Hiring Guidelines
Catalpa is committed to hiring the best talent through a transparent and fair hiring process
The following information on our process has four main objectives:
It is meant to be instructive for Catalpa employees on how to conduct interviews and best hiring practices
Ensure that recruitment processes are business-focused, merit-based and meet organisational objectives
Ensure that people who are appointed to our roles have appropriate competence, experience and qualifications
Implement the organisation’s policy commitments to child safeguarding and to safeguarding against sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment to prevent a person from working with children and/or vulnerable adults if they pose an unacceptable risk.
Scope
These procedures apply to all Catalpa staff employed by Catalpa, permanent and fixed term.
Equal Employment Opportunity
Diversity is one of Catalpa's core values and we are dedicated to providing equal employment opportunities (EEO) to all team members and applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, or disability.
Catalpa complies with all applicable laws governing non-discrimination in employment. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoffs, leaves of absence, compensation, and training. Catalpa expressly prohibits any form of workplace harassment.
See the Policies section handbook to find out more about how our policies underpin the recruitment process to ensure we are building diverse teams with a diversity of people, views, opinions and perspectives.
Conflict of Interest
A potential Conflict of Interest may arise when a staff member has a personal relationship with an applicant and has the authority to unfairly influence the recruitment, selection and/or appointment of the Candidate.
Refer to the Code of Conduct for further Information.
Key steps in the Hiring Process
Step 1 - I have a vacancy I need to recruit for
If you want to start hiring for a position, the Hiring Manager will need to make sure there is an up to date job description prepared in the first instance.
A template for Position Descriptions can be found here The template includes a statement of commitment regarding safeguarding.
The People and Culture Manager and the Safeguarding Focal Point will review the Position Description filled in by the Hiring Manager to establish the “level of contact” of this role with children and/or vulnerable adults. Depending on the level of contact there may be additional - guidance on how to do so is attached at Annex One
Approvals to start recruitment
If the vacancy is a role that exists in the program design or is a vacant role that needs to be replaced, the Hiring Manager can seek approval from their Sector Head to commence recruitment for the role. Please also confirm the budget for the role with the COO before commencing recruitment.
If the role is new and does not exist in the program design, the Hiring Manager and/or Sector Head will need to seek approval to commence recruitment from the relevant Director/s and COO for appropriate budget:
The Hiring Manager should then flag the vacancy with the People & Culture and work together to create a Recruitment Plan.
The Recruitment Plan outlines: key requirements of the role, a timeline for recruitment, the type of role e.g., employee or consultancy input, reporting line, location, any requirements to advertise the role and through what sources and cost implications, and the outcome of the ‘level of contact’ assessment undertaken as above.
Identify who is the recruitment team - note the recruitment team needs to be gender balanced and diverse. Consider the decision makers and those that will work closely with this hire.
The People & Culture Manager will:
draft a job ad in consultation with the Hiring Manager including a statement regarding the criminal history checks that Catalpa utilises, in order to deter applications from any candidate who does not intend to honour Catalpa’s code of conduct
Create the job in Workable
Arrange advertising
Step 2 - Advertising the role
The hiring manager should always ask the Catalpa team for passive referrals for open positions.
The recruiting team will always publicise the job through the following means:
Announce on the #general chat channel in Slack
Share job openings on Catalpa’s LinkedIn, Twitter and social media pages
Application Form
Use the Application form in Workable to think about information you can solicit from the candidates as they apply for the role: Eg please upload examples of reports you have written, What are your salary expectations? Please confirm you have experience in….This is a useful process to use to further refine your shortlist.
It is a requirement for the applicant to disclose any current or previous charges or convictions regarding a violent offense, and/or an offense perpetrated against a children and/or vulnerable adult (such as sexual exploitation or harassment), child safeguarding, sexual exploitation, abuse and/or harassment, fraud or corruption and/or terrorism; and agreement to provide a criminal history check for their country of citizenship and every country they have lived in for 12 months or more over the last five years (or in the case of a World Bank funded project, seven years)
Therefore, for ALL employee positions recruited at Catalpa, we will always ask these three mandatory questions:
Question 1 - Have you have any current charges or previous convictions to declare regarding:
child safeguarding
sexual abuse, sexual harassment and/or sexual exploitation
Fraud, bribery, corruption and terrorsim
Question 2 - Do you agree to provide current police clearance certificates to Catalpa as required (YES/NO answer)
Question 3 - Do you agree to Catalpa searching your name in the sanctions lists for counter terrorism? (YES/NO answer)
Other questions we may ask are likely to be more related to the role, for example:
What professional experience do you have that makes you a great fit for this role?
