text of the agreement, especially in the part concerning his personal obligations to this commercial structure.

In practice, there are cases when a candidate, for some reason, refuses this right (shyness, inexperience, gullibility, etc.). In these circumstances, a representative of the company (bank) should tactfully insist on familiarizing the candidate with the text of the agreement and its mandatory endorsement or signing, which allows, as a rule, to avoid conflict situations in the future.

If the candidate himself strives to carefully study the draft agreement, it is recommended to pay attention to which specific sections and paragraphs attract his greatest attention and which of them he is inclined to ask clarifying questions about or insist on changing the relevant points or individual formulations.

As a rule, people with a choleric or sanguine temperament do not pay due attention to the substantive side of the employment agreement and, therefore, can sometimes miss important paragraphs that limit their freedom to handle confidential information.

Phlegmatic and melancholic people, on the contrary, usually study the text of the agreement slowly and thoughtfully and are inclined to ask quite a lot of clarifying questions, stipulating individual procedures of their work activity, which should be perceived by the HR department employee as a normal and natural reaction of the interlocutor.

However, special attention should be paid to such unexpected circumstances, in which a sanguine person, for example, seeks to scrupulously evaluate some key points of a contract or a phlegmatic person does not pay due attention to the content of the document he is signing. These features should alert HR staff, since they indicate certain abnormal deviations in the standard behavior of candidates that require additional study.

Basic recommendations for screening and selecting job candidates

In conclusion, it should be emphasized that psychological selection is always recommended to be carried out in combination with other methods of studying candidates.

Tasks of the security service

Today it seems appropriate to remind once again that from the point of view of ensuring the strategic interests of a commercial structure, the following functions of the security service are mandatory:

determining the degree of probability of the candidate developing criminal inclinations in cases where certain favorable circumstances arise in his environment (personal control over credit and financial resources, the ability to control the movement of cash and securities, access to material and technical assets, working with confidential information, etc.);
identifying previous criminal inclinations, convictions, connections with the criminal environment (criminal past, the presence of specific convictions, cases of fraud, machinations, fraud, theft at the candidate's previous place of work and establishing or reasonable judgments about his possible involvement in these criminal acts).

An integrated approach to organizing professional selection of personnel

To obtain such information, the capabilities of various departments of commercial structures are used, primarily the security service, the human resources department, the legal department, medical support departments, as well as some third-party organizations, such as detective agencies, employment agencies, dispensaries, etc. The following methods are used to collect information of this nature: surveys, questionnaires, targeted interviews with individuals at the place of residence of candidates and at previous places of study or work, inquiries through medical institutions, etc.

It is also obvious that representatives of commercial structures must be absolutely sure that they conduct tests, interviews and meetings with those persons who act as job candidates. This implies a thorough check of passport data, other documents, as well as obtaining photographs of candidates without glasses, contact lenses, wigs, makeup. It is recommended to require a set of photographs of several sizes (6 x 12, 4 x 6).

It is preferable to obtain a set of color photographs of the candidate, which can be used, if necessary, to present to residents at his place of residence or colleagues at work. The use of color photographs in personnel work is also preferable due to the fact that they clearly and without distortion convey the color of the hair, eyes, skin, age and characteristic features of the candidate.

In practice, there are already known cases when, for additional analysis of the candidate's questionnaire and his photographs, the heads of commercial structures invited highly professional lawyers, graphologists, famous psychoanalysts and even psychics in order to ensure maximum completeness of the formulations of the final conclusion and to identify possible hidden contradictions in the character of the person being checked.

In recent years, handwriting examination has been widely practiced in leading Moscow commercial banks, which allows one to determine many character traits of a candidate: temperament, endurance, volitional qualities, loyalty, accuracy, literacy, general educational level, etc., as well as a predisposition to committing unseemly and dishonest acts.

If the results of the specified checks, tests and psychological examination do not contradict each other and do not contain data that would prevent the hiring of this candidate, an employment agreement is concluded with him, in most cases providing for a certain probationary period (1-2 months).

Features of checking management personnel

In summary, it is necessary to emphasize the following important circumstance: persons hired for responsible vacant positions in commercial structures (members of the board of directors, chief accountants, consultants, heads of security and guard services, heads of computer centers and workshops, assistants and secretaries of top officials) are today, as a rule, subject to the following standard check, which includes:

quite lengthy procedures for collecting and verifying installation and biographical information with their subsequent analytical processing;
providing letters of recommendation from well-known business structures with their subsequent verification;
checks against law enforcement records;
installations at the place of residence and at previous places of work;
series of interviews and tests with subsequent psychoanalytic processing of the results.

According to experts, even each of the above-mentioned verification methods taken separately is quite effective. Taken together, a very high degree of reliability of information about the professional suitability and reliability of the candidate, the ability to work creatively in a specific area in the relevant commercial structure is achieved.

