Why do people falsify information on their resumes? The answer is obvious: the job market is increasingly competitive, and as a result, many job seekers are willing to embellish their credentials to gain a competitive advantage.
Another reason people falsify their resumes is the belief, which is true to a significant degree, that prospective employers won’t bother to do a background check.
Though it may be comforting to presume that only a tiny proportion of the population would be guilty of distorting information on their resume, some studies have suggested that up to 40% of the population have at least a small amount of misleading or inflated content in their resumes.
In fact, telling resume lies has become so commonplace to the extent that hundreds of websites focus on offering tips and guides on how to create fake resumes and manipulate the interview process.
Big Lies, Small Lies: What Constitutes a Resume Lie?
We’ve often found that the education section of the resume is where embellishments are most frequent. This usually comes from an individual claiming that they have completed an educational program that they may have only started.
Falsified ages, lying about reasons for leaving previous positions, embellished titles, exaggerated job duties, altered dates of employment, and even false references are also typical.
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Catching Resume lies: Why does it matter?
People who are comfortable falsifying information on their resumes reveal that they have integrity issues.
Therefore, job candidates that falsify information on their resumes are worth exposing. This is because research has found that those who are comfortable exaggerating their skills or telling any kind of lie at all, are very likely to be comfortable being immoral in other ways.
The fact is that when you hire somebody who’s misrepresented their qualifications, you will be getting somebody who has lesser qualifications. Worse, you might be bringing somebody in who’s likely to defraud your organization or commit any other kind of crime.
When it comes to hiring right, it is like Warren Buffett said: “In looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities- integrity, intelligence and energy. And if they don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.”
When discerning fact from fiction on an applicant’s resume can be pretty tricky for managers and business owners, it’s a problem that a simple background check can quickly solve.
In our experience, here are four of the false claims that commonly appear on resumes:
Hiring Right: 4 Common Resume Lies
1. University Degrees
You only have to watch the news to appreciate the extent to which certain individuals are willing to go to advance themselves.
Whether in the public sector or private sector, many applicants present false degrees and corresponding false certificates. Hiring someone who lacks necessary training can result in a poor hire and increased costs when you have to start over to find the right employee.
A simple educational background check that verifies university degrees and professional credentials can quickly fix this problem and keep you from bringing a loose cannon on board.
2. Hyper-embellished Job Titles
For instance: Was the applicant really an experienced, national customer service manager like he claimed on his resume? Or was he a customer care representative with a few direct reports?
Incompetence cannot be hidden, and poor performance will always announce itself. When your employees lack the required skills, it could cause your customers to lose confidence in your organization. The effect this has on your company’s reputation can be far more significant than simply the time and money invested in this hire.
An advanced background check can help you confirm that the hired person has the skills and knowledge to perform the job. It can also verify their former employer and the positions they held.
3. Altered Dates of Employment
Unfortunately, too many applicants think nothing of lying about dates of employment to cover gaps in their work history. The need to alter dates often happens when they are trying to conceal that they’ve been fired before or that they’ve been job-hopping.
In addition, some women trying to reenter the workplace after starting or raising a family tend to stretch timelines to cover the months or years they weren’t employed.
And some of the worst cases we have found have involved applicants stretching dates of employment in an attempt to hide time spent in prison.
A thorough background check can save your business the trouble of wasting its hard-earned resources on applicants that are not fit for the role.
In addition, it is essential to verify dates of employment so you can quickly identify gaps that may not have been obvious on the resume and that may warrant further investigation.
4. Falsification of the Previous Salary
Previous salaries are often used as a guide when determining compensation for new employees.
In trying to make as much money as possible, we have observed that a shocking number of job applicants inflate their previous figures in the hopes of securing higher pay from a new job.
While it is natural to desire increased earnings, it is unscrupulous behaviour and a strong indicator of a shady character to arm twist a prospective employer by inflating one’s previous salary.
A background check can set the record straight in this area also. While not all employers will give out salary information, many will confirm the information provided to them as correct or inaccurate. Therefore, primary employment verification should ask for salary confirmation.
In summing,
In the end, it is always a bad strategy to judge a book by its cover. You never know what lies beneath the surface of a well-polished persona.
The information you get by conducting a background check helps you discern if a potential employee is likely to lie, steal from your company, hurt someone who works for you, or pose potential harm to your clients or your reputation.
Therefore, when you consider the time and expense you commit to hiring and onboarding the right employees, the true worth of a background check is more than uncovering inaccuracies on resumes.
As a leader in the recruitment industry, Workforce Africa is uniquely positioned to help you navigate the challenges of uncovering inaccuracies on resumes and hiring the right talents in Africa.
Click here to have a quick chat with us.
