lying on your cv

slum dog

hi my polish friend told me that he regularly lies on cvs when applying for jobs. he says that companies who hire in ireland are less likely to do background checks into his employment history or school grades becasue he is polish. i was just wondering whether this is legal or not? would it amount to misrepresentation?

thanks in advance

Victor

If the employer finds out and its a material lie, then he could be fired. If the lie is serious enough, e.g. claiming to be a doctor with 10 years experience, when in reality he flunked first year medicine, then he might also be sued and prosecuted.

krd

slum dog wrote: »

hi my polish friend told me that he regularly lies on cvs when applying for jobs.

he says that companies who hire in ireland are less likely to do background checks into his employment history or school grades becasue he is polish. i was just wondering whether this is legal or not? would it amount to misrepresentation?

thanks in advance

It's not just Polish people. I know Irish people who put down qualifications they don't have. Full degrees. Lots of stuff.

In the 90s, someone I knew running an IT contractor company. He had a client request for a CISCO certified engineer. The client was adamant that the credential be verified. The guy, had a pile of over 120 CVs, all the people claiming to be CISCO certified. He meticulous checked each candidate - and not a single one was CISCO certified. Of over 120 people, not a single one had told the truth.

Generally Irish employers don't check. Irish HR people are incredibly lazy - and they tend to go on their "gut instinct" - more or less bottom sniffing. The HR will generally only be rigorous in checking you out, if they want to find a reason not to hire you (they don't like you and want an excuse to block your appointment). If they like your "personality" then they won't check. A company I worked for, employed a person, who as it turns out was a fugitive - and wanted for a very serious crime.

A trick used by Polish people - but I've known people from Italy, Denmark, and Germany to do the same thing - is to give themselves accreditation from a far flung universities and institutes in their own country. Tralee institute of technology type thing. The Polish gag is even one better - they pick a university that uses strange Polish spelling (in Polish, some letters are compounded to give a sound completely unrelated to the English pronunciation - For example the city of Rzeszow, is not pronounced Res-zow. It's actually Je-shh-off.............A bit of struggle for a lazy Irish HR person)

Polish people are not particularly any more sneaky or dishonest than Irish people. The average Irish person may actually be worse. A few years ago, I came across a guys CV. The first half of it looked eerily like a version of my CV. He had himself down for studying the same course, at the same time and place I had. I don't know where he was at the time he claims to have been on that course - whatever he was doing with his life, he certainly wasn't studying with me.

I did some searching on some Irish HR "professionals" recently. For two of them, I found two different versions of their CV. On each CV, they had different qualifications and different work experience.

A sad fact of life, is many people are sleazy and dishonest.

ABajaninCork

*Sigh*

Reading the above has made me even more depressed. Maybe I should lie on my CV too! That's probably one of the reasons why I can't seem to get a job...

slum dog

thanks for the replies. i dont think lying on your cv amounts to being sleazy tbh

barman linen

I have experience in joining a company which was a start up in Ireland - US company.

They had used a highly reputable agency to fill a vacancy ahead of me and when I joined and the business picked up the cracks started to show. Cue illness, absence and then she left to join another company. I had a look at her CV and tried to verify her experience which was all bogus. 12 years of supposed experience with blue chips was in fact 7 months as a temp. An ACCA qualification was a fantasy.

The company paid over 20K in a recruitment fee to the agency and when I challenged them they said it was our fault for not checking ! Needless to say that was their last commission.

The funny thing is when I got back her laptop I was able to see the latest version of her CV which was another work of fiction - again tailored for the role she applied for - she lasted 3 months over there until she was found out again.

She was Irish BTW

RangeR

slum dog wrote: »

thanks for the replies. i dont think lying on your cv amounts to being sleazy tbh

It's not far off it. It gives you an unfair shunt at a job opportunity. One you probably don't deserve.

coylemj

RangeR wrote: »

It's not far off it. It gives you an unfair shunt at a job opportunity. One you probably don't deserve.

It's only unfair if the other candidates for the job tell the truth in their CVs.

Note I'm referring to the fairness of it, not the moral issue of telling lies.

professore

I take qualifications on a CV with a VERY LARGE pinch of salt. If someone puts something on their CV, they better be able to talk at length about it and answer very specific questions on it. Otherwise the interview will be very short.

Recruitment agencies are generally a waste of space.

Rasmus

Tailoring a CV to suit a certain role or job is not lying. It's a competitive job market and merely omitting parts and highlighting others on the CV is something that is even advised on CV sites.

coylemj

What happens in most large companies is that the recruitment company or the HR department filters the CVs and they only call to interview the people who supposedly meet the minimum qualifications and/or experience set down by the department looking to fill a vacancy.

