Not on my CV, but on the CV of someone I was interviewing
I sometimes get involved in recruitment at my company and on this occasion I was interviewing a guy who had listed "Grappling" (which incidentally when I was at school was a euphemism for wanking) as one of his interests.

So i asked him "You've listed Grappling as one of your interests, can you tell me a bit about what that is?"

He looked me square in the eye and said "I don't talk about Grappling"

Cue uncomfortable silence.....

Not wanting to lose face I carried on "Well, as you've listed it as an interest, has no one ever asked you about it before?"

Again he just stared at me and said "No, never."

I was baffled, but I offered him the job anyway as I didn't like the prick he would be working for.

6 months later he was sacked for attacking said prick (presumably with some sort of Grappling move). I'm sure there's a moral there somewhere - probably don't let me interview for positions in your team.
( chronic And he doesn't know I licked his back!, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 17:38, Reply)

Talented Individuals
Just before leaving part-time job to start a proper grown-up job, we had great fun looking through the raft of application forms that came in, applying for my soon-to-be-vacated position.
The other members of staff informed me that it was always an "utter bunch of tinks" that applied there. Whilst there were a few exaggerations to worry us, it was the remorseless honesty that was perhaps the most alarming. These fuckers should take heed of this board. Examples of responses include:

Full address : "Mum's House, (Something) Road"
Postcode:"Henry"
Reason for Leaving Previous Job: "Saveer Post Natel Depresion"
Reason for Leaving Previous Job: "Caught borrowing money from till" (Obviously the word borrowing had been changed from stealing, cos that sounds much better...)
Previous Employment: "Making tea for my Gran"

and my own personal favourite

Previous Job Responsibilities: "Putting Rolls on shelf"

Total number of applications recieved: 27
Total number of interviewees: 4

They were all dead serious applicants, most of whom had applied when I got hired. Looks like I beat off stiff competition.
(Last Night a DJ Shaved My Wife, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 14:29, Reply)

I've never lied on my cv
I've just missed out the early chunks of my work history where I bottled milk, killed chickens, sold drugs and dj'd at illegal parties.

The year that this took place has turned into 'travelling europe' after failing my degree.
( The Beast can't help looking at womens breasts on the tube, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 14:20, Reply)

Good luck legless
Perhaps you could put on the CV "Well networked member of the IT community", i.e. "Everyone on B3ta keeps a sharp look out for my anecdotes regarding my *ahem* colourful past".
( Colonel Dracula Two manky hookers and a racist dwarf, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 12:07, Reply)

Apt...

As I was fired yesterday for writing on my Blog that a server engineer was a fuckwit, this question is quite apt.

Have to dust off the old CV and start looking for another contract. I've never lied on my CV before but, as I don't want to put down that I was fired for saying that someone is an incompetent fuckwit, looks like I'll have to bend the truth a little this time.

And as the guy in question reads B3ta, he'll be proud to know that all of B3ta knows he's an incompetent fuckwit.

Cheers
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 11:41, Reply)

semantics are your friend
I am a freelancer, so certain amount of my CV always involves some liberty with the truth. I've become so good at changing certain words to completely shift the focus (according to the contract I'm after) that my recruitment agencies have even taken to using my squillions of alternative CVs as examples for other new recruits to 'look and learn how to bullsh*t'.

Mind you, I probably shouldn't lie about still being 'highly proficient' in pretty much every design package when I left my graphics career 5 years ago. Oopsy.
(niceandwarmandhot vive la résistance, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 8:54, Reply)

Okay, I'm Late With The Rock n Roll Story
Click "I Like This " anyway because it's a cool story.
So anyway, there I was, walking through Manhattan's Greenwich Village. It was Halloween night, 1992. I had just marched in the NYC Halloween Parade and was on my way to meet several friends for a showing of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. I was in costume - as Slash, from Guns n' Roses. I had the wig, the hat, even the cigarette (I don't smoke them. It was just there for effect). I was also tripping on seven - that's right, SEVEN - hits of acid. It's the most I'd ever done, or ever have since.
I wasn't very coherent, but I knew my way around the Village, and made it to the theater fine. On the way, though, this guy stopped me, complimented me on my costume, and asked me did I know who he was.
Well I sure as hell did - it was Lars Ulrich! Bear in mind, of course, that in '92, Metallica didn't suck like they do now.
Well my eyes widened. The guy realized that a mob scene would ensue if I yelled out his name, so he assured me that he was actually Lars' identical cousin. And you know what? On seven hits of LSD, I was just impressionable to believe that. So I nodded, accepted his compliment on my Halloween costume, and went on to the movie, where I met my friends and was offered a few phone numbers of metal head chicks.
The only thing is that to this day, I don't know whether that was Lars, or a drug induced hallucination.
(evilsausage, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 5:40, Reply)

Went for a job
With the Rural Payments Agency in Newcastle, told them I wasn't into nudity and drinking vomit from cups. Those mad-crazy fools believed every last word.
(Chickenwire social lubricator extraordinaire, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 5:11, Reply)

I claimed

to be totally qualified in sodomy.