Please outline your specific experience in XYZ?
Can you provide an example of where you have done XYZ?
Can you please provide your salary expectations for this FT role? Please include currency
Step 3 - Managing applications
Ensure that you screen applicants according to their responses to the pre-screening questionnaire safeguarding question – have they agreed to undertake the criminal background check if they are the preferred candidate? Are they free of any charges or convictions regarding abuse, exploitation or harassment of children or vulnerable adults, and/or of fraud and corruption? If not, they should not proceed to the next stage of the process.
Remember to inform applicants about what stage they are in. So, for example, if in the hiring process for the particular position / team you've agreed that there will be four stages, be sure to inform the applicant of where they are in the process during each call / stage: "You are in stage X and will be moving to stage Y next." Some brief feedback from the previous stage can also be included to help the candidate gauge their progress.
Be aware that the visibility of internal comments in Workable can be switched between hiring team managers only, or all members of the hiring team.
If you have completed your portion of the hiring process and would like to stop receiving notifications about a candidate from Workable, remove yourself as a follower. To do this go to the candidate's profile, under timeline there are boxes with the photo of each follower. Uncheck your photo/name, and this will remove you from the Workable emails. You will be added to each candidate profile upon being mentioned, so you might have to remove yourself each time.
Confirmation of the application: applicants automatically receive confirmation of their application, thanking them for submitting their information. This is an automated message from Workable. If the person came through another channel they must be added to Workable before continuing the process. There are various ways to do this, see Workable's documentation.
Step 4 - Recruiting team does first round of evaluations:
Recruiting team does a first round of evaluations: Disqualified candidates should be sent a note informing them of the rejection. There are templates in Workable to assist, but messages can be tailored as appropriate: place yourself on the receiving end of the message. If more information is required to make the determination, feel free to specifically ask for it (e.g. a cover letter). (If you don't see the templates, you probably haven't linked your email account to Workable yet.)
Step 5 - Phone screens
The hiring lead will do a screening call; move the applicant to the "15 min screen" stage in Workable. Depending on the outcome of the screening call, the hiring manager can either reject an applicant, or move the applicant to the interview stage in Workable.
A template for a typical phone screen can be found here.
At the end of the screening call applicants should be told what the timeline is for what the next steps are (if any). An example message would be "We are still reviewing applications, but our goal is to let you know in X business days from today whether you've been selected for the next round or not. Please feel free to email us if you haven't heard anything from us by then."
Step 6 - Interview:
Further interviews would typically follow the reporting line to the Hiring Manager and/or Head of Area. For key roles in the organization, the Directors may wish to be involved. Note, all interview panels should be diverse and include at least one female Catalpa team member.
Running awesome interviews:
Interviewing is hard, it's hard for both sides. In less than one hour you both need to get to know each other and both will have to make the decision if you want to work with this person.
This is an effort to provide a set of guidelines to make interviewing a bit less traumatizing.
Preparing and Interview Guide
The People & Culture Manager will arrange an interview guide for the recruitment team based on the competencies required for the position.
Our standard interview guide template can be found here and it will be tailored to the competencies required for the role.
Note, for all employee positions and consultant positions that have been assessed as either ‘contact or work with children’ or ‘contact or work with with vulnerable adults’ the interview must include behavioral event style questions about safeguarding. See below for more information.
Consider how else you could assess the candidates competencies in the recruitment process. You might like to consider options like:
a practical test
some scenario questions
ask the candidate to prepare a presentation on something
provide a written response to a topical issue
Before the interview
Screening - writing a good resume is an art, and not many people master it. When you read a resume look for evolution rather than buzzwords, and if something sparks your curiosity, ask. If the process is taking too long, apologize and explain what is going on. It is really frustrating to not hear anything from the other side, and then resume conversations like nothing has happened. Show respect for the time of the candidate. If the process ends at this stage, be kind, and if the interviewee asks for feedback, give honest constructive feedback that explains why have we taken our decision.
During the interview
There is an unbalanced power relationship during the interview. The interviewer is in a powerful position. It will decide if this candidate will get an offer or not. Be mindful of this. Be as friendly and approachable as you can. Be frank about what is going on, explain how the interview is going to be and set clear expectations: tell it like it is. This has the added value of getting people comfortable (over time) and allows you to get much better data.
