In this edition of VantagePoints, our director of financial investigations, John Beard, discusses the prevalence of resume fraud. In today's competitive employment climate, it is an unfortunate fact that a large number of applicants choose to inflate - or even flagrantly falsify - their professional resumes.

 

When it comes to screening job candidates, the professionals of ResultQuest® can help you avoid hiring those who misrepresent themselves, thereby saving you potential embarrassment and liability.  

 

J.R.Skaggs
Founder, Owner, and Manager

Would you believe that a whopping 53% of resumes and job applications have been embellished with false information? These embellishments cost employers approximately $600 million annually. What happens and what can be done.

• Embellish skill set - 57%
• Embellish responsibilities - 55%
• Dates of employment - 42%
• Job Title - 34%
• Academic degree - 33%
• Companies worked for - 26%
• Accolades and awards - 18%

• Automatic termination - 51%
• Depends on the lie - 40%
• Overlook if they like the person - 7%

• Frank Abagnale - forged degrees from Harvard and Colombia Universities. Posed as a pediatrician and an airline pilot. Served three prison terms.
• David Edmondson - former CEO of Radio Shack claimed to have dual degrees in psychology and theology from Pacific Coast Baptist in San Diego, but there is no record of him graduating from there.
• Marilee Jones - former admissions dean at Massachusetts Institute of Technology claimed she had degrees in biology from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the Albany Medical College and that she held a doctorate. She resigned after officials learned of the fabrications.
• Ronald Zarrella - former CEO of Bausch Lomb asserted for 10 years that he had an MBA from New York University's business school. He had enrolled in the program but never finished. He resigned and had to return a $1.1 million bonus in 2008.

Under the Texas Penal Code, for example, it is illegal to use, or even to just claim to hold, a postsecondary degree you know to be fraudulent, substandard, or fictitious in order to obtain employment. This makes it illegal to either falsely claim you received a degree from an actual, accredited university, or to list a degree from a "diploma mill" (an unaccredited institution that for a flat fee in a short amount of time with little to no coursework). Punishment for resume fraud of this variety varies ...  Read More