The process of dismissal of personnel

Employee dismissal procedures have a serious impact on the security issues of commercial structures. Unfortunately, individual managers are sometimes not very interested in the feelings and experiences of personnel who, for one reason or another, are laid off. As experience shows, such an approach usually leads to serious negative consequences.

Psychological approaches to the problem of personnel dismissal

Modern psychological approaches to the dismissal process allow us to develop the following fundamental recommendation: whatever the reasons for dismissal of an employee, he should leave a commercial organization without a feeling of resentment, irritation and revenge. Only in this case can we hope that the dismissed employee will not take rash steps and will not inform law enforcement agencies, tax inspectorate, competitors, criminal structures about the real or imaginary shortcomings, blunders, mistakes in the activities of his former managers, known to him.

Thus, HR representatives should be clearly focused on identifying the true motives for dismissal of all categories of employees. Often, the reasons cited by an employee when resigning and the true motives that prompted him to take such a step differ significantly from each other. Usually, a false protective motive is used because the employee, due to previous habits and traditions, fears that his actions will be misinterpreted by his superiors and colleagues. Along with this, there are very often cases when the employee himself is internally sure that he is resigning for the reason he openly states, although his decision was formed and made under the influence of completely different circumstances, sometimes hidden from him.

In this regard, the fundamental task is to determine the true reason for the employee's dismissal, try to correctly assess it and decide whether it is advisable in this situation to attempt to artificially retain this person in the team, or to work out and implement a procedure for his calm and conflict-free dismissal. It is recommended that the decision be made on the basis of strictly objective data regarding each specific employee.

Preparing for a conversation with dismissed employees

Upon receipt of an oral or written application for dismissal, it is recommended in all cases without exception to conduct a conversation with the participation of a representative of the HR department and one of the heads of the commercial structure. Before the conversation, it is advisable to take steps to collect the following information about the employee being dismissed:

the nature of his relationships with colleagues in the team;
attitude to work;
level of professional training;
the presence of personal or work-related conflicts;
previous statements or wishes to move to another place of work;
access to information, including that constituting a commercial secret;
the probable period of obsolescence of information constituting a commercial secret;
the expected future place of work of the employee being dismissed (dismissed).

Features of conducting the interview

A dismissal interview is conducted only after all the necessary information has been collected. Of course, the head of the commercial structure first works out a principled approach to the question of whether it is advisable to attempt to persuade the employee to change his initial decision or to authorize the execution of his dismissal. In any case, it is recommended to let the interlocutor speak out and explain the reasons for his decision in detail. When choosing a place for the interview, preference is usually given to office premises.

Depending on the expected result, the conversation can be conducted in an official tone or take the form of a confidential conversation, a heart-to-heart talk, an exchange of opinions. However, whatever the plans regarding the employee, the conversation with him should be structured in such a way that the latter in no way feels humiliated, offended, or insulted. To do this, the tone of the conversation should be kept extremely correct, tactful and friendly, even despite any critical and unfair comments that the employee may make about the commercial structure and its specific managers.

Problems of protecting commercial secrets when dismissing staff

If the bank's (firm's) board, HR department and security service decide not to interfere with the employee's dismissal, and due to his official position he had access to confidential information, then in this case several options for keeping commercial information secret are worked out (execution of an official subscription on non-disclosure of data constituting a commercial secret, or an oral «gentleman's» agreement on maintaining loyalty by the dismissed employee to «his bank or firm»).

In this regard, it is necessary to emphasize that a personal appeal to the sense of honor and dignity of dismissed persons is most effective in relation to those individuals who have a sanguine and phlegmatic temperament, who, as a rule, highly value trust and goodwill.

As for people with a choleric temperament, it is recommended to end the conversation with this category of employees on an official note. In some cases, announcing the decision to dismiss them causes a strong negative reaction associated with attempts to speculate on their true, and sometimes imaginary, professional merits. Therefore, with employees of this temperament and character, it is advisable to carefully discuss and stipulate in documents the possibility of the onset of legal consequences for them of disclosing a commercial secret.

It is recommended to act somewhat differently in cases where employees are dismissed on the initiative of commercial structures. In these circumstances, the decision taken should not be hastily implemented. If the dismissed person has any information that constitutes a commercial secret, it is advisable to transfer him/her to another work area in advance and under an appropriate pretext, i.e. to a department that does not have such information.

In addition, such persons are traditionally sought to be retained in the structure of a bank or firm until measures are taken to reduce possible damage from their disclosure of information constituting a commercial secret, or adequate means of protecting confidential data (technical, administrative, patent, legal, financial, etc.) are found.