Communication is really hard, don't expect perfect answers. Every person is different and they will express things differently, they are not listening to your train of thought so they will say things differently than what you expect, work on approaching to what they are trying to say. Once you have an answer validate your assumptions by explaining to the interviewee what you understood and allow the candidate to correct your story.
Don't go checking for perfect theoretical knowledge that the interviewee can google when needed, or give a problem that took you 2 months to dominate yet you expect your interviewee to master in a 30 minutes conversation. Be fair.
Aim to at the end of the interview to know if you want to work with this person.
Interview for soft skills, really, do it. Pick some behavioral questions to get data on what has the candidate done before and how his behavior aligns to the company values. We are all going to be much happier if we all naturally agree on how things should be.
Consider having more people interviewing with you, different people see and value different things. More data helps making better decisions and ends up being a better use of interviewing time for both the candidate and the company.
Always let the interviewee ask questions at the end, and be frank in your answers.
Technical interviews
Try to get a real sample of work (which we already do for developers) Avoid puzzles or weird algorithm testing questions. Probing for data structures is fine as long as it is relevant to the job the person is going to do.
Be mindful of the background of the candidate, someone who knows 10 languages already (and some languages in particular, Perl for ex), may pick up Ruby in a second given the right chance. Don't assume that someone with a Java background will not be capable of moving to a different stack. Note that individual positions may have stricter requirements; the Backend Developer position requires Python experience, for example.
Consider including non-engineering people to ask soft skills questions. Because technical people should be capable of talking to non-engineering just fine, we should assess it.
Behavioural questions (STAR)
The goal of these questions is to get the candidate to share something they did in the past. Previous behavior is considered the best way to predict how a person is going to act in the future.
They usually start with the form "Can you tell me about a time when...". The kind of answer that we are looking for is to get a story that is structured following the Situation, Task, Action, Result.
There is no right answer, what matters here is to hear the candidate and gather data on how is it telling the story. Some things to pay attention to:
What was the candidate role? Was it a leader? A follower? Why?
What is it highlighting as important? Did it matter? Is it clearly explained?
Is the story well told? If it is a technical story and the interviewer is a non-technical person, are things being explained in a way that make sense?
If you ask "why?" will you get an actual explanation?
Is the Task and the Action clear? Is it well reasoned? Is there a result or was the story left unfinished? Is it still going on?
Was the result measured in any way? How does the candidate know that the result matches the expectation? Was there an expectation?
Safeguarding -related behavioural questions
If the ‘level of contact’ determination has indicated the role will have ‘contact with’ or ‘working with’ children or vulnerable adults, Catalpa’s Child Safeguarding Policy and Prevention of Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment Policy requires behavioural questions regarding safeguarding to be used.
A list of example questions is provided here.
The purpose of these questions is not that the candidate necessarily answers perfectly but that they demonstrate a commitment to safeguarding, ‘do no harm’, and willingness to comply with Catalpa’s policies.
After the interview
Internal interview debrief
Always discuss feedback, this will help everyone to understand what happened and how you came to your decision.
Typically our interview form requires the hiring team to evaluate the candidate by scoring each question out of 5 to give an overall rating.
The hiring team is also asked to provide a:
Summary: Include your general impressions, a brief description on what have experienced during interviews, where you stand and why you have this perspective. Bullet points are fine.
Strengths: What is good and where did you hear it during the interview?
Weaknesses: Where are the candidate's weaknesses specific to the requirements of the job? Identify how the candidate fell short of your expectations and why. Consider that some things can be taught or learned.
Interview notes: What questions were asked and what story did you got back? Scoring can be defined as follows: 5 - Certainly would hire (meets all requirements, aligns with values, no flags) 4 - Likely to hire (meets most requirements, aligns with values) 3 - Neutral (may meet some requirements, has some yellow flags) 2 - Not likely to hire (meets few requirements, has many yellow flags, may not align with values well) 1 - Would not hire (does not meet requirements, red flags, not aligned with values)
Step 7 - Criminal History Checks
If, after the interview stage, you have a preferred candidate then you can advise the candidate of their status as preferred candidate and remind them of the obligation to provide criminal history checks. You should suggest they get started on applying for these criminal history checks while Catalpa undertakes referee checks.
Provision of criminal history checks is a pre employment condition of all fulltime and part time positions at Catalpa. Before a contract of employment can be offered, preferred candidates must provide a criminal record check for:
each country in which you have lived for twelve (12) months or longer, over the last five (5) years prior to engagement, and
for the personnel’s country/ies of citizenship.
