It's been an exciting start to 2023 for us here at Vault! Today we wanted to kickoff a new series on the blog where we let you learn more about the people behind the scenes at Vault. Naturally, it made sense for us to start with our President, Meredith Vadis.
Why do you love working at Vault?
I love the opportunity to make America’s workplaces safer. As someone who used to run mass transit and wastewater utilities, I know firsthand how much it matters that CDL operators and other safety-sensitive employees are healthy when behind the wheel or elsewhere on the job. An employee who is not physically or mentally prepared for the work they’re being asked to do puts themselves, their customers, and the public, at risk as well as the reputation of their employer.
What is your favorite client story?
One of our long-term clients is so invested in workplace wellness that they’ve asked Vault to provide aggregate, anonymized data from CDME medical exams. Vault conducts all the QA/QC on their reviews and in the process, enters all the data including metrics like blood pressure, cholesterol, tobacco use, sleep apnea diagnosis, etc. The employer can use this aggregate data to provide wellness solutions specifically to that subset of their workforce and to track improvement over time with hard data.
Employee wellness surveys are self-reported and sometimes not as accurate. Insurance claims data can be hard to narrow to a specific population. But the CDME data is specific, timely and actionable. I love to work with employers that really care about their employees!
How did you find yourself at Vault?
I came to Vault Workforce Screening to help provide COVID testing capacity and solutions across the US and specifically to more than a dozen states and many other local governments. My background in public service allowed me to work closely with those clients to meet their needs during the darkest days of the pandemic.
When we acquired Vault Workforce Screening (formerly FSSolutions) my history with employing safety-sensitive teams made it natural for me to come over as the pandemic wound down.
What is your best advice for someone managing an employment screening program?
The pandemic changed everything – especially the labor market and hiring process. If you haven’t had time to update your screening program in the last few years, now is the time to take a fresh look. Not only do candidates and employees engage, apply and work differently than before, but the employer risk profile has changed. Your employment screening vendor should be a though partner in how to meet the needs of your workforce.
What is your style of leadership?
I’m a servant leader – I'm here to remove roadblocks and make it easier for my team and my clients to do their work and achieve results. A fancy title doesn’t make me better than my team – if I’m asking the team to work weekends or dig in on necessary but undesirable cleanup work, I hold myself to the same requirements.
What is something unique or interesting about you?
I started my career as a campaign press secretary when my high school teacher decided to run for Congress. As they say, the rest is history....
How has working remotely changed the client experience Vault provide?
The pandemic contributed to higher positive drug and alcohol screening results across many, many industries. This changed the experience of nearly every Vault client because they’re consistently receiving more regular calls from our Medical Review Officers (all licensed US physicians) to review a non-negative result and discuss how to handle the situation. Vault prides itself on making our MROs and larger compliance team not only available for the initial notification, but for follow ups as your situation evolves. Everyone hopes for 100% negative results, but that’s not our reality. And, when a result isn’t negative, that moment is the most important moment in the Vault-client relationship, which is why we’ve added MROs to ensure every client is fully supported.
Connect with Meredith on LinkedIn