Only after these measures have been implemented is it recommended to invite the employee to be dismissed for an interview and announce the specific reasons why the commercial structure is refusing his services. It is desirable that these reasons contain elements of objectivity, reliability and verifiability (repurposing of production, staff reduction, deterioration of the financial situation, lack of customers, etc.). When motivating dismissal, it is advisable, as a rule, to refrain from referring to the negative business and personal qualities of this employee.

Maintaining psychological contact with dismissed employees

After the announcement of dismissal, it is recommended to listen carefully to the employee's counterarguments, arguments and comments regarding the nature of the work, the company's management style, etc. Usually, dismissed personnel very critically, sharply and truthfully cover the situation in commercial structures, revealing vulnerabilities, serious shortcomings, personnel miscalculations, financial troubles, etc.

If you approach such criticism without bias and objectively, these considerations can be used very effectively in the future in the interests of the company or bank. In some cases, the dismissed employee is even offered to put forward his recommendations in writing, of course, for an appropriate reward.

In addition, such a conversation allows you to decide on the advisability of providing the dismissed person with any references for employment at a new place of work. Any hints about settling personal scores with the dismissed candidate for his previous shortcomings in work and behavior should be strictly avoided.

During the final settlement, it is usually recommended, regardless of the personal characteristics of the dismissed employees, to take from them a non-disclosure agreement on confidential information that became known during the work process.

In any case, after the dismissal of employees who are aware of information constituting a commercial secret, it is advisable to conduct an operational installation at their new place of work and simulate the possibility of leakage of confidential data through the capabilities of the bank or firm's security service (private detective agency).

In addition, in the most acute and conflict situations of dismissal of personnel, operational and preventive measures are carried out at the place of work, residence, and also in the environment of the bearers of commercial secrets.

CONCLUSION

This paper examines the main issues related to the problems of ensuring the security of commercial structures when working with personnel. As follows from the above, personnel has a significant, and in most cases even decisive influence on the economic security of a bank (firm). In this regard, the selection of personnel, their study, placement and qualified work during dismissals significantly increase the resistance of commercial structures to possible third-party negative influence and agent penetration of illegal elements.

Regular study of all categories of personnel, understanding the objective needs of employees, their leading interests, true motives of behavior and the choice of appropriate methods of uniting individuals into a working team — all this allows managers to ultimately solve complex production and commercial-financial problems, including those related to ensuring economic security.
Summarizing the main recommendations, it seems that the Personnel Work Program in a commercial structure could be formulated as follows:

obtaining, within the framework of current Russian legislation, the maximum amount of information about job candidates, a thorough check of the submitted documents through both official and operational capabilities, including the security services of a bank (firm) or a private detective agency, a comprehensive analysis of the information available on the relevant candidates;
conducting a set of verification measures in relation to job candidates, their relatives, former colleagues, and immediate circle in cases where the issue of their employment in management positions in commercial structures or access to information constituting a commercial secret is being considered;
the use of modern methods, in particular interviews and testing, to create a psychological portrait of job candidates that would allow one to confidently judge their main character traits and predict their likely actions in various extreme situations;
assessment using modern psychological methods of diverse and multi-order factors that may hinder the hiring of candidates or their use in specific positions;
defining a certain probationary period for candidates for employment in commercial structures for the purpose of further verification and identification of business and personal qualities, and other factors that could hinder their employment;
introduction into practice of regular comprehensive checks of personnel, including through the capabilities of security services;
training of personnel departments and security services employees in modern psychological approaches to working with personnel, social, psychoanalytic, ethical and moral methods, skills in using modern technical means for recording interviews and conversations, techniques for conducting targeted conversations «in the dark» and procedures for information and analytical work with candidate documents;
selecting a personnel curator from among the top managers of commercial structures to monitor the activities of personnel departments and security services when working with personnel.

In addition, it seems possible to identify the following basic principles that should be followed in working with personnel:

implementation of an effective system of material incentives; — providing each member of the team with long-term and creative work;
development in employees of a sense of responsibility for the work performed and independence as an executor;
ensuring the participation of all personnel, of course, in cases where this seems possible, in the development of fundamental, strategic decisions on development, the formation of social incentive and insurance funds, the distribution of profits of commercial structures, etc.;
creating opportunities for advanced training and education, as well as career advancement;
placement of personnel in accordance with the abilities, qualifications, education, length of service, health status and other factors that influence the career and appointment of personnel;
implementation in practice of a flexible, non-trauma-free system of dismissals of personnel.

Thus, we can make a certain conclusion that Russian entrepreneurs are increasingly changing their attitude to the «human factor», arming their HR departments and security services with modern methods of working with personnel. It is obvious that further development in this area is connected with the active use of the significant potential of methods of psychoanalysis, prisology and management ethics, conflictology and a number of other sciences and a more complete integration of relevant specialists into commercial structures.