In limited circumstances where a country does not provide a criminal record check of adequate reliability, a statutory declaration/local legal equivalent should be obtained instead. If a new hire has requested the police checks prior to commencing with Catalpa but not received them at the time of contract commencement due to bureaucratic delays / no fault of their own, in that case a statutory declaration can also suffice as a ‘bridging arrangement’ as long as the police check is submitted to Catalpa within 30 days of commencing work. The new hire should also provide evidence of submission of the police check such as a copy of a receipt.
Step 8 - Reference checks:
Undertake reference checks for the final preferred candidate. This process can start at an earlier stage, but should happen before an offer is made.
Move the candidate to the "Reference Call" stage in Workable, and ping the relevant person from Operations to get it going.
Catalpa has various policy commitments regarding referee checks contained in the Child Safeguarding Policy and Prevention of Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment Policy which require the following for all positions
undertake a minimum of two verbal referee checks,
that at least one of the checks be undertaken with a current or recent line manager / direct supervisor and the other with a colleague (another line manager / supervisor is also ok),safeguarding questions must be asked – notes must be taken of the referee checks and saved on file.
Our standard reference check form can be found here. Questions can be tailored to the role as required, with the exception of the three mandatory questions.
Step 9 - Sanctions Checks
Catalpa undertakes sanctions checks for all new employees and consultants by checking these databases and documents this on this form:
Australian National Security Website
UK’s Prescribed Terrorist Organisations
Step 10 - Select and make offer:
When the hiring manager makes the offer, this can be done verbal during the call with the applicant, but is always followed quickly with the written offer as described in the section on preparing offers and contracts.
If criminal history checks have not yet been completed, the offer should be conditional “pending successful outcome” of the police checks.
Offers made to new team members should be documented in Workable through the email thread between the person authorized to make the offer and the applicant.
An email example is in the "Offer letter" template in Workable.
Step 11 - People & Culture Manager will draft and send contract:
The People & Culture Manager will draft a contract based upon the written offer that was extended. Hiring manager follows up to ensure that the offer is accepted, and that the contract is signed.
When the contract is signed, the People Ops team member should move the candidate in Workable to the "Hired" bucket of the "Hired Team Members (admin access only)" job. This same person from People Operations files the signed contract in the appropriate place, and starts the onboarding Candidates will start the onboarding process no more than 30 days before her/his start date.
Step 12 - Start Onboarding
Onboarding at Catalpa is undertaken using a Trello Board. More details can be found here - Onboarding a New Hire
Step 13 - Close the vacancy in Workable
Hiring manager considers closing the vacancy.
Rejecting applicants: At any time during the hiring process the applicant can be rejected. The applicant should always be notified of this. The recruiting team is primarily responsible for declining candidates. If the applicant asks for further feedback, offer frank and fair feedback. This is hard, but it is part of Catalpa's values. All feedback should be constructive and said in a positive manner. Keep it short and sweet. Feedback should always be applicable to the skill set of the position the candidate applied and interviewed for. Feedback and rejection should always be based on the job requirements. If you feel uncomfortable providing feedback for whatever reason, reach out to the People and Culture Manager for assistance.
If people argue with the feedback that we provided: Do not argue with or acknowledge the validity of the contents of the feedback. Share the feedback with the people involved in the interviews and the decision.
Annex One - “Level of Contact” assessment criteria
Purpose and background
This document is intended to guide the assessments of “level of contact” that each specific Job Description within Catalpa has with children and with vulnerable people.
There are two aspects of the assessment - contact with children and contact with vulnerable adults. After assessment, each role will be deemed as either: ‘no contact’, or, ‘contact with’ or ‘working with’.
This level of contact assessment helps to identify and manage risk related to each role; and informs which risk management strategy to employ i.e. for ‘contact with’ and ‘working with’ roles there are additional steps in recruitment and screening of applicants for these Job Descriptions to ensure safeguarding-sensitive hiring practices.
The requirement to undertake a ‘level of contact’ assessment for each job description as part of recruitment is to ensure compliance with Catalpa’s Child Safeguarding and PSEAH Policies, which are themselves compliant with DFAT and MFAT’s requirements regarding safeguarding.
Definitions (these are from relevant Catalpa policies, put here for ease of reference):
Working with children:
Working with children means being engaged in an activity with a child where the contact would reasonably be expected as a normal part of the activity and the contact is not incidental to the activity. Working includes volunteering or other unpaid works.
