Resume Padding

Some links to stories of people who have been caught padding their resume and other information on the subject.

KARL ZINSMEISTER – White House Domestic Policy

SIMPLY REVAMPED ENTERPRISE MAGAZINE — BUT DID HE REALLY FOUND IT? OK, as best as I can determine, Karl Zinsmeister didn’t found the American Enterprise magazine. He revamped it. Would this be the biggest whopper ever told? No. But if true it’s resume-padding nonetheless.

Time Magazine Michael Brown:

Before joining FEMA, his only previous stint in emergency management, according to his bio posted on FEMA’s website, was “serving as an assistant city manager with emergency services oversight.” The White House press release from 2001 stated that Brown worked for the city of Edmond, Okla., from 1975 to 1978 “overseeing the emergency services division.” In fact, according to Claudia Deakins, head of public relations for the city of Edmond, Brown was an “assistant to the city manager” from 1977 to 1980, not a manager himself, and had no authority over other employees.

“The most common inflationary statements on resumes are job title and education. Some of my clients want me to change their job title to a more mainstream title, which is alright, as long as they list the real title in parentheses. Other candidates want to change their title to appear to have more experience than they possess, which I will not do,” said Kathy Sweeney, certified professional resume writer and interview coach from The Write Resume (www.awriteresume.com). “Further, I will never allow my clients to misrepresent their educational background. There are other areas we can strengthen on the resume, such as industry-specific training, which may be of more value to an employer.”

Key Race: U.S. House, West Virginia, District 1 Analysis

» September 14, 2006 | Alleged financial scandal and resume fabrications plague this tight House race as likely voters can’t decide who has a more disturbing track record — incumbent Rep. Alan Mollohan (D) who is under federal investigation for alleged financial crimes, or challenger Chris Wakim (R), a state delegate who admitted he exaggerated his education and veteran credentials.

A recent Majority Watch poll has Mollohan, a 12-term House veteran, beating Wakim by 10 percentage points, 52 percent to 42 percent, The Charleston Gazette reported Sept. 9.

But the federal probe of Mollohan continues as government investigators look into his personal finances and his work to secure hundreds of millions of dollars in earmarks for nonprofits he founded.

Meanwhile, voters in this district are still absorbing Wakim’s early August announcement that information in his official campaign bio was not accurate. Wakim’s campaign Web site had said he was a Gulf War veteran and that he earned a Master’s degree in public policy from Harvard when he actually served stateside during the Gulf War and his degree was in Liberal Arts, with a concentration in government.

In a race as close as this, both candidates can hope their challenger continues to make negative headlines.

U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt
Congresswoman accused of padding résumé to win seat

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Reginald Fields

Plain Dealer Bureau

Columbus- A state elections panel on Wednesday said there is enough evidence to look closer at whether a Cincinnati-area congresswoman improperly padded her résumé to get elected last year.

Forbes Magazine Most Common Resume Lies

Dave Edmondson, the former chief executive of RadioShack (nyse: RSH – news – people ). He resigned in February after questions arose about the accuracy of his résumé.

CNN Top Resume Padding Items:

Job title: Who ever said inflation is dead isn’t checking resumes. Job seekers have been known to make up a title or boost the one they had by a notch or two.

Resume Fair Tales 

Other common fabrications include inflating salary history, puffing up job titles, plugging gaps in employment histories and embellishing achievements on projects.

Lying on resume simply isn’t worth the risk

Common falsehoods are overstating education, previous responsibilities

The Chicago outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc. found that the most common falsehoods involved education, either listing a degree from a school the job applicant didn’t attend or inflating a grade point average. That was followed by making up job titles, boosting salaries and mischaracterizing why the applicant left previous jobs

Bruce Duke: South Carolina Public Service Commission Executive Director resigned amid allegations he made false statements on his resume about his academic background and military experience.

Sandra Baldwin: Former President of the U.S. Olympic Committee resigned after admitting she misrepresented her academic credentials.

George O’Leary: Fired Notre Dame Football coach fired when the school learned that a degree claimed on his resume was a lie.

Glynn Cyprien: Former basketball coach also fired when the school learned that a degree claimed on his resume was a myth.

George Deutsch: NASA public affairs official who resigned after Texas A&M University said Deutsch didn’t graduate, as he had claimed.

Steve Duchane: Sterling Heights City Manager fired in 2003 after it was discovered that he didn’t have the three college degrees he listed on his resume 15 years earlier.

Kenneth Lonchar: Former CFO of Veritas (which means “truth” in Latin) fired for lying on his resume, claiming a Stanford MBA he doesn’t have.

Joseph Ellis: Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, suspended for a year from teaching at Mount Holyoke College as punishment for lying about serving in the Vietnam War.

U.S. Rep. Wes Cooley: In the mid-1990s, was convicted of lying in Oregon voters’ pamphlets after claiming he fought in the Korean War.

Federal Judge James Ware’s: Ware’s nomination to a higher court was derailed by the discovery that he lied repeatedly about being the brother of a black teen-ager killed by whites in 1963.

Ronald Zarella: Current CEO of Bausch and Lomb who was discredited for saying he finished business school when he didn’t.  He did not get fired but made a huge show of offering to resign.