"Making Up" skills on resume/CV

Mar 10, 2020 5 Comments

Borrowing the words of a managing director at a recruitment firm in Asia, "there's now a growing tendency for junior candidates to pull the skill set of the more senior person who sits next to them on their CV because they've seen what they [seniors] do, so they think they're also capable of carrying out those duties."

There is currently a demand for junior professionals in banking as banks do not want to hire seniors/experienced hires that cost more, esp. given the fears of a recession. But at the same time, they're seeing an influx of junior CVs that are simply too exaggerated.

It's common practice to polish one's resume for interview, but how much "polishing" is too much? According to Monster's 2019 recruiter survey, 85% of recruiters said that candidates exaggerate skills and competencies on their resumes.

Have you personally seen such resume come through for review or encountered a candidate that clearly didn't have the knowledge/skill set they listed on their resume?

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TOP 5 Comments
  • 85% of recruiters are bad at their job
    Mar 10, 2020 0
  • This happens all the time, and honestly, I don't blame interviewees as all applicants now have insane GPAs, work experiences, extracurriculars, etc. Personally, I don't see anything wrong with it morally (since everyone interviewing is trying to make themselves seem as outstanding as possible). Just don't mess up because a lot of people will see through the BS and the lies.
    Mar 11, 2020 1
    • It's true that morality aside, it'd be so easy to mess up or slip if you put something on your resume that's not your own achievement and are put in a position to explain what you did. I agree competition is fierce these days but it's still a risky move and perhaps one without merit to outright lie on their resume.
      Mar 14, 2020
  • Oliver Wyman
    Josh2189

    Go to company page Oliver Wyman

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    JPMorgan Chase & Co.
    Josh2189
    Don’t lie on your resume or invent things up. Exaggerating a few points might be okay but I am not even sure it will help
    Mar 10, 2020 0
  • It’s like this:
    There is no common unambiguous language for resumes.

    Your definition of “HTML” may be literal, but a hiring manager could conflate it to mean: HTML5 + JS + CSS + WebPack + Git + Linux + NodeJS + JQuery + Angular + PHP + Ruby.... + (our custom in house way of using JavaScript)

    And putting a technology on my resume, there are two reasons.

    Some jobs want familiarity.
    Hiring Manager: He doesn’t even know basic command line? Pass, he’s too Junior, he obviously just graduated...

    Some jobs want specific skills at senior level of everything posted.
    Hiring Manager: Okay, I see on your Resume you put C#... Can you show me how you would build a Xamarin App that supports Virtual Reality and I want it to use GraphQL? You have 1 hour.

    It’s the babel problem. We all have words for things but no one actually agrees on when you should or shouldn’t put something on your resume.
    Does following a tutorial count?
    Does using the technology in a Hackathon count?
    Mar 10, 2020 0