Contact with Children position:
A job description that involves or may involve contact with children, either under the position description or due to the nature of the work environment (also see Working with children definition). Note: In determining whether a staff or volunteer position will involve ‘contact with children’, Catalpa also takes into account ‘potential’ or ‘accidental’ contact, i.e. cases where the nature of the position may unexpectedly or unintentionally lead to or involve some form of contact with children (for example while working in the broader community, visiting clients at their home, etc).
These roles could include:
direct contact with children: This may occur for personnel in both child-centred and non-child centred projects if work is conducted in or with communities as a whole, and although children may not be a primary target group, they are impacted because they are part of the community. It could include people doing house-hold level data collection or people working on a livelihoods project that means that parents are working outside the home and therefore impacting on the children of the family.
indirect contact with children: Some personnel in both child-centred and non-child-centred organisations may not visit the field directly, but may have access to personal information and details of families and children (name, age, photos, location, etc.) which they obtain directly from field staff or via other communication channels (such email, databases, unsecure files, etc.). These personnel are in a position to expose children to vulnerabilities and risks, by giving out confidential information to media, authorities or others.
No contact: for example, home desk based work (no access to Catalpa computers or shared drives and therefore no access to sensitive information).
Children: Any person under 18 years old.
Vulnerable adults: As per Catalpa’s PSEAH Policy, this is an umbrella term, recognising that all people can be vulnerable if the circumstances make them so, and that being vulnerable at one stage of someone’s life does not render them perpetually vulnerable. It is a term intended to convey that an adult might be experiencing circumstances that make them vulnerable at that point in time, for example due to poverty or living in an area with low levels of rule of law or high degrees of isolation. Catalpa personnel can also be considered vulnerable adults in particular circumstances, for example if they are in a situation of unsafety or a power imbalance.
Criteria for level of contact assessment - child safeguarding
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Teacher training in schools and/or activities in a school environment (including visits to classrooms) | Working or travelling internationally in a country not their usual residence where the project is situated; and/or working in or visiting remote, rural or unpredictable locations |
Any activity 1:1 alone with children including research activities involving interviewing children and/or any of the following: One-on-one supervision, overnight supervision, out of town activities, advising or offering guidance to children or spending extended periods of time with children e.g. camps | Research activities involving household visits where children are present (but not directly interviewed / involved) and/or Any activity visiting families in their homes or in their communities |
Working on an activity where under 18 year olds are utilised as volunteers | Conducting programs / activities in communities where children are present |
Working on activities involving disability services, youth clubs / youth forums or conferences for under 18s, childcare services, sports activities or where activities physical touch of children or where children have challenges that contribute to their vulnerability i.e. a disability, or a situational challenge like poverty or lack of functional family network to protect them. | Working on an activity where children accompany their parents / caregivers who are the activity beneficiaries and/or participants |
Working on an activity involving the transport of children | Online activities such as online campaigns and/or communication with children; online training about cyber security; children participating in online discussions or any other activity with children online 1:1 or in groups |
Working on an activity involving domestic violence / gender based violence survivors in a refuge / shelter environment | Any women and/or gender or education / children focused activities |
Adult has a perceived or actual level of authority (from child perspective); controls access to resources (medical, food, career training, sports or music opportunities); and/or involves developing close / personal and/or long term relationships with children | Roles with access to images, videos, and/or personal and/or confidential details of children |
Have access to specifically sensitive data relating to a person under 18 years i.e. information about an investigation | Access to data relating to a person under 18 |
How to assess the role for a classification:
If you have only identified one or more items from column A; the position would be deemed to be ‘working with children’.
If you have only identified one or more items from column B; the job description/ role would be deemed to be ‘in contact with children’.
If you have identified items from both columns then the job description/ role would be deemed as ‘working with children’.
If there are no items from column A nor B that are relevant to the job description / role, then this role would be considered ‘no contact with children’. However, if the role is an ongoing role with Catalpa (either a staff role or an overseas contractor with staff-like role) then a criminal history check is still required.