In fact I'd failed sodomy in high school, and had to learn on the job.

But I got it in the end.
(apeloverage committed the vile act of onanism on, Wed 12 Jul 2006, 2:11, Reply)

Back in the unemployment days...
...I was sent on something called 'Gateway to Work' by the Job Centre. Basically, it consisted of two weeks sitting doing nothing, while local charvers figured out how to use their 'magical writing sticks'.

Anyway, one of the requirements of the 'course' was that we had to send out a certain amount of spec letters and CVs to companies in the yellow pages...
Due to the mind numbing boredom I never wish to repeat...I included on all of my CVs that I possesed super powers.

...Never heard from any of the companies.
(NoStrings Tastes like zombies!!, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 20:41, Reply)

It's not a lie if you lie for somebody else. It's compassion.
To this day, my friend's employers think she's capable of writing fluently- utilising punctuation in a manner fitting to her education and spelling English words with a grasp that shows a thorough knowledge of English, the language she's been speaking for 23 years.

What they don't know is that (inevitably the night before) CaptMuggins is sat not only retyping the bastard thing, but also explaining why she's just had to.
( Captain Wow currently being a cunt in Infamous, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 17:08, Reply)

too true to be good
I'm a copywriter, so pretty much everything I write is a professional lie. My CV says that I have four A grades at A' level, a first class BA and a distinction in my MA. People either assume I'm lying and disregard my application, or assume that I'm a wanker and disregard my application. The qualifications are true, so I usually drop the MA, give myself a 2:1 and add a few Bs or Cs to the A' levels. Then I get interviews. Ironically, I failed all my GCSEs, which makes what followed even more unlikely.
(frankspencer, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 16:07, Reply)

Not my cv but a candidate's...
Several years ago I had a programmer working for me at the Stock Exchange. He was a surly, baldy, syrup-wearing git. He left under very petulant, stampy-footy circumstances, but before he left, he buried unprintable characters in the code and prepared a timebomb in the system to kick in just before Christmas.
These were all found before his seat was cold because we had been monitoring his activity for two weeks before his departure.

Move forward a couple of years. I am working for a financial services company in Surrey. One of my colleagues is about to do an interview of this self-same individual.

Tipped off about past events, the guy asks lots of question about the Stock and finishes with "Why haven't you disclosed the events surrounding the sabotage of the systems at the Stock Exchange?"
Queue my entry with two security guards who politely escort him out of the building.

The moral of the story is "Don't fuck up your cv and don't fuck with me"
(bof, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 16:03, Reply)

lies on my CV
Not so much lies, more just complete exageration.

As a construction manager and applying for a better position with a new company, i decided that my mundane achievements with my current employer simply didnt cut it.

So having suitably bulled up both the number of projects and the profitability etc. i then decided that it was time to really shine. So i explained how i redrafted several company policies and procedures and single handedly turned the companies fortunes around in several key areas.

Then came the the most important aspect - existing salary, no point in actually telling them what i was really on, needed to exagerate my salary and bonus to make any offer of employment really worth it, about an extra £5k salary and an extra £5k bonus should do the job i think.

Well it all seemed to work, as the offer arrived, with a more than suitable remuneration package.

The fact i was so out of my depth didnt bother me as six months in there, out and back to what i could actually manage was more than enough extra bunce for a cracking holiday and 6 months of complete alcoholism and piss taking generally!!!
(toptoonfan, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 15:56, Reply)

I lied on my personal statement to university
listing amongst my interests;
sailing (for some outdoor glamour), gothic architecture (for some culture) and that I had won a design award for a fictional website.

managed to blag it.
( WormuIus, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 15:17, Reply)

