beckyomas: Bookmarked.
*modified*
Can't believe i'm FTC again
Can you guys see me from down there? Don't worry, it'll be your turn one day.
Btw, signs of greater things to come

What's ur gain in being FTC? Mbok, educate me!

This Typo aspect happen to me just 2 days back. I wish I've seen this post earlier. I left my working place after 5 years experience, and while I was editing my cv it read just a year experience. I tried to convince them, but they said that's not a good quality of a goog manager. So cv must be properly reviewed before sending it. I have learnt from my mistake anyway.

Lol mine was terrible i mistakenly gave d wrong cv and d interviewer was amazed ‘are u a yoruba‘ i was dumbfounded ‘no i‘m ibo its a mistake‘...

Has anyone even read the rebuttals ? The read is in the rebuttals and not the main article

glitest: TRUE!...Yet, some Ediots will still lie on their resumes, even after reading this.

Please go to the main source and read the replies to the main article and you'll see that at times it pays to spice up your resume a bit

kaboninc: In as much as the points are very interesting especially to peeps like us hunting for jobs, the rebuttals are just so overwhelming! Guys take a look at that thread on Linkedln and you'd be amazed at the number of comments criticising the post.

To young lads, the point raised are very important but to the experienced, its a different ball game.

Someone actually read the rebuttals , brilliant rebuttals aren't they ?

Some of the replies :
# 1 Job descriptions are full of typos
and the formatting of job descriptions
( especially the ones posted on
LinkedIn) is appalling.
# 2 The length of most job
descriptions + must - haves + should-
haves + would - be - nice -to -haves is
unbearable .
# 3 Companies notoriously lie about
the roles, their values are there just
to look pretty and they hardly ever , if
ever , practice what they preach .
# 4 Go to a hiring manager' s LinkedIn
profile and you are bound to find
typos .
Even the LinkedIn Pulse posts are full
of typos.
# 5 Since most companies use dumb
software that looks for key words in
applicants ' resumes for pre -
selection , so actually a resume of 4
or even 10 pages is a smart move -
the more words you use on your
resume the greater your chances are
that you will go past the initial
selection .
# 6 Also, I have just googled for
' executives fired for lying on their
resumes' and I have come across
this article
http : //readwrite .com/2012 /05 /03/10-
executives -who -lied - on- their-
resumes- and -2- who - got - away -
with -it
Finally , if you worked for me as a
recruiter or hiring manager and
eliminated " good or even great
people " just because of typos , I
would fire you!
In the era when ' recruiting' is called
' talent acquisition' I would expect a
bit more effort on the part of hiring
managers in identifying talent.. ..
unless you are hiring resume writes

With the exception of the last two,
which are obvious red flags, the fact
that resumes get very quickly thrown
out because of a mild typo or
because of a formatting issue is often
the reason why companies neglect to
hire good talent and wonder why
anyone isn ' t rising to the top of the
crust . Recruiters and HR people
spend all of 7 seconds looking at a
resume before throwing it out the
window for the pettiest of things , and
it ' s frankly an insult to the person
who has spent a whole lot of time
applying to that position . Larger
companies have absurd portals
where you have to type in your
resume information multiple times
such that a computer can filter
through keywords and skills , and
your resume that you have carefully
tailored may as well have gone into a
void . I once went into an interview
and saw that the hiring manager had
a version of my resume that I never
formatted and that did not have
current information. It came out of
an algorithm or an HR person who
doesn ' t truly know what the hiring
manager would be looking for, and
good people get lost in the shuffle.
Frankly I' ve read too many articles
that parrot the same ideas about how
to fix your resume and make it
perfect , and they ' re always written by
people who barely devote the time to
actually look at them .

Maria Johnsen
Strategic Marketing( SEO , PPC )
Brand Management , IT & Operations
Right . Most of those whom got hired
at major player companies were lairs,
had long resumes and because of
their networking connections their
typos were overlooked. Your article is
beautiful on paper but in practice
these are not applicable in real life .
Do you know what get people hired ?
Networking ! You have got to know
someone who knows someone in the
company . All other stuff you guys
give people are bunch of beautiful
words in well written articles . 15
years you have been working as a
recruiter ; have you ever put yourself
in an applicant ’ s shoes ? Do you
know how many job applications they
are filling out and sending out to
employers/companies? This job
hunting has become a 24 /7 unpaid
job. So don ’ t you dare to judge
people for having a couple of typos in
their applications. Specialty matters .
Recruiters run these resumes through
their software and at the end of the
day they hire someone who is not
qualified for the job, a year later, we
see the same old job announcement
all over again. Every single year I
have seen companies look for the
same job applicants and I see the
same job applications. Do you know
why ? Because they follow all these
cliché advice and do not pay
attention to real qualification !
Qualified people ’ s resumes are buried
under fake ones and recruiters
choose them and hire the wrong
people . Then companies in their
annual reports complain about losing
money over recruiting processes ,
hiring wrong people and lack of the
right specialists.