Criteria for level of contact assessment - vulnerable adults
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Activities including direct contact with women or men community members who are:
| Roles that include visits to project communities and/or project participant’s homes (but not alone visits, which would come under ‘working with’) |
Activities that involve decision making over resources / money / assistance in communities where adults are experiencing poverty, isolation and/or lack of rule of law or adults who experience social stigmatisation such as people living with disability or people from disenfranchised ethnic minorities | Roles that include access to people’s private information either online or in-person |
Activities that include direct engagement with target beneficiaries who are classified as vulnerable including people living with disability, people who are part of LGBTIQ community, women in communities with traditional gender roles (i.e. almost all communities) | Any activities focused on beneficiary groups classified as vulnerable e.g women and/or gender including LGBTIQ issues and any activities focused on people living with disability |
Activities that include 1:1 visits to adults’ homes or other locations with privacy | Activities that could lead to vulnerable adults understanding that the Catalpa personnel has a real or perceived power over them |
Access to specifically sensitive data relating to a vulnerable person or staff members that person is supervising i.e. information about an investigation | Access to data relating to vulnerable adult(s) |
How to assess the role for a classification:
If you have only identified one or more items from column A; the job description/ role would be deemed to be ‘working with vulnerable adults’.
If you have only identified one or more items from column B; the job description/ role would be deemed to be ‘in contact with vulnerable adults’.
If you have identified items from both columns then the job description/ role would be deemed as ‘working with vulnerable adults’.
If there are no items from column A nor B that are relevant to the job description / role, then this role would be considered ‘no contact with vulnerable adults’. However, if the role is an ongoing role with Catalpa (either a staff role or an overseas contractor with staff-like role) then a criminal history check is still required.
Examples at Catalpa:
An Engineer working fully remotely on development of an information management system that does not have any access to personal data of children and/or families and not working on a project that relates to education / child related issues or social protection nor GBV etc. could be assessed as ‘no contact with children’ and ’no contact with vulnerable adults’
An Engineer working fully remotely on development of an information management system that does have access to personal data of children and/or families and/or works on an education related program could be assessed as ‘contact with children’ and ‘contact with vulnerable adults’
Annex Two - what is needed for each type of personnel (see definitions here)
| Board of Directors | Employees / staff (full time and part time) and long-term consultants | Daily rate Consultants/ Contractors | Volunteers, including interns | Others such as visitors to projects |
Disclosure any current or previous charges or convictions regarding:
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
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Interview guide must include behavioral event style questions about safeguarding. | Only if assessed as either:
| Only if assessed as either:
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Only if assessed as either:
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Only if assessed as either:
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National criminal records check prior to commencing work | All | All | Those consulting with Catalpa in roles assessed as ‘contact with’ or ‘working with’ children &/or vulnerable adults need to have for all countries of citizenship and countries of residence for 12 months or more in the last 5 years (or 7 years for World Bank – funded activities). If there are delays in obtaining the documents, they need to sign a Statutory Declaration as a bridging method while documents are obtained. If documents cannot be obtained from overseas countries, a Stat Dec or legal local equivalent is required. Only consultant /contractor roles/ tasks assessed as nil contact with children &/or vulnerable adults are exempt. | Those whose positions is assessed as either contact with or working with children to have for all countries of citizenship and countries of residence for 12 months or more in the last 5 years (or 7 years for World Bank – funded activities)
Only roles/ tasks assessed as nil contact with children &/or vulnerable adults are exempt. | N/A |
Verbal referee checks (at least two) | All | All | All
| For those volunteering with Catalpa in a role assessed as having “contact with” or” working with” children &/or vulnerable adults. Those in positions assessed as nil contact with/nil impact on children &/or vulnerable adults are exempt | NA |
Inclusions for each contract type | All | All should include: - A commitment to preventing a person from working with children if they pose an unacceptable risk to children &/or vulnerable adults. - Provisions for disciplinary action up to and including dismissal for any person who breaches the Child Safeguarding Policy, PSEAH Policy, Catalpa Code of Conduct and Child Safe Code of Conduct. | For those in positions assessed as in “contact with” or “working with” children &/or vulnerable adults, the contract must include clauses that:
| For those in positions assessed as in “contact with” or “working with” children &/or vulnerable adults, the contract must include clauses that:
| N/A |
Signed Catalpa Code of Conduct | All | All | All | All
| All who are visiting projects |
Signed Catalpa Child Safeguarding Code of Conduct | All | All | Yes for those who are ‘contact with’ or ‘working with’ children &/or vulnerable adults plus also those representing Catalpa (project evaluators, call centre staff etc.) Those others in positions assessed as nil contact with children &/or vulnerable adults are exempt | Yes for those who are ‘contact with’ or ‘working with’ children &/or vulnerable adults plus also those representing Catalpa. Those others in positions assessed as nil contact with children &/or vulnerable adults are exempt | All except those in positions assessed as nil contact with/nil impact on children &/or vulnerable adults |
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Working with Children Check – relevant for the specific Australian State or territory | Those in Australia whose position is assessed as ‘working with’ children
| Those in Australia whose position is assessed as ‘working with’ children | Those in Australia whose position is assessed as ‘working with’ children | Those in Australia whose position is assessed as ‘working with’ children | Those in Australia whose position is assessed as ‘working with’ children |
Confidentiality Agreement
| All | All | All requiring access to information that Catalpa would regard as confidential | All requiring access to information that Catalpa would regard as confidential | Not required |
Privacy Agreement | All | All | All obtaining access to personal information stored by, or to be gathered in the name of Catalpa | All obtaining access to personal information stored by, or to be gathered in the name of Catalpa | Not required |
Annex Three - guidance regarding how to undertake police checks (and, where needed, a statutory declaration or local legal equivalent)
Generic:
It is a requirement of Catalpa that all personnel (except for certain short-term consultant positions that are designated as ‘nil contact’ with children and/or vulnerable adults) require a criminal history check for every country in which you are a citizen and also any country in which you have lived for 12 months or more in the last 5 years (or 7 years for World Bank programming).
