Shawn Mahoney just passed his 5th anniversary as a Senior Investigator with ISN, and he’s still loving the work as much as he did the day he joined the team.
“It’s a great job for dealing with people. I’ve always thought of myself as a people person, so it fits right in with my lifestyle and where I’m at at this point in my life.”
Mahoney joined ISN after retiring from 3 decades with the Toronto Police Service and moving to North Bay, and after a brief period of R&R, he was ready to roll up his sleeves and get back to work.
Shawn is frequently investigating serious complaints such as harassment for all varieties of workplaces, including small and large corporations, and government entities.
He even manages to keep a toe in the policing waters by supporting multiple police services with their background and hiring investigations. These include record checks, education verification, character references, and even further investigations such as applicant interviews and social media searches. [1]
He’s pleased to be able to use his background as an investigator from his time in law enforcement to ask the right question, and ascertain the facts. The bulk of his days consist of preparing for interviews, conducting them in the late morning or early afternoon while participants are still alert and engaged, and then reviewing and documenting his evidence.
“It’s important to know what the ultimate goal is for the client,” he adds, “you take your investigative skills and you’re really able to pull information out.”
For his part, Shawn notes that there is a noticeable difference between those interviews, and the ones that he conducts today, with many of the changes being quite positive.
In his previous career, he had retired from the Homicide Squad, after spending much of his career conducting investigations in hate crimes, youth crimes, fraud, and guns and gangs cases. Today his investigations, along with his interview subjects, have changed significantly.
“You get to interact with people who are decent, hardworking, and cooperative. They’ve come into contact with you usually because of their employment, and they generally want to talk and are upbeat,” says Shawn.
“Usually in the past I was dealing with people who had experience with the system, and a negative view of law enforcement,” he added. “This is a little more upbeat.”
He does note that it has been an adjustment having a restricted access to information. In law enforcement it was much easier to access what he needed, but privacy laws means that his new role involves more strategy.
“You don’t want to make leaps in information, so you need to be very objective,” he says. “You have to make sure that you have enough information to support your conclusions.”
Shawn is tremendously proud of the areas where he feels most able to help, such as in completing a report that confirms an employee’s allegations of workplace harassment.
“You’ve shown them that they’re not isolated and alone, and they were right all along,” he says. “Making someone feel like they have a voice is powerful.”
Our Background Investigation package, led by a retired Police Officer, like Shawn, offers a thorough and professional service at a flat rate. Here’s what’s included:
● File Preparation: We start by reviewing the application, Pre-Background Questionnaire, and Personal History Form.
● Employment Reference Interviews: We conduct three detailed interviews with past employers to verify work history.
● Personal/Character Reference Interviews: We perform three interviews with personal or character references to assess integrity and character.
● Executive Summary: We compile a comprehensive report summarizing findings and making recommendations for follow-up actions prior to hiring
Our expert-led process ensures a detailed and reliable background check for your needs.
@agarel@isninc.ca Let me know how that works for you!
Assigned to agarel@isninc.ca
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