Xref Limited has been recognized for Cloud Innovation in the World Business Awards 2017 for the research and development of Xref. The World Business Award for Cloud Innovation [CLD] recognizes cloud products and services that provide innovative solutions for new and existing market needs.

Xref was founded in 2009 by entrepreneurs Lee-Martin Seymour and Tim Griffiths who had spent long careers working as specialists in HR and technology respectively. They recognised the need for a multi-disciplinary solution for a critical process. The solution was launched to market in 2011 and listed on the ASX in 2016.

Xref automates candidate reference checking for HR professionals and  recruiters  as they hire talent, via an easy to use, mobile-ready, fully reportable, cloud-based platform. However, beyond the core, tangible outputs of the platform, Xref also ensures maximum value-add from the HR professionals that use it, given the time and capacity it frees up for them.

While many outsourced companies provide reference checking, the process is expensive, inconsistent, and provides limited data. Xref adds value for businesses, allowing its customers to automate a commoditised aspect of their role while they focus on more strategic tasks.

For the first time, Xref moves responsibility for driving the process from employer to candidate. It’s more efficient and reliable, provides more accurate information, guards against fraud and protects employers from breaching privacy and discriminatory regulations. It collects 60 percent more data than phone-based referencing and offers analytics and benchmarks for future recruiting.

Automated cloud-based referencing systems allow employers to make data-driven hiring decisions, as opposed to ‘gut feel’. A previous lack of consistent data-gathering meant that HR leaders could not interrogate their hiring decisions to improve the quality of their candidates and new hires.

Neither could they be sure that the approaches they were taking and the questions they were asking of referees, were legal and appropriate. Xref removes any stress from the process by working with organisations to develop compliant questionnaires that can be used as standard for every applicant to a role. It removes the risk associated with the conversational nature of the phone-based approach and delivers the best responses in terms of word count, ensuring detailed and insightful information for employers.

Xref is, at its core, a problem-solver. It was born of a real, ongoing issue within the HR sector. Xref’s true value is in the quick, affordable, accurate and insightful collection process which allows recruiters, hiring managers and HR leaders to focus more on adding strategic value, and less on the laborious, time-consuming but essential task of collecting references.

Acceptance of Xref’s unique online service has accelerated, generating dramatic growth. At the end of the 2016 financial year more than 390 companies used Xref in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and Europe, North America and Singapore, supported by the organisation’s physical offices in Sydney, London and Toronto.

For further information on Xref go to xref.com