Usually the HR department and/or the recruitment company don't have the expertise to call someone's bluff if it's a specialised job like accountancy or IT so they won't be able to tell the chancers from the genuine people.

The next step is that the relevant department in the company is presented with a set of four or five CVs of potential candidates and the senior managers in that department interview the candidates, on the basis that the people who have made it this far have been properly screened but in most cases they have not.

In many cases people jump from competitor to competitor and those companies, being mortal enemies won't talk to each other which makes lying on the CV a piece of cake. I have seen lots of cases where salespeople in IT companies jump from one company to another safe in the knowledge that nobody in company A is going to pick up the phone to ask the people in company B if this guy actually achieved all of the sales successes he's put on his CV.

krd

slum dog wrote: »

thanks for the replies. i dont think lying on your cv amounts to being sleazy tbh

You don't think lying amounts to being sleazy?

What do you think amounts to being sleazy?......Telling the truth?


Lying is lying.

FreudianSlippers

I wouldn't do it in that I wouldn't positively lie on my CV (that is add in false qualifications etc), I would lie by omission and leave off jobs that I didn't think were exactly great.
I worked in a restaurant for a summer when I was 15... do I really need that on my professional CV? :P

Victor

FreudianSlippers wrote: »

I would lie by omission and leave off jobs that I didn't think were exactly great. I worked in a restaurant for a summer when I was 15... do I really need that on my professional CV? :P

That's not lying. That is rationalising the CV to make it easy for the recruiter to read. It also means that you know what is irrelevant.

krd

ABajaninCork wrote: »

*Sigh*

Reading the above has made me even more depressed. Maybe I should lie on my CV too! That's probably one of the reasons why I can't seem to get a job...

There could be many reasons. Like that the economy is banjaxed and there are 450,000,000 people out of work.

If you're not getting called to interviews, it could be the look of your CV. Not your experience etc.

There's a lot of bollocky carry on as well. The person getting your CV might be a school drop out, with no qualifications, and they don't want to run the risk of hiring someone who might better than them. This goes on - I know someone who does this. That person might only pick the worst written CVs, deliberately.

RangeR

There could be many reasons. Like that the economy is banjaxed and there are 450,000,000 people out of work.

so you probably have "The abilty to exaggerate public information" on your cv?

Lanaier

Lying on a CV may not be "sleazy" but it's definitely bad.

"Scummy"?...perhaps?
That's probably a bit too far.

It's "Dishonest" , no doubts about that.
If your first interaction with an employer/employee is based on dishonestly ....where does that lead you?

Also, lying on a CV is not the same as tailoring the info to suit the job (as long as the info is true)....not the same thing at all.

Milk & Honey

It is an offence contrary to Section 6 of 2001 Theft & Fraud Offences Act to lie on a CV.
"Dishonest conduct calculated to lead to gain for oneself or loss to another".

krd

Milk & Honey wrote: »

It is an offence contrary to Section 6 of 2001 Theft & Fraud Offences Act to lie on a CV.
"Dishonest conduct calculated to lead to gain for oneself or loss to another".

There was a scandal with the Smurfit school of Business a few years back.

It turned out, several of the senior teaching staff had less qualifications than their students.

And there was a time, Bertie Aherns website claimed he had academic qualifications that in fact he did not. This of course was a clerical error. Someone's hand slipped and gave him a primary, and masters degree. It's easy, your hand can just slip. asgfgatterg phd mba awerwfa <-see.

coylemj

Since we're on the issue of fibs and morals, here's one to test you...

You're selling your house, you have a choice of two estate agents - A and B.

A is an old-style wheeler dealer, he'll tell any amount of lies to sell a property, including (remember the RTE expose a few years ago?) telling a prospective buyer that there's a couple of serious offers on the table when there aren't any. However he doesn't stray into territory that could lead to consequences afterwards like telling people that there's a brand new school being built around the corner when that is not the case.

B is as straight as a die and morally clean as a whistle, won't say anything that isn't 100% true.

Which one do you engage to sell your house? Go on, tell the truth.....

argosy2006

Wouldn't it all get crinkled up if you were lying on it,
Why not just put in in filing cabinet

Lanaier

coylemj wrote: »

Which one do you engage to sell your house? Go on, tell the truth.....

I'm not selling anything, nor am I planning to.... I like truth-guy though.

Robbo

coylemj wrote: »

Since we're on the issue of fibs and morals, here's one to test you...

You're selling your house, you have a choice of two estate agents - A and B.

A is an old-style wheeler dealer, he'll tell any amount of lies to sell a property, including (remember the RTE expose a few years ago?) telling a prospective buyer that there's a couple of serious offers on the table when there aren't any. However he doesn't stray into territory that could lead to consequences afterwards like telling people that there's a brand new school being built around the corner when that is not the case.