It can take a month or more to receive criminal history checks, so please apply ASAP.
These checks are a component of Catalpa’s commitment to safeguarding, and are part of Catalpa’s recruitment and screening processes. Therefore, it is a requirement that the criminal history checks are obtained prior to commencing with Catalpa.
If there are delays in obtaining checks through no fault of your own, i.e. you applied in good time but there have been bureaucratic delays or the process takes a long time, then bridging arrangements are available through a statutory declaration or the legal equivalent in that local context.
To help you identify how to apply for a criminal history check and/or submit a statutory declaration (or local legal equivalent) in any / all countries in which a check is required for you, please see the below specific guidance for Timor Leste, Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Australia. If you require a check from a country that is not on this list, please see information on the UK government website for how to apply for other locations: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/criminal-records-checks-for-overseas-applicants
If it is not possible to obtain a criminal history check for a country in which you are a citizen and/or where you have resided for 12 months or more in the last five years, then please reach out to the Catalpa People and Culture Manager for further advice as additional checks may be needed as well as a Statutory Declaration or local legal equivalent.
How to apply in Australia:
Australian citizens and those applicants who have lived in Australia for 12 or more months in the last 5 years (or 7 years for World Bank projects) should apply for a national criminal history check here https://www.afp.gov.au/our-services/national-police-checks
Further, for those citizens or past / current residents those positions are categorised as “Working with Children” should also apply for the relevant ‘Working with Children’ check that is applicable in the State in which they reside https://aifs.gov.au/resources/resource-sheets/pre-employment-screening-working-children-checks-and-police-checks#state-and-territory-requirements
There are costs associated as follows (costs as of 2023):
NSW - $80 or free for volunteers
Western Australia $87 or $11 for volunteers
Queensland - $101.30 or free for volunteers
Victoria - $128.20 or free for volunteers
South Australia - $62.50
Northern Territory - $81 for child related work or $8 for volunteers
Australian Capital Territory - $146
If there is a delay in obtaining criminal history checks, as a bridging arrangement you can provide a Statutory Declaration using the Catalpa template here
How to apply in Timor Leste:
Applying process in Timor-Leste (East Timor) for citizen and non citizen.
The application should be done in-person. Applicants shall apply for Police Clearance Certificate in-person with “Office of Civil Registrations”:
Direção-Geral dos Serviços de Registos e Notariado, Registo Criminal (Criminal Registry) Ministerio da Justica (Ministry of Justice) Dili Crisogno da Costa Neto cneto@mj.gov.tl Telefones (+670) 77230148
Go to the respective office. Application forms can be obtained from the office on visit. Don’t forget to take the required copy of documents along with originals to the office.
Timor-Leste citizens must provide:
a completed form (available from the Office of Civil Registrations);
one passport size photo;
‘Declaro do Domicilio’ signed by the Chief of Village or Sub District Administrator;
National Timor-Leste ID card; and
a birth certificate.
Third country nationals must provide:
a completed form (available from the Office of Civil Registrations);
one passport sized photo;
national passport;
a letter from the applicant’s employer; and
a police certificate from your own country (if possible).
Fee: There is no fee for the certificate.
The certificate can be collected from the office where the applicant applied in-person upon notification or issued as per norms.
Applying process - overseas for citizen and non-citizens.
