Don't Be a Liar! Resume Advice That Could Save Your Career

Liar, liar, pants on fire.

While most of us won’t resort to playground name-calling, it does seem silly to hear adults argue about lying on a resume.

You’ve likely heard “Everyone does it,” (not true) or “It’s not lying, just embellishing” (tomato, tomahto,) or “It’s none of your business,” (yeah, true - unless you’re the one doing the hiring).

And while we may hear celebrity stories of how getting caught in a resume-lie knocked someone out of a cushy position, we don’t really hear stories of normal people who get caught lying.

So what’s the big deal?

First of all – people do get caught. They just don’t brag about it.

The most common lies are around college degrees. People list colleges they did attend, but include degrees that they didn’t earn. Some people actually make up degrees, and sometimes even colleges.

Unfortunately for them, not only is this the most common lie, it’s also the easiest to check. And, believe me, they do check.

A survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) found that more than 60% of HR professionals reported finding inaccuracies on resumes.

An inaccuracy may not be a lie, but it is enough to call your character into question. A busy HR manager trying to narrow a field of qualified candidates, can view an inaccuracy as sufficient reason to remove you from the stack.

Or worse… you could be dismissed from a job that you’re already in.

Aside from the possibility of getting caught, saying you have knowledge and experience that you don’t might actually get you hired into a job that’s over your head. This could lead to embarrassment, damage to the company, or worse, harm to you or another person.

And, even if no one is hurt, most companies would feel uneasy about trusting you once they knew.

The truth is that the best resume advice is: the truth.

Why people lie

In my resume-writing firm, one of the most frequent questions I hear from potential clients looking for resume advice is:

“I have a problem in my professional history in ____________. I’m afraid how that will look on my resume. Do you think you could help me?”

You can fill in the blank with lacking a degree, a gap in work history, having been fired from a past job, or one of a thousand other possible challenges.

The simple reason that people lie on a resume is the same reason people lie about anything – they have insecurities about their abilities and lies help them cover these up.

But, there is a better way.

Challenge me

With 20 years of experience writing thousands of resumes and providing resume advice to thousands of other job seekers, you can bet that I HAVE dealt with your situation before. The same is true of other experienced, credentialed professional resume writers.

The best professional resume writers know how to use ethical, honest strategies to highlight your strengths while downplaying your weaknesses. With these strategies, we can create effective, TRUTHFUL resumes that show the top-notch, competitive candidate that is there.

A Well Crafted Resume

Your resume is a marketing document, with the goal to emphasize and promote your skills, talents, strengths, and potential value-add in relation to your job target.

Content

The most crucial aspect of your resume is that the content reflect the skills and experience needed for your target position.

• Always think in terms of relevance and impact.
• Reorganize experience so that transferable skills are clear and understandable.
• Describe how your work benefited your employers. List them showing the challenges, the actions, and the results of each situation.
• Don’t confuse your reader with irrelevant experience, qualifications that don’t match your focus, out-of-date experience, or achievements that don’t support your value proposition.
• Place emphasis on achievements, listing quantifiable results whenever possible.

Remember, you won’t get hired for what you KNOW how to do, you’ll get hired for what you DO with what you KNOW.

With an honest assessment of what you bring to the table, lying is simply not necessary.

Format

Think of your resume format like a pyramid.

• The most important and relevant information should be presented at the peak of the pyramid or the beginning of the resume.
• The information that you want to de-emphasize and downplay should be at the bottom of the pyramid, or the end of the resume.
• Think strategically about the format and apply various design elements (underlining, bolding, white space).
• Draw the readers’ eyes to the data and elements that you want to emphasize. Downplay the irrelevant by letting them fade into the background.

Use the resume advice in this article to think creatively about how you promote your strengths and downplay your weaknesses. You’ll find that you can be truthful and still present yourself as a top candidate.

And, if you need help, schedule a resume review and consultation with me. I’m happy to help!