B is as straight as a die and morally clean as a whistle, won't say anything that isn't 100% true.

Which one do you engage to sell your house? Go on, tell the truth.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htVkGx4_GqA

fasttalkerchat

I've been tempted to change one GCSE result by one grade. I got a C in one of them so 11 GCSE's A*-C doesn't sound the same as 11 GCSE's A*-B.

Never bothered to do it though.

Lanaier

I never even include the leaving cert.

Redundant, irrelevant info.
No point filling the CV with stuff they wont look at.

fasttalkerchat

Lanaier wrote: »

I never even include the leaving cert.

Redundant, irrelevant info.
No point filling the CV with stuff they wont look at.

Unfortunately they ask for GCSE results here since A level subjects are chosen and may not include English & Maths.

krd

coylemj wrote: »

Since we're on the issue of fibs and morals, here's one to test you...

You're selling your house, you have a choice of two estate agents - A and B.

A is an old-style wheeler dealer, he'll tell any amount of lies to sell a property, including (remember the RTE expose a few years ago?) telling a prospective buyer that there's a couple of serious offers on the table when there aren't any. However he doesn't stray into territory that could lead to consequences afterwards like telling people that there's a brand new school being built around the corner when that is not the case.

B is as straight as a die and morally clean as a whistle, won't say anything that isn't 100% true.

Which one do you engage to sell your house? Go on, tell the truth.....

Well.............I'll explain.

There's a saying, you can't fool an honest man. Basically, if you get into bed with a chancer, don't complain if you end up getting screwed - which you probably will.

"Wheeler dealers" or sales&morketing bullsh1tters are usually, in practice, the worst sales people. If you think they're only going to limit their lying to lying on your behalf, you'd be a fool. You're a mark, just as much as the people they may be selling your house to.

These guys are lazy, and out for a quick profit for themselves. They'll tell you they'll get you the best price - that's not how it works. They want to make a profit without killing themselves. And it's all upside for them.

I saw the results of a study on American real estate agents. When they're selling their own houses, they keep them on the market for longer than average. They also get higher than average prices for their own houses. When they're "working" for clients, they make a trade off between how much they work, and how much they profit. So, they'll flog your house to the easiest bid - so they can take your money, and move on to the next mark.

Slippery bolloxes are slippery bolloxes.

If you're selling your house, and you go with the bollox, you only have yourself to blame.

coylemj

krd wrote: »

"Wheeler dealers" or sales&morketing bullsh1tters are usually, in practice, the worst sales people. If you think they're only going to limit their lying to lying on your behalf, you'd be a fool. You're a mark, just as much as the people they may be selling your house to.

These guys are lazy, and out for a quick profit for themselves. They'll tell you they'll get you the best price - that's not how it works. They want to make a profit without killing themselves. And it's all upside for them.

I saw the results of a study on American real estate agents. When they're selling their own houses, they keep them on the market for longer than average. They also get higher than average prices for their own houses. When they're "working" for clients, they make a trade off between how much they work, and how much they profit. So, they'll flog your house to the easiest bid - so they can take your money, and move on to the next mark.

Slippery bolloxes are slippery bolloxes.

If you're selling your house, and you go with the bollox, you only have yourself to blame.

Stuff the American study, go to any town in Ireland and the natives will tell you about the local auctioneer who could sell sand to the arabs. They may not be happy with the guy's morals but you can be sure when they go to sell their pub/farm, he's the guy they will use.

RangeR

coylemj wrote: »

the local auctioneer who could sell sand to the arabs

But will they get a good price for said sand?

Ninja Edit : Fk It, we are going way off topic with this bull**** analogy.

krd

coylemj wrote: »

Stuff the American study, go to any town in Ireland and the natives will tell you about the local auctioneer who could sell sand to the arabs. They may not be happy with the guy's morals but you can be sure when they go to sell their pub/farm, he's the guy they will use.

I have some awful news for you. We had a property boom and crash. And it was mostly caused by foolishness, and gullible, stupid, bacon and cabbage eejits, in the towns and villages of Ireland, who believed the guff of slippery auctioneers and estate agents, that there was a demand for hundreds of thousands of "luxury" apartments and housing estates in the middle of nowhere.

There is a morality tale in there somewhere, don't you think?

coylemj

krd wrote: »

I have some awful news for you. We had a property boom and crash. And it was mostly caused by foolishness, and gullible, stupid, bacon and cabbage eejits, in the towns and villages of Ireland, who believed the guff of slippery auctioneers and estate agents, that there was a demand for hundreds of thousands of "luxury" apartments and housing estates in the middle of nowhere.

There is a morality tale in there somewhere, don't you think?

Yes, people were blinded by greed - the buyers, the speculators, the builders and the selling agents.