This is a guest blog from the charity Working Chance, who support women who have been through the criminal justice system and helps them to find meaningful work.

It’s a tricky time for employers from all sorts of sectors. But retailers in particular are struggling to find great staff and then keep them in their roles. Many report a high rate of staff turnover: the British Retail Consortium found that the rate of turnover for retail organisations is around 50%, compared to average turnover across all sectors of 35%.

Meanwhile, there are 12.3 million adults of working age in England and Wales with a criminal conviction. Often these people are written off by employers, regardless of their work history, skillset, or the efforts they have made to turn their lives around since their conviction.

Employers who assume that these people are an inherent risk to their business and have nothing to offer are losing out by failing to tap into this under-utilised talent pool. Most people with convictions have faced adversity, but just want the chance to rebuild their lives. 

Forward-thinking organisations understand that staff who come from a broad range of backgrounds make an organisation more vibrant and bring in a useful range of perspectives and life experiences. That’s why more and more employers are approaching Working Chance because they want to pro-actively recruit people with convictions.

But many employers are, understandably, concerned about risk or not sure how to approach these changes to their hiring strategies. The reality is that no evidence exists that suggests that an employee with a criminal record is any more likely to commit an offence within the workplace than an employee that does not have a criminal record. In fact, employment is one of the surest ways of preventing reoffending. There is evidence, however, that people who abuse their positions of trust in the workplace do not tend to have criminal records when they do so.

The key principles, as we see it, when deciding whether to hire someone with a conviction is the following:

• Assess whether convictions are relevant.
  Most of the time, someone’s convictions are completely irrelevant to the role you’re hiring for. The most important aspect is whether someone can do the job and would be an asset to your organisation. That means a case-by-case approach. For example, you might not hire someone with a financial conviction for a finance role, but there’s no reason to assume they wouldn’t excel on the shop floor.
  
  
• Keep an open mind.
  Don’t write someone off for their past. Convictions can sound more serious on paper, so take the time to understand the context and circumstances. Once you understand this, it often much less intimidating and much more understandable how someone found themselves in those circumstances. By being open-minded you can give someone the chance to explain themselves and tell their side of the story,
  
  
• Act with kindness.
  Often people who need to disclose a conviction in an interview dread it. It can be painful to recount traumatic events to a stranger, and there is often a fear of being judged, their application being rejected, or the experience being humiliating. You can act with kindness and empathy to make the interview feel easier.

Working Chance is developing guidance for retailers who want to pro-actively hire people with convictions, which will be circulated with British Retail Consortium members in spring 2025. Working Chance can also offer direct support to rethink your hiring practices. Contact their Head of Strategic Partnerships, Richard Rowley, to learn more on richard@workingchance.org