MyTruSeal provides a sunny outlook for job seekers

A partly sunny outlook on the 2011 holiday shopping season has retailers leveraging social media to announce their specials in a bid to bring more consumers through their doors.

Staffing specialists are also using the power of technology to hire temporary holiday employees. QR, or quick response, codes are driving job seekers to career pages and some are even finding their next job via Twitter.

Human resources managers are often looking for the best way to quickly screen the stream of new hires for a low cost, and a fast glance online is where they go. Self-background checks, if you haven’t heard of them, are the wave of the future, and they are literally a few simple clicks of the keyboard away.

Colorado-based MyTruSeal, a subsidiary of TruDiligence, is single-handedly leading the industry by offering something no one else does: a comprehensive background check that scans for everything from criminal history to educational background to sex offender registries.

But they are not performed by the company with the vacant positions. They are ordered by the applicants in an attempt to help themselves stand above the rest by volunteering information that highlights their clean history. After all, few job applicants with questionable histories are likely to utilize the service, providing a natural filter for those who are required to know every detail of a person’s background.

It is the perfect tool for those who work for companies hit hard by Christmas season deluges, such as shipping companies, retail stores, hotels and especially delivery services, which have the added responsibility of making sure their drivers maintain a near-spotless record on the roadway.

Although the National Retail Federation is projecting only a 2.8 percent increase in holiday sales over 2010, clients of MyTruSeal are afforded a 100 percent guarantee that any red flags that might be lurking below a job applicant’s surface immediately rise to the top.

Those searching for a non-holiday job have an added advantage in December, despite lower hiring rates for the majority of industries. Hiring managers are typically determined to fill remaining openings before the end of the year, but are caught off guard when the number of qualified candidates dwindles as Christmas and New Years arrive.

That’s when ambitious unemployed workers can seize their moment. There is less competition for jobs that could lead to a lucrative and enjoyable career.