There is really only one main reason not to lie on your resume, in an interview, and of course in life. It is not because of the obvious consideration, which is that the lie will be exposed eventually. That thought should be enough to scare you straight as you play out the game ‘what’s the worst that could happen?’, but for many people it is not. The rationale is that it falls more into the ‘embellishment’ category that you could explain away if challenged, or worse, you believe there is no way they would ever find out unless they did were conducting an FBI-Level background check, which most companies do not do. Still, even without such through background checking, you need to consider how you will answer to the items you have shared in person or via your resume to ensure you can speak to them factually, eloquently and without having to think too much about the fabricated or exaggerated pieces of your story. As they say, if you are honest you don’t need a great memory.
The greater consideration to focus on is what if it is not exposed, and no one ever challenges you on it? Think it through and project what your life and career is like as time goes by and your lie is accepted and unchallenged, and you are thriving in the role you secured partly due to your lie.
Anxiety
You will be looking over your shoulder forever, wondering if at some point your boss, perhaps someone from HR inquires about this item you offered as truth that is suddenly in question. Even if accepted forever, when is the time that you will not have a level of anxiety about that very thing happening?
Unending
If you lied to get in the door, it will come up again. It could be very innocently that someone pulls you into a project based on the fabricated expertise or experience, or someone in an open meeting asks you to talk about that great success you had previously that relates to something currently being worked on.
Introductions
can lead to exposure: You got the job, the promotion, the contract, whatever it is you sought that prompted you to go that extra mile from the truth to get it, you can expect that you will eventually run into someone that will dig in further on it. When introduced to new people, the mutual colleague will often share common ground between you that they know of but you do not. ‘Oh, John got his MBA from the that school also,’ ‘Anna ran her own business in that space a few years ago,’ ‘Kyle used to do a lot of business with a company you worked with,’ and more. The questions or potential common ground areas that could come out and pull you back into the lie are limitless and unpredictable. So, as good as you think you are maintaining the lie, you had better be ready to go, because you never know when, where, or from whom the questions will come.
Advancement
Okay, you put the lie out there originally to achieve an objective. That may have been a long time ago. Now, you have had success, proven yourself. You knew you were the right person for the job and justified the actions you took to get in the door as a means to an end that no one would ever care about once they saw what an asset you are. You have justified and rationalized for a long time now, certainly since you took the job. Sometime later things are going swimmingly, and you are valued for the great work you do, and now have upper-level management encouraging you, even tapping you, to go for next level opportunities. You will need to apply of course and make a choice of whether to perpetuate the lie or attempt to omit it this time around, thinking you can distance yourself from it and start anew by giving a current resume that is 100% honest. It could work, but the risk is that those who’ve pushed you to go for the promotion either know or have heard through the grapevine of the accomplishment or achievement that only you know is not true, but that’s what they want to talk you about, or are looking for you to leverage in the new role. You may be inclined to stay put in the role you started in for fear that you will be exposed and have your reputation ruined. Or by perpetuating the lie, you again start the clock of when you pretended be something you are not and will relive the pain of carrying that with you for as long as you are there.
The Man in the Mirror
All of the reasons above are real and how most people process the actions they have done and decisions they have made. This is not for those devoid of conscious or worry. They can and usually do lie, cheat, and steal to accomplish whatever goal they have, and do so unburdened by further thought or worry about it. This is for the other ninety-nine and half percent who are human, have a conscience, and feel guilt and pain when they have done the wrong thing.
I’ll share a quick synopsis of one of my favorite movies that delves into this concept really well, called ‘The Words’ with Bradley Cooper and Dennis Quade who play younger and older versions of the same character. The character is a writer who, as a young unknown, can’t seem to get his work published or even considered. While on vacation in Europe, he and his wife stop in an antique store, where he falls in love with a beat-up old leather attaché case and buys it. Back home he is going to put his new case to use when he realizes there is something in it and it is a manuscript, clearly decades old, hidden in the lining. He reads it and is simply blown away at what he reads. It is brilliant, and must be the work of an Emily Dickinson, Hemingway, etc. It has no name to identify the author, but he is certain it is the work of a literary giant. He does his best to search and find whose work this is, but after months, he finds nothing to match it to from the writing style to the actual words used, and he believes that this work is in fact unknown and likely a single, original work unattributed. While he continues to struggle as an unknown, and thus unsuccessful writer, he can’t take his mind off the found manuscript, and simply wants to feel what it would be like to write such a work.
He transcribes the work on his typewriter and reads it, imagining it is his own, and is euphoric. For that moment he is Hemingway. He puts it aside, just wanting to feel what the originator may have felt and doesn’t think about it again for a while. One day his wife finds it and reads it, and as he starts to tell her what it actually is, she stops him. She weeps as she tells him she didn’t know he had this level of talent. It is the best thing he has ever written, and that he should absolutely keep pursuing his writing based on this masterwork. She looks at him in a way she never has before, and in that moment he has to decide whether to tell her truth and watch that look of crushing disappointment take over her face as she returns to the likely belief that he is just another writer. He decides to let her believe it is his own. She insists he bring it to the publishing house he currently works at as a low-level employee, and he does. Like many editors do, he ignores it for about a year until one day he calls the mailroom/writer in.
The editor sits for a moment in stunned silence and opens with an apology for having sat on this work of literary genius for so long. He tells him they are fast-tracking his work to be published immediately, intending to build a marketing campaign around it, and he will soon be the biggest author in the world. He again considers whether to tell the truth, but instead goes with the plan and becomes famous, immediately considered among the greatest writers of his generation. With such notoriety he is then able to publish several of his completed works that previously went unnoticed. All great things come to him as a result of perpetuating the lie, even though the success he has had since is based on his own original work. The question though is whether it would be successful on its own, or has it happened only as a result of the stolen work and the ongoing lie. He actually goes to his editor of the publishing house some time later amid his running success and comes clean. He does the same with his wife. That look he feared from his wife happened as he suspected. Heartbroken and deceived, she eventually leaves. The publishing house convinces him to keep his lie to himself and keep the sales train running, and he does.
In the end, decades later, having enjoyed success that only the most well-known writers in history ever come close to, he seemingly has it all. But he is forever tortured by the thought that he was perhaps never that good, and everything he has accomplished was solely the result of having stolen the work of the original writer. Already a writer himself at that point, he made the regrettable decision to take the shortcut, the imposter’s path, to success. He unwittingly robbed himself of ever knowing whether he actually was any good, or of ever feeling the honor and pride of having achieved something that is true and his own.
For those of you considering what you need to do to get the job, the promotion, whatever your career goal may be, be sure to consider not only being caught, but never being caught. Can you live believing that everything you accomplish thereafter may only be because of what began with a lie? For that half-percent, you’ll do just fine. For everyone else, you know what to do.
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