The process can only be undertaken via a representative acting on your behalf with your authority using a “power of attorney”. The Representative needs to follow the instructions as per the direct application above, but also need to have:
“procuracao” (power of attorney) -
ID card or passport.
Applicant shall mandate a authorized representative to apply on their behalf at the “Office of Civil Registrations” (at contact details above)
If you experience a delay in obtaining a criminal history check for Timor, you can use a document notarised by an official of the Notaries and Civil Registrars office as a bridging document to enable you to commence work at Catalpa before the background check is received (assuming the background check aligns with what you have stated in the notarised document). A template is available here
How to apply in Papua New Guinea:
An application can be lodged locally at any police station to obtain the form which then, once completed and fee paid, needs to be submitted to either the Police National Forensic Science Centre or the National Criminal Records Office
Overseas applicants can fax the blank form over and also submit the completed one with proof of fee payment
The applicant needs to supply the following (It is the same information for both local and overseas):
full set of finger prints (which can be done at a local police station in Australia, and a copy signed by the Australian police station will be accepted by the PNG authorities)
full copy of their current Papua New Guinea Passport
receipt for fee payment for the request
The cost is 10 Kina payable only in cash at the Papua New Guinea Treasury Office. The payee must get a payment receipt to submit with the other application documents. This payment receipt can be submitted to Catalpa as proof that the application has commenced .
For more information, please contact:
Police National Forensic Science Centre Varahe Street, Gordons, PO Box 85, Konedobu, National Capital District, Port Moresby, PNG Telephone: +675 325 4188/4472 Fax: +675 325 5365
or
National Crime Records Office, Gordons PO Box 85, Konedobu, National Capital District, Port Moresby, PNG Telephone: +675 322 6144/6160 Fax: +675 322 6159
If you experience a delay in obtaining a criminal history check for PNG, you can use a PNG Statutory Declaration form as a bridging document to enable you to commence work at Catalpa before the background check is received (assuming the background check aligns with what you have stated in the notarised document). A template Statutory Declaration for PNG is here and wording to use in the Stat Dec is available here.
How to apply in Fiji:
The document that needs to be applied for is called “Police Clearance Certificate”
The applicant needs to supply the following documents:
A letter from their employer’s office requesting the penal clearance (Catalpa can provide this)
copy of birth certificate
address for certificate to be forwarded to
completed application form available at this link - https://fijihighcommission.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Fiji-Police-Clearance-Checklist-FHC-Canberra-2.docx
photocopy of photo page of passport
phone number
The application typically takes 4 weeks. Costs are currently as follows:
local applicants (Migration and Employment Purposes): FJ$61.30 with a 1 day fast track service of FJ$122.65
overseas applicants from Australia: AUD 170 according to the embassy https://fijihighcommission.au/application-form-fee-schedule/
Applications can be lodged in Fiji :
The Officer in Charge Criminal Records Office P.O. Box 239 Suva,Fiji Island
Or overseas at your local Fijian embassy. In Australia it can be lodged online through www.fijihighcommission.au
If you experience a delay in obtaining a criminal history check for Fiji, you can use a document (INSERT DETAILS) as a bridging document to enable you to commence work at Catalpa before the background check is received (assuming the background check aligns with what you have stated in your declaration). A template Statutory Declaration for Fjii is here and wording to use in the Stat Dec is available here.
How to apply in other countries
A handy resource to determine the requirements for other countries is provided by the UK government here https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/criminal-records-checks-for-overseas-applicants
Annex Four. Process for determining next steps in the event of disclosable offenses or charges
In the event that an applicant discloses any charges or convictions, the following procedure will be followed:
If the charge or conviction relates to a violent offense perpetrated against children and/or vulnerable adults; plus Fraud, bribery, corruption and terrorism, then the applicant will be automatically disqualified.
Note: A breach of family violence order or a restraining order would be included under ‘violent offense’ and preclude employment. A conviction related to ‘revenge porn’ etc. would also preclude employment.
If the charge or conviction relates to a non-violent crime that is also not related to fraud / corruption / bribery or terrorism, then the applicant is not automatically precluded from employment. In the vast majority of such cases, the applicant would be treated as any other applicant.
Note: There could be specifics related to such crimes that preclude employment i.e. if it was a drugs trafficking crime and the role they are applying for involves a lot of travel because it could be very difficult to obtain visas for travel with that conviction.
The P&C Manager would consider these applicants on a case by case basis to determine suitability.
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