Education and Technology
Consultant
OK - anyone see a problem with the
hiring process ?!!! Seriously ,
passing up a great candidate because
of a minor typo is more than a little
short -sighted in my humble opinion .
Some companies seem to have
forgotten ( or never knew in the first
place ) that you might just be hiring
the WRONG candidate simply
because they didn' t make any
mistakes on their resume . We' re all
human and quite frankly , I don' t think
I would want to work for a company
that operates in such a fashion . Cold,
clinical and robotic. My father , who
was a professor of education and
trained hundreds of teachers and
future superintendents, once told me
that great teachers DO NOT get A ' s
in Teachers' College . Great teachers
usually have lower grades but WAY
MORE life experience , including
failure .

Andrea Eskin
Writer / Editor / Graphic Designer
The worst offense is not having the
courtesy to even send a computer -
generated acknowledgement that a
resume was received , followed later
by an update telling the applicant
that the job has been filled . Although
some companies do this , most of
them don ' t . If you think a typo
reflects badly on one applicant ,
believe me , when he or she is
ignored , it will reflect even worse on
your company , and that person will
communicate his disappointment to
lots of other people . There are many
software programs that make it easy
for a company to contact, thank , and
update an applicant about a job, so
there ' s no excuse for ignoring people
who have shown genuine interest in
working for you, and invested
valuable time and effort in sending
you their resumes.

Sharad Agrawal
Regional Transformation Lead at
Alcatel - Lucent Telecoms
I wonder , when people start
recruiting , why suddenly they start
expecting robots to write CVs and
100 % perfect candidates in perfect
height , length , not a single typo and
100 % factual . Please ! Get real . If we
start rejecting resumes because of
typos , 50% of employed population
would be unemployed. There is no
perfect length and I bet you, if
someone is recruiting by looking at
formatting - I have come across
some real beautiful CVs and faces
that spoke to me were absolutely
rubbish . In fact , I have a great team
mate who is just not skilled in
Microsoft Word - but I can sleep if I
know he is dealing with an issue
' cause he is so committed and
skilful . I am sorry , I don ' t appreciate
a black and white approach to
rejecting resumes

Tom Henkel
Creative Director at CHIEFTAIN
STUDIO
First, articles virtually identical to this
one have appeared dozens and
dozens of times here on LinkedIn and
elsewhere on the Internet . If you
want to get noticed , why not write
about a fresh topic or , at the very
least, take a different angle on this
topic to differentiate it ?
Second , every person on LinkedIn
could compile a list of annoying
things that happen with frustrating
regularity on their jobs . Maybe other
HR people cheer these resume
perfection articles, but to everyone
else it sounds like incessant whining .
The millionth article complaining
about typos in resumes ( this article
might be a candidate for that title )
isn ' t going to fix the problem. People
don ' t purposefully put typos in
resumes just to annoy HR people
( although it ' s a temptation) . It ' s a
mistake . It happens . Deal with it .
Third , when you reject candidates for
violating crazy rules, who are you
hurting ? The candidates will
probably find jobs somewhere .
You ' re just arbitrarily removing
potentially qualified candidates from
consideration by your company for
nonsensical reasons. Some of those
candidates might turn out to be star
performers who add great value to
your competitors . Does a software
engineer need perfect grammar and
spelling to do his /her job? When that
candidate develops a billion dollar
product for your competitors are you
going to feel proud for rejecting them
in the name of resume perfection?
Your job is to hire the best available
talent for your company . It ' s not
about finding candidates that don' t
annoy you.
Lastly , and I do agree lying is a bad
thing , when you invent a system that
automatically rejects resumes for
lacking every keyword you desire ,
aren ' t you setting up scenario to
promote lying ? Isn' t it equally
dishonest for a company to demand
more skills than is necessary to
reasonably qualify for any given
position ?

