Evidence for Language Knowledge of Employees

Hello, please discuss:

If we hire employee, we stated, they shall speak fluent english. Most of them do. But we do not have any evidence.
What can you suggest as an evidence, if there is no working certificate stating that the Person speaks english or certificate of a course or studied in english speaking Country, or worked in english speaking Country with english speaking Company.

What you suggest?

Thank you and have a nice day!

Hello there!
I wonder actually if anyone has a courage to claim fluency other than native speakers.
I have used to indicated fluency, spending my last two years in Scotland though ... I tell you what ... even native speakers do not necessarily understand each other from different geographical locations.
If you keen on to have some record in place, you can keep your assessment as part of your selection process. You sign off that at the time of the interview you were happy with it. Simple is that.
Why would you need the exam record though?
Cheers!

ps.: I have never had an exam to be honest ...

If the interviewer conducts the interview in English then proof is given. If the employee has to demonstrate English while working and does so, this can be recorded as well. It really depends on how you define "Fluent English" and who you define as checking this.

If we hire employee, we stated, they shall speak fluent english.

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Where did this "shall" requirement originate. (unless your business is teaching fluent english)
Working knowledge of english must be sufficient depending upon the type of work allocated.
If you look at Understand / Speak / Read / Write of English from the working level, you will gather that different levels of works will need different levels of combination of these.
Your "speak fluent english" hence must be replaced by "Possess necessary working knowledge of english language"

somashekar said:

Your "speak fluent english" hence must be replaced by "Possess necessary working knowledge of english language"

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This is good. But, I would look at why do they need to have this requirement, is it truly necessary?

Any robust requirement for specific languange skills as a condition of employment should be relative to the nature of the work being performed and the surrounding work environment of the employee. For example, if a company hires a majority of Spanish-speaking contractors to perform station work that doesn't require much talking at all to successfully accomplish their goals, then the value in requiring that everyone speak English is only a percieved one. Likewise, if company objectives are being effectively translated and good two-way communication is taking place, and the resultant output is up to par, then turning someone down solely on the basis that they only speak Spanish where it may not even be that critical can open some metaphorical doors to discrimination.

I am no expert in the HR profession, but I would be concerned about that.

Brian

This has been a real problem of mine in some jobs. There are several issues -
Just because a job may be an assembly position, without much communication, there is still a need to know if the employee can read and understand LockOut Tagout labels, Warning and Safety notices, as well as emergency procedures posted or that may arise. A lack of a certain level of competency puts the employee and others at risk.
Training these employees, or even pointing out errors or improved methods may be a real challenge, as they are typically unwilling to indicate to you that they do not understand, so one must watch them constantly.
Keep in mind, just because an employee can speak English does not mean that they understand written English instructions, and many times there are variations in meaning that are misinterpreted.
So from a safety and educational (training) standpoint, it is necessary to know how to best communicate with employees that may not have a firm grasp of all 'English' forms of communication.

SuperGirl said:

This is good. But, I would look at why do they need to have this requirement, is it truly necessary?

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My guess (and this is only a guess), most of there communication dealings are with English speaking personal. If I remember correctly (and since I am getting older, there is no guarantee I remember anything) all international pilots as well as tower personal at international airports must speak English, it could be a requirement like this.

A formality I had to go through before teaching courses for a college was to submit a paragraph on a subject. Then at least the school has a writing sample (well, yes, I realize you have said ability to speak, but . . . at least the written word would provide some formal "proof" especially if you observed them write it).

I feel this requirement can be verified by comment to the employee.If the commentter feel he/she can meet the English need of his/her current position,that is ok.it meets the position need.