News
Labor/Employment
Jul. 26, 2002
Records Fabrications Can Come Back to Haunt You
Employment Column - By Martha Fay Africa - The president of the U.S. Olympic Committee resigned recently because of discrepancies in her résumé. She lied about an academic degree years ago, and long after the lie ceased to account for her previous or current success, it, unfortunately, remained on her rsum, waiting to trip her up.
Employment Column
By Martha Fay Africa
The president of the U.S. Olympic Committee resigned recently because of discrepancies in her résumé. She lied about an academic degree years ago, and long after the lie ceased to account for her previous or current success, it, unfortunately, remained on her résumé, waiting to trip her up.
Most résumé falsifications confer little benefit at the time they are made, add little or nothing to one's overall candidacy and have legs that walk long after the candidate has revised the résumé.
How is this so? It used to be that those who evaluated résumés kept a paper copy of it only for a finite period. Most employers have document retention policies that govern how long they keep various documents and how they are discarded. Some shred documents in five years. Others send them to a remote warehouse, not to be seen again until subpoenaed.
So if you falsely wrote on your résumé that you were president of the Yale Political Union in 1985, as an acquaintance of mine once did, 15 years later few could easily document your lie because the false résumé resides in a remote file drawer.
No one likely would go to the trouble to compare it to your current version. And the chance of you running into the real 1985 union president is pretty slim, unless you happen to have truly bad luck, like my acquaintance did.
But now, with the advent of electronic storage, organizations and legal search consultant firms can scan your old résumé into your document file, compare it with your current résumé and check for discrepancy patterns such as jobs omitted, dates modified and honors left on or off. If you send your legal recruiter a revised version next year, he or she then could have access to three different versions of your résumé and can spot new "variations."
Comparing old and new versions of résumés provides legal recruiters and law firms with important information about a lawyer's character - or lack thereof.
The conversations the headhunter could have with the rare candidate who misrepresents his or her résumé are an awkward but necessary part of the business. And if the consultant feels that the candidate has a cavalier attitude toward the truth, he or she may get dropped by that legal search firm.
With such a difficult market and so many lawyers laid off, some, nevertheless, are tempted to look better by providing a new version of their past. When earlier versions of résumés scrupulously noted both months and years but the new version shows years only, it may invite the question, "When did you leave your firm?" Usually, the candidate will admit that they were laid off months ago and have been looking for a job ever since.
Are such subtle misrepresentations necessary? Does it matter that someone has been laid off for economic reasons? It won't bother legal recruiters as much as lying about it.
Some legal recruiters may try harder to help those who have been laid off. And although law firms may prefer at the outset a candidate who has not been laid off, they often change their mind when they see that the candidate's background and experience are very relevant to their needs.
Firms often can handle, "I was laid off but my references attest to the quality of my work and the economic nature of the layoff."
Firms, however, abhor puffery, such as lying about chairing those trials or deposing expert witnesses when you were merely in attendance. Moreover, did you inherit those clients or did you build your own book of business? Does your practice really generate $2 million a year from your client billings or is that merely an expectation you have of your practice once you "change platforms?"
Some firms and legal search consultants' databases can store school transcripts, too. Several years ago, a candidate received an offer from the Bay Area office of a New York-based firm. The parent office of the firm routinely compared new and former résumés and new and former transcripts and asked its legal recruiter to see whether both versions were available so that a comparison could be done.
It became apparent that there were a few minor discrepancies between the new and old versions of the résumé, but there were major differences between the new and old school transcripts. Grades and class standing had seemingly been altered on the most recent transcript, even though the old transcript was strong enough to have gotten him the offer. The offer was rescinded.
The old adage "don't play with fire" also goes for the truth, so don't make misstatements on your résumé or changes to your transcript.
Martha Fay Africa is a legal search consultant in the San Francisco office of Major, Hagen & Africa.
By Martha Fay Africa
The president of the U.S. Olympic Committee resigned recently because of discrepancies in her résumé. She lied about an academic degree years ago, and long after the lie ceased to account for her previous or current success, it, unfortunately, remained on her résumé, waiting to trip her up.
Most résumé falsifications confer little benefit at the time they are made, add little or nothing to one's overall candidacy and have legs that walk long after the candidate has revised the résumé.
How is this so? It used to be that those who evaluated résumés kept a paper copy of it only for a finite period. Most employers have document retention policies that govern how long they keep various documents and how they are discarded. Some shred documents in five years. Others send them to a remote warehouse, not to be seen again until subpoenaed.
So if you falsely wrote on your résumé that you were president of the Yale Political Union in 1985, as an acquaintance of mine once did, 15 years later few could easily document your lie because the false résumé resides in a remote file drawer.
No one likely would go to the trouble to compare it to your current version. And the chance of you running into the real 1985 union president is pretty slim, unless you happen to have truly bad luck, like my acquaintance did.
But now, with the advent of electronic storage, organizations and legal search consultant firms can scan your old résumé into your document file, compare it with your current résumé and check for discrepancy patterns such as jobs omitted, dates modified and honors left on or off. If you send your legal recruiter a revised version next year, he or she then could have access to three different versions of your résumé and can spot new "variations."
Comparing old and new versions of résumés provides legal recruiters and law firms with important information about a lawyer's character - or lack thereof.
The conversations the headhunter could have with the rare candidate who misrepresents his or her résumé are an awkward but necessary part of the business. And if the consultant feels that the candidate has a cavalier attitude toward the truth, he or she may get dropped by that legal search firm.
With such a difficult market and so many lawyers laid off, some, nevertheless, are tempted to look better by providing a new version of their past. When earlier versions of résumés scrupulously noted both months and years but the new version shows years only, it may invite the question, "When did you leave your firm?" Usually, the candidate will admit that they were laid off months ago and have been looking for a job ever since.
Are such subtle misrepresentations necessary? Does it matter that someone has been laid off for economic reasons? It won't bother legal recruiters as much as lying about it.
Some legal recruiters may try harder to help those who have been laid off. And although law firms may prefer at the outset a candidate who has not been laid off, they often change their mind when they see that the candidate's background and experience are very relevant to their needs.
Firms often can handle, "I was laid off but my references attest to the quality of my work and the economic nature of the layoff."
Firms, however, abhor puffery, such as lying about chairing those trials or deposing expert witnesses when you were merely in attendance. Moreover, did you inherit those clients or did you build your own book of business? Does your practice really generate $2 million a year from your client billings or is that merely an expectation you have of your practice once you "change platforms?"
Some firms and legal search consultants' databases can store school transcripts, too. Several years ago, a candidate received an offer from the Bay Area office of a New York-based firm. The parent office of the firm routinely compared new and former résumés and new and former transcripts and asked its legal recruiter to see whether both versions were available so that a comparison could be done.
It became apparent that there were a few minor discrepancies between the new and old versions of the résumé, but there were major differences between the new and old school transcripts. Grades and class standing had seemingly been altered on the most recent transcript, even though the old transcript was strong enough to have gotten him the offer. The offer was rescinded.
The old adage "don't play with fire" also goes for the truth, so don't make misstatements on your résumé or changes to your transcript.
Martha Fay Africa is a legal search consultant in the San Francisco office of Major, Hagen & Africa.
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