Lies- but not my own
I have been looking for a year in industry placement since january, but havent managed to find anything my uni was 'happy' with until now. (for some reason they *insist* on a 'significant amount of software engineering' :s ) Anyway, I was looking for jobs through a placement scheme, and recently went for an interview at a very well known company at canary wharf.
Interview was going well, everything running smoothly, then one of the three interviewers says 'I can understand Computing, Maths and Electronics A-levels, but an HND in Fashion??' I then looked very puzzled, as I am a computer bod at heart, and have a reasonable grasp of fashion in its loosest sense, even though I am of the female persuasion, but I am not passionate enough to studay it in any shape/form.
It was dismissed as some sort of error by the placement scheme, and everything went well from there, with the exception of the manager who had pointed it out making several jokes that I had to laugh at about other 'hilarious' qualifications I posessed.
I found out later that the company pulls out all details from a DB for each person, and for some reason it had decided to add on some extra qualifications to mine. So the computer lied, not me.
Plus I have got the Job!!
(PixelGirl unlock the mind...unmind the lock, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 15:06, Reply)

Not really a lie, but damn unfortunate...
When I was 16 I was desperate to get out of the shitty job I had as a table scrubber in a local resturant, so I looked around and applied for other jobs. A Trespass shop in town were looking for weekend staff, so I walked in and they told me to just hand in a CV. Needless to say, as soon as I got home, I began working on it.

Being 16, I didn't really know much about writing CVs, so I told my parents what I wanted on it, and got them to write it for me. A few hours later, I went downstairs and went to see what my parents came up with. They had written the worst CV imaginable, as a joke, with things such as "The shop is opposite Blockbuster so it will be easy to spend my wages" and "I think till work will be a peice of piss" on it, my current job listed as "Table scrubbing bitch who sometimes makes sandwhiches in kitchen"....and my hobbies as "Lazing about and wanking". After I read it, they showed me the REAL copy, which was perfect. Next day, I shoved it into an envlope and handed it into the shop.

When I got home I discovered the real, proper CV lying on my desk.

I think you can work out for yourself what happenend. I never heard back.
(LiquidRogue Powerful tiny fists..., Tue 11 Jul 2006, 14:43, Reply)

What the frack are proes?
My friends C.V I borrowed as a template for mine said that he enjoyes poetry and proes, so I copied this onto mine. However in an interview the employer asked me what poetry I enjoyed (managed to bluff my way round that) and then asked me about proes at which point I had to ask him what proes where. Sounds like ponce language to me!
(grizzlefizzle, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 14:21, Reply)

Once upon a time...
I was driving my old but functioning Citroen down to Cornwall when I stopped to pick up a hitchhiker. they turned out to be a little nuts and when I got out to help them with their bag, they pinned me against the bonnet.

Thinking quickly, I told my would-be assailant that I was carrying a large knife, and knew how to do some serious damage with it. This seemed to work, and off they went lest I cause them more harm than it was worth.

And that was a lie I told while on my 2CV....
( Sonic James Doom forgetting the date since... umm..., Tue 11 Jul 2006, 14:03, Reply)

Dole SCUM
While sifting through applications for a bog-standard data entry position, I arrived at the pile of blatant dole CV's that had been sent to every other job in the entire town.

The best one was from a girl who's only other experience was 'On the counter on Boots at christmas but I got asked to leave' and her personal statement was that 'I have been on the sick for the last six months but its a bit boring now.'
(lolaphallus, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 13:50, Reply)

I work part time in a restaurant...
...for a bit of extra cash. Being independent they have a rather unorthodox application form with such questions as "If you were a drink what would you be?" and "What film character would you be and why?" One such application was passed around showing interests as "running, jumping and climbing trees." The same person wanted to be the wicked witch of the west because "I'd have my own band of flying monkeys". Successful applicants are then interviewed. The only question of any importance is "Frank Sinatra or Dean Martin?" Anyone not answering with ol' blue eyes is out on their ear.
(serve chilled, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 12:34, Reply)

A job application form....
I had applied for a job doing catering work at a very posh 5-star hotel. Filled out the form, then handed it in the next day. A week later went down for a chat about the job with the catering manager. She went through my application, over my qualifications etc, then stopped and looked at me and said, 'I wasn't sure about this part though, what's going on here?'
On the form was the question, 'How many children do you have?' To which I had answered '0'. However, I had been stupid enough to leave the form lying carelessly unattended on my desk and one of my housemates had taken the opportunity to put a '1' in front of the 0.
I had to explain that I didn't really have 10 children and I wasn't sure what had happened there at all and I'm very sorry..

