Recently, I am in the process of hiring someone in my team. As I move along with that process, I keep on encountering various fake resume. Times are tough, maybe that’s why genuine people are becoming desperate to compete with these fake profiles, and they are also including false information on their resume. While I might not have a complete solution to avoid these fake people, I have few tips through which you can prescreen these candidates before taking their interview, and save your precious time.
Avoid the perfect match: Have you ever seen a resume which exactly replicates your job requirements as it is posted on the job portal? I have seen many resumes, which contains exactly same wordings as they appear in the job requirements, and that too in the same order. This should give you a strong signal that this person has directly copy pasted the job description in his job profile. So, don’t even bother interviewing these kind of people.
Avoid out of context keywords: If you get a resume that has all the keywords that you are looking for, but if they are out of context, then chances are….. it has some falsified information. For example: Java, C#, Windows 7, Linux, etc. Someone who has the knowledge of these keywords would easily classify these keywords properly, and they won’t seem out of context. In our example, they would say…… they know programming languages like Java and C#, while they have administrative knowledge of OS like Linux and Windows 7.
Avoid resume without contact information: If you received a good resume which doesn’t have any other contact information other than just an e-mail ID, chances are….this might be a resume of a fake person or a person with fake information. I would not even consider a resume that doesn’t have a contact phone number and a proper residential information.
Google their names: This practice has helped me a lot. Before I decide to give a call to someone, I always go online and Google their name. In today’s day and age, you can find out lot of information about your job applicant by just googling their name. One time, I was going to call someone for an in-person interview and I happened to google his name, and I found out that he was convicted for two different theft charges from his past two jobs. Thus, I highly recommend you to check their online footprints before you call them for an interview.
Call them before an official interview: Technology has made everything possible in past few years. If you work for a company, which has their own video conferencing tools then please make use of those tools before you invite someone for an in-person interview. If you are working on a budget, then use free conferencing tools like Skype or Meebo for a prescreening interview. You should always prescreen out-of-town people using these tools, so that you can save some valuable hiring money, which you might otherwise spend on scheduling their travel arrangements.
I hope these tips will help you to catch any fake resume during your hiring process, and hence avoiding any hiring mistakes. If you have any other ideas through which you can improve your hiring process then please feel free to share it with me through your comments. Thanks. – Bhavin Gandhi
Keep your recommendations updated: Do not just wait for someone to write you a recommendation. If someone (for example a friend, colleague, professor, customer, or client) praises you for your recent work or assignment, you might ask this person: “Would you write me a short note restating that so I can include it in my resume or LinkedIn Profile?” The chances are….. they will be happy to do so and they might even like your initiative to keep your profile updated. If they reply that they’d like to write you a note but are very busy right now, you can offer to do a draft of the note, which they can edit, put on their stationery, and sign. In this way, you are not becoming a burden on them and still getting your things done.
Update your resume as you go: In addition to asking for recommendations, you can also add to the items in your Resume by creating them. Let’s say, you are in the same job from last 2-3 years, but your responsibilities keep on changing. In this case, you want to make sure that you keep a note of all of your job responsibilities somewhere. I would recommend you to keep your resume located somewhere on the cloud using something like ‘Windows Live’ or ‘Google Docs’. In this way, when your job responsibilities changes or you take on more tasks, you can go ahead and update your resume right away.
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