Resume padding 3

[berkshire]

A company I am involved with hired a new executive with exellent credentials. Business exe with MBA, several bachelors degrees and attaboys on several programs
The new hires contract specified that they be subject to a background check.
The subject came on board, now three months later the background check company has found, glaring, discrepancies in the information provided ,and there is now serious doubt that some of the degrees are valid.
The Hr dept terminated this individual citing breach of contract,
in that the qualifications were not as represented.
My question is, should not Hr have done due diligence prior to hiring.
Or is it common practice to hire pending an investigation?
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[MacGyverS2000]

When a company wants someone in there, they'll hire first and fire later. Makes sense in a way... if the candidate had to wait three months to be accepted, he may very well accept another job in the meantime.

Of course, in this case it would have been to your benefit...

Dan - Owner

http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com

 

[TheBlacksmith]

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. If you later discover all you got is the bird excrement - wash your hands.

 

[patprimmer]

BE

I will have a $ each way on this one.

HR should check references as far as possible and make a few phone calls and the applicant should have copies of their formal qualifications with them at the first serious interview. If not, why not.

If some qualifications or references cannot be checked out with a simple phone call, then I agree it might be necessary to hire then do a final check.

If possible, when assessing applicants at the final stage, I normally try to call a friend who I know must have crossed their path professionally, especially one not listed as a reference.

Here, we have unfair dismissal laws, but they do not apply if the application contains lies. That is grounds for immediate dismissal.



Regards
Pat
See FAQ731-376 for tips on use of eng-tips by professional engineers &

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for site rules

 

[berkshire]

Pat.
"""Here, we have unfair dismissal laws, but they do not apply if the application contains lies. That is grounds for immediate dismissal."""



That is the basis for dismissal in this case.
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[casseopeia]

I'd like to know if this person was given an opportunity to explain the discrepancies. My fear is that the background check can be flawed.

"Gorgeous hair is the best revenge." Ivana Trump

 

[TheBlacksmith]

When I retired from the Navy, I had my first resume professionally written by someone who (1) did that for a living, and (2) supposedly knew me; I served with her husband twice and we were social acquaintences. Unfortuantely I didn't recognize the person decribed in the resume and couldn't explain some of the miracles that person was supposedly capable of. I then wrote my own, with exploits and phrases I could explain and did just fine. I think some of the professional writers embellish too much and if the person didn't check carefully or trusts the professional ...

 

[bridgebuster]

If it sounds too good to be true...

In the late 90's my employer was looking for a strategic hire to rebuild the big bridge sector of the company. They found a candidate - the chief engineer showed me the resume and I said there's no way this person could have done all this at his age, his response "I know" - six months after being hired he got clipped, not because he was a phony. The management realized it about two months in. It was because he was trying to push out the man who hired him.

The management got suckered by a lot of BS on paper that they didn't think clearly before hiring this character.

 

[jmw]

Outsourcing will be the death of us all.
HR could and should have done some superficial checking. It ought to at least have discovered some discrepancies.
You rely on external companies who can do a criminal convictions check, for example but I suspect HR just farmed out the whole checking business and washed their hands.
I would have thought any half way decent company ought to have found out some of the issues straight away.
But of course, they need to take their time getting back to HR to make it look like they actually had to do some hard work.

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[berkshire]

In this case, after the red flags were raised the person could simply have produced the degree or diploma. They were unable or unwilling to do that. They were also unwilling or unable to name the professors they worked with as students at the university mentioned.

MacGyverS2000 (Electrical) hit it on the head, the guy sounded too good to miss. And as they say, if it sounds too good it probabaly is.

The next red flag was the guys performance. Not of the quality expected.
Why people do this is beyond me, simple fact checking revealed the guy to be a fake.
I also found out this week that HR did not bother to fact check this guys resume until the performance issues surfaced, so there is some egg on the face in that dept.
B.E.


The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[Ron]

Basic due diligence does not take that long...degree confirmation can be done in a few hours. There are several services that will do this for you or you can do it yourself.

Criminal records can be checked in a matter of minutes; provided the person has not lived in many different locations.

I often run background checks on contractors who bid on my projects. If something seems awry, their bids are disqualified. Had to do that a couple of weeks ago.

 

[jmw]

My last company, after I left, apparently hired someone "too good to be true" and only figured out he was an illegal immigrant who had lifted his resume and identity off the internet, presumably.
They figured it out when he failed to turn up for work but the Border Control people did.
HR hadn't done their checks either.....
... But he only lasted about a week so too soon perhaps for performance issues to emerge.



JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[TheTick]

I hope that HR at least checked this guy's Facebook profile before hiring him.

 

[berkshire]

The tick,
No they did not,However they did check his linked in profile which glowed. Strangely enough, after this all surfaced, his linked in profile was severely edited and a large number of contacts and recommendations were removed.
B.E.

The good engineer does not need to memorize every formula; he just needs to know where he can find them when he needs them. Old professor

 

[beej67]

Theres a whole new industry forming around faking people's resumes, their credentials, and providing false references. They'll even direct phone calls to fake call centers where they'll pretend to be HR reps from fake companies, to fool the real HR reps doing the background check.

It's getting highly complicated. The problem is compounded by the fact that many high level exec positions are basically just about BSing e people around you anyway, so these BSers are actually rather qualified for what the actual job entails.

Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[TheTick]

Did he have previous experience at Vandelay Industries or Dunder-Mifflin?

 

[beej67]

Thinks modern HR people need to be aware of:

http://careerexcuse.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashwood_University

Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[bridgebuster]

careerexcuse - brilliant!

 

[DRWeig]

Two companies ago, we hired a female engineer, resume stated a five-year period as "Senior Design Engineer" with Alderson, Inc. Reference check was glowing with praise and dripping with remorse that they had lost her.

After it became obvious that she had never designed anything before (about one month into her employment), HR got to doing what it should have in the first place. They did a background check. Turns out Alderson, Inc. was really FPC Alderson (FPC = Federal Prison Camp). She had done a five-year sentence for fraud.

They didn't bother trying to track down who was on the other end of the reference phone call.

Amazing gall!

Good on ya,

Goober Dave

Haven't see the forum policies? Do so now: Forum Policies

 

[FreddyNurk]

A company I once worked at hired a structural engineer, who appeared to have a consistent employment rotation every 12 months for at least 5 years.

I don't know what was said during reference checks, but the question was asked of HR and they assured the appropriate parties that this person checked out.

Obviously said engineer had been through all of this sort of thing before, as it wasn't noticed just how much of a turkey this person was until well after the probation period had expired.

Apparently this person was actually somewhat competent at Structural Engineering, but the resume had failed to indicate their other skills, such as using a condescending air when talking to anyone in earshot, and delightfully telling clients that they were wrong and hadn't done things properly.

Part of the issue came to light when a client mentioned that he would want to resort to physical violence if we brought him to another client meeting. (Something like I'd want to smack him in the nose if he turns up again)

We spent the next 12 months attempting to remove said engineer from our employment.

In short, whilst its a good idea to get HR to do the background screening, its also a very good idea to keep an eye on them in the probation period...