I got the job but it was rubbish and I jacked it in after one night and returned to my normal gutter rat student lifestyle.
An unintentional lie I suppose..
(gunken 100% better than tungsten, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 12:18, Reply)

More weaknesses
I was interviewing a bloke once and asked him what his weaknesses were.
"Pork Products", he replied, "and women with big arses"
(LunarJim, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 12:14, Reply)

danny_rosh
yes my mate did,
while at a mock job interview at some shitty "lifeskills" thing at school (basically a bunch of people turn up and you get a day off work to be told how to talk about yourself) he had an interview infront of the whole year and teachers etc.

interviewer: do you have any weaknesses?
Jamie: only kryptonite *dead pan*
Interviewer *slightly shook*: any other weaknesses?
Jamie: Just Kryptonite.

genius

and as for lying on my cv, i dont need to 'cause i'm fucking amazing as it is


"massive penis"

vote for this if only for the fact is has massive penis in it
(classic-spastic, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 11:17, Reply)

Just the man for the job!
Many years ago, I had left my previous job with a sweetheart severance package that included eight months full salary, or half-salary if I should happen to find employment during that time.

(It was so generous because it included a condition that I not take them to the labour board for a blatant violation after they had the union certification that I'd organized overturned through some illegal jiggery-pokery.)

Although I felt obliged to take full advantage of a 2/3 year paid holiday, I was required to demonstrate that I was indeed looking for work. This meant sending out a lot of resumes that had "Please don't hire me, as I am mentally unbalanced!" written fairly large between the lines. I had a lot of fun being creative with them.

I accidentally got called in for an interview though once. "How did it happen? What can they be thinking?" I asked myself. I decided to have fun with the interview portion of the charade as well. I prepared myself with a small amount of a central nervous system stimulant several orders of magnitude more efficacious than caffeine in order to better put off the desired vibe of "skeevy undesirable."

When the interview began, the H.R. drone skipped by everything in my work experience, commented not at all on the numerous deliberate mispellings designed to make me appear as incompetent as humanly possible, or any of the other inappropriate elements that I'd included in the body of the resume. Instead, she skipped to the end. "Under 'Hobbies and Interests,'" she observed, "You have written 'I enjoy repetitive tasks.' What do you mean by that?"

Oh, crap. It was only meant to suggest an IQ in the mid-twenties -- she was reading it as an asset. I bluffed my way through it, saying that doing the same thing over and over put me in a trance-like state that I enjoyed a great deal. "Almost as good as sleeping, which I like better than anything."

On the strength of this, she was prepared to hire me on the spot -- no amount of twitching and fidgeting would dissuade her. I eventually had to call back and explain that I'd accepted a position elsewhere to get my head out of the noose.

I have a feeling that job would not have been the most challenging or stimulating employment one might find.
(Larry_Mudd, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 8:05, Reply)

Temp agency 'reformatted' my CV for me
I applied for temp work through an agency after i graduated. I had to go for an interview for some boring admin role.

The interview was going as well as expected, when towards the end, the guy started asking me questions about my time as a travelling minstrel.

My brain went into it's reflex mode of 'I must have told a lie.... tell more to cover it up', but even with my L337 sK1lls at bullshitting, I was truly stumped at that one.

After a lot of confused glances bounced round the room, we managed to figure out that the 'tards at my temp agency had decided to reformat my CV before sending it, and had somehow removed the full stop and line break between two of the entries in my 'interests' section:

Spent 6 months travelling round the Middle East and the Far East.

Playing the guitar.

We all had a good laugh about it, and I even got offered the job, but turned it down because it was rubbish.
( HoratioFellatio Taking the the out of psychotherapist, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 4:45, Reply)

I have a good lie or several..........
In approximately 2 weeks, I will receive my paperwork that allows me to work legally here in the US......however, I've been here 7 years and have not been out of work yet - nor had to scrub toilets or pick strawberries.
See, although I failed all but one of my GCSE's (English - got a C), I just write on my resume that I had a standard UK education. To most employers, that means that I went to Oxford or Cambridge.....I barely scraped through my GCSE exams, FFS!
I also am in my 3rd job in 7 years - they just found out I'm not quite legal and they bent over backwards to keep me instead of firing me and reporting me as they should have done.
I can't wait till I get my paperwork through, then I'll be able to make even more money! g o d d ess bless the USA!

Edit: Well fuck me with a bargepole, I just got a vital piece of paperwork in the mail!
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Tue 11 Jul 2006, 4:20, Reply)

I was the "Young Captain Birdseye 2000-2001"
just for the hell of it in an application for a job I did not want all that much.
( gaijintendo Regular Member, Mon 10 Jul 2006, 23:36, Reply)

Not mine, but a cousin...
asked to use my computer to write his CV on. Sice he left school before actually getting any qualifcations I was a little curious as to what he had actually put down. He gave himself a nice long list of high GCSE grades, including an A in English language, and also helpfully added that he was taking a "night coarse".

On another note, does anyone else ever think of listing Kryptonite as one of their weaknesses?
(Danny_Rosh, Mon 10 Jul 2006, 23:29, Reply)