How to explain A Felony On A Job Application
How to Explain a Criminal Record in an Interview
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hey guys this is Harley Blakeman today I
want to tell you about one of the most
troubling issues I had trying to deal
with the criminal record
trying to get back into the work force
there's a lot of things that make it
really hard to convince employers to
hire you for one thing the obvious most
obvious thing is that you have a
criminal record but you can't really do
anything about that so the fact is that
individuals with criminal records have
to move forward in life you have to work
you have to have a job and most people
want to move to better positions or
better jobs and to be able to do that
you're going to need to be able to
explain your criminal record so that's
the topic that I'm going to be talking
about in this video is the best way to
explain your criminal record in an
interview and through trial and error
over several years trying to get
corporate management positions I really
kind of X out what I think is the best
practice and kind of the root of why I
think this is the best practices
it causes individuals to look at you
more like a human they feel more empathy
for you and it reduces cognitive
dissonance in the conversation so
basically people aren't as put back by
it whenever you explain your criminal
record in this way so let's jump into
how how we go about doing that and I
summarized it with an acronym which is C
OD c in my book I called the CEO DC
storyline and what that stands for is
circumstance ownership development and
change
so essentially you want to tell them
about your life the circumstances in
your life what was your life like before
making a decision that got you a
criminal record everyone knows that most
people in jail or prison had pretty
rough lives before they made that
decision and it's not wrong of you to
let people know the circumstances that
led up to you making a decision now that
is not telling you to avoid ownership
that's why ownership follows it is you
don't want to sound like you're avoiding
taking responsibilities you've explained
the circumstances that led up to making
this bad decision you want to
immediately take ownership because you
definitely don't want to seem like
you're avoiding taking responsibility so
when you take ownership you can simply
just say I take ownership for my
responsibilities I do understand that I
made a bad decision and I've learned
from that decision I fully accept what
I've done I just want to
forward so that's just letting the
individual know that you're an adult you
realize that you are accountable for
your actions and that's something that
any employer wants to see is that you
know that you're accountable for your
actions now next would be development
and development is an interesting part
because it's similar to change but it's
more of a mental cognitive maturity
thing so you want to say these are the
circumstances that led me to my mistake
I take ownership for that mistake and
here's how I've developed because of
making that mistake so a lot of people
with criminal records have been punished
they had either time in jail or prison
some high community service probation
and during that time you want to be able
to explain that you developed as a
person for me I got closer to my family
I wanted to Philip I learned to a new
value for education I generally just
matured a lot when I was incarcerated
part of that was because I had to the
circumstance I was and I couldn't be
childish I had to be mature and when I
came out I was a completely different
person I was much more mature I was
aware of the value of education and I
did not want to break the bond with my
family again so that was development and
then after explaining how you developed
mentally and matured you want to talk
about how you are different today than
you were then and that's change when you
talk about change depending on where you
are in your life if you just got out of
jail or prison or if you're three years
out it's going to be very different but
basically you want to talk about
education I'm in college now or I got a
technical certification or I volunteer
now I have been full-time employed for
two years straight I volunteered the
church I there's a list of things that
you could say that show that you are not
the person who used to do none of those
things you know if you have a drug
trafficking charge but now you're saying
I work 60 hours a week and I volunteer
at the church on the weekends that
speaks volumes as to who you are today
compared to who you were before
so just to recap when you're going to
interview and you have to explain your
criminal record it's a turning point
that really decides if you're going to
be that person that they want to hire so
I suggest that use the acronym Co DC
which is explain your circumstance take
ownership
for the decision you made explain how
you developed and it explains to explain
how you have changed thank you
