Record Keeping and File Retention

All maintained documentation will follow the Texas A&M University System Records Retention Schedule .

Hiring managers, department heads, search committee chairs and departmental assistants can utilize the Compliance Checklist for Departments to track their documentation.

Both Human Resources and each hiring department will share responsibility in collecting and retaining documents related to each hire. To ensure this responsibility is met the following steps will be followed:

Human Resources Responsibility

At the beginning of each hiring event (when a position is first posted to Jobs at Tarleton) Human Resources will deliver a link to the Hiring Process Compliance Checklist. This checklist will identify all necessary documentation required by the hiring department to develop, copy, distribute, gather and/or retain throughout the hiring event.

Human Resources will ensure the job description, appropriate approvals, position posting with Jobs at Tarleton, posting with the Texas Workforce Commission are included in the job file which will reside with Human Resources for the entire retention period.
Human Resources will ensure that all electronic applications, supplemental attachments and other materials collected within Workday will be maintained and retained for the entire retention period.
Human Resources will ensure that copies of all advertising (which must be approved by Human Resources) are included in the job file which will reside with Human Resources for the entire retention period.
Human Resources will ensure that all correspondence with the hiring department and search committee chair regarding committee makeup, access to the candidate pool, or communications with candidates will be included in the job file which will reside with Human Resources for the entire retention period.

At the end of the hiring event, Human Resources will ensure a list of all candidates and their dispensed or hired status (and reason) will be retained with Human Resources for the entire retention period.

Human Resources will ensure through receipt of the departmental hiring file at the end of the hiring event that all documentation has been collected and retained according to assigned responsibility. Human Resources will complete a Final Hiring Process Compliance Checklist, inventory file contents and deliver a copy to the hiring department as receipt and notification of compliance inadequacies if noted.

Department Retention

The hiring manager will determine who is responsible for what required documentation throughout the hiring event. The hiring manager, search committee chair and members and the departmental administrative assistant will all have responsibilities to ensure proper documentation is collected and maintained and should be reminded throughout the process of this responsibility. The term “hiring department” will be used for the following responsibilities:

The hiring department will ensure that copies of all external advertising are routed to People and Culture for approval. The hiring department will retain copies of external advertising.
The hiring department will maintain and retain a numerical ranking system or Scoring Matrix used to score and screen candidates for the position at each stage of the hiring process (candidate screening, interviewing, and reference checks of multiple candidates). The Scoring Matrix will identify who completed the scoring, the screening criteria, an explanation of the scoring scheme, and list of all qualified candidates in the pool–not just the finalists and their final status. (See Evaluating Candidates and the Scoring Matrix).
The hiring department will develop, maintain, and retain a standard set of questions composed beforehand and utilized throughout the interview stages. The documentation will indicate all interviewed candidates were given an opportunity to respond, and their answers were documented. All interview notes will be retained and will clearly identify the author as well as the interviewee.
The hiring department will ensure that reference verifications were conducted on the finalists or final candidate and the responses were documented. All reference notes will be retained and will clearly identify the author as well as the reference interviewed.
The hiring department will document all correspondence with candidates, correspondence with the search committee chair and search members.
The hiring department will provide People and Culture the complete hiring file upon completion of the hiring event or upon request of People and Culture. Typically, completion of the hiring event will be marked by the new employee’s start date.

Do Not Retain