Gennady Shenker
Creating value on teams that play to
win
Laslo, I very much appreciate your
sentiment, but let me turn tables on
you, may I? May I suggest that you
and " hiring managers" waste their
time on wrong candidates ?
Would you rather hire " Michael
Jordan " of the profession , who chose
to spent his time on polishing his
" game " or someone who sacrificed
enhancing his /her skill set for the
sake of learning to play fake resume
game ? As a hiring manager I have a
responsibility to find the best
candidate for the job and not the
master of the resume and interview.
I am still to read a worthwhile advice
on resume or interview on LinkedIn .
So many experts , so few insights !
I ' ve read about tricky questions to
ask . Unless you are in the business
of answering tricky questions on a fly ,
what exactly do tricky questions
test ? I' ve read from the only question
that matters to 5 that make a
difference . Ask 100 recruiters /hiring
managers of their interpretations of
this " only " questions and you' ll get
100 different interpretations .
After interviewing 100+ candidates , I
came to realization that I learn more
about candidates from questions they
ask then from canned answers to
well known questions . Behavioral
interviews became a competition
between not professionals with the
best capabilities for jobs at hand and
in the foreseeable future but story
makers and tellers. Unless making
and telling stories are key drivers for
success in your business , what use
of tasting these skills during
interviews ?
It ' s time recruiters and hiring
managers got out of the fantasy land
in their heads and back into reality .

Can someone please explain the fourth point: confidential information. How then do you tell your employer to be that you have experience in a field without making reference to where you have worked before?

I work in the clinical research industry ...the Google HR recommendation will not work , as a scientist , the more pages you have on ur resume , the more chance you get , you reliable have to expansiate , the previous task and duties ...

neoapocalypse:

Someone actually read the rebuttals , brilliant rebuttals aren't they ?

Of course!

RentedReality: Typos & lies I agree with.

I'll tell you the absolute truth no one says; Key word match
g
Yeah I said it.

I'm a Talent Acquisition Specialist, in other words I match candidates with my clients job description. I feed off this, pay my bills and MB i use on Nairaland off this.

Truth be told, it is all about matching the clients job description with your work profile; but don't push it, no lies or you will get caught.
There's a grey area, capitalize on that.

10 years + experience? keep it down to 3 pages.

Not enough experience? focus on your achievements.

Get rid of your date of birth, and state of origin; it's against employment laws and could lead to bias.

Cover letter? 100 words or less highlighting the value you could bring to the organization.

Preferred font? Verdana or Calibri; shows you are serious minded.

Structure of resume? brief intro, career progression, training & workshops attended, and I.T proficiency related to your area of specialization.

This Google HR guy is yarning dust, things are done differently here, read this post this morning on my LinkedIn and laughed, had 600 CV's to review and only two of what he listed was a criteria.

Again, *dust*

gud

@Op, did you read the comments following the Google head of PR exposé? ok let me create a thread of it

kobonaire: In some cases if you get connection, your CV can even just be a blank page ...

always following

wow!!! Nice one. VERY IMFORMATIVE

kobonaire: In some cases if you get connection, your CV can even just be a blank page ...

One of the greatest problems of graduates of our time. Be the best you can and avoid these mistakes, you will need no connection!

rattlesnake: The Grace of God can overcome our CV limitations

True that but His grace should not be taken for granted. Take note of these mistakes and avoid them. God is not against tending towards perfection!

Op, A sample of your good resume or stfu.

Drogba11:
One of the greatest problems of graduates of our time. Be the best you can and avoid these mistakes, you will need no connection!

very good advice Mr Drogba .... I did not mean for my original post to imply that graduates should not work hard and rely solely on contacts. The reality of today is you need both:- work/study hard so that you get the knowledge + skills. Also ensure that you network so that you get that foot in the door.

emperorbanks:

seconded...thought people never visit these part of thus forum, especially ladies.

Bullshit. Total nonsense. some people just don't have sense especially sexist posters like you.

neoapocalypse:


Please go to the main source and read the replies to the main article and you'll see that at times it pays to spice up your resume a bit

Oh yes!..It pays big if one spices up a resume, until one gets caught.

If lying on cv can translate to sack, half of our govt officials should be relieved of their jobs, starting with GEJ.

Mistake 4: I don't understand why stating the name of d company u once worked for translates to divulging confidential info/secret?

I agree though that putting your best foot forward for a job interview begins with preparing a very good cv.
My humble submission

glitest:

Oh yes!..It pays big if one spices up a resume, until one gets caught.

Simple instruction you no comply , go read the rebuttals. There are people who spiced up their resumes , got employed , got busted years later and were still retained because they had justified their inclusion to the coy. If they hadn't spiced up their resumes a bit they wouldn't have had the chance to prove their mettle.