The Secret to Gaining an Unfair Advantage in Your Job Application

The Secret to Gaining an Unfair Advantage in Your Job Application

Liars, cheats and narcissistic egomaniacs are just some of the personalities that you may be competing against when you apply for your next job. Think I'm exaggerating? Maybe I am, but I wonder what your reaction might be if you received divine knowledge for just a short period allowing you to see the truth about your fellow job candidates and how their real life skills compare to the cover letters and resumes that they produce.

And I ask you, if the world of job applications is fair then why do employers go to great lengths to verify the detail in the job application? Why do interviews exist? Why bother with interview questions? What is the purpose of referee checks? The short answer is "to weed out the liars, cheats and narcissistic egomaniacs" of course.

So, we've established the disadvantages of a job candidate the other candidates. But what's the secret of an unfair advantage? As the legendary interview response goes, "my greatest strength is my weakness. I am honest and sometimes even humble".

So why is that strength a weakness? Well if you don't lie you may find it harder to compete against unethical candidates. But on the other hand, your honesty stands out like a beacon amongst a sea of hogwash. I distinctly remember one particular job years ago where my boss said to me several months after starting, "Yes, I remember what I liked about your resume. You could tell it was honest". I never did ask for more detail than that but that's real life evidence of my claim.

It's hard to say exactly when, but at some stage in history job applicants decided that employers are actually looking for superman. They began listing every skill under the sun and rating their own abilities as expert level'. What they don't realize is that their application is most likely being assessed by an expert. You see, employers often develop expertise in their fields after years and years of commercial competition. And therein lies the irony, in trying to deceive a real expert, dishonest job candidates are losing credibility and along with that their opportunity.

So how does your resume stack up in the honesty test? Read through it and ask yourself how it would come across to a complete stranger. Are you the best' at something? Really? Do you have exceptional skills in", do you? Try to rephrase those lines using real life examples of your experience. Below, you will see how adding a little detail gives you heaps more credibility.

The Before' statement: "I have outstanding computer skills using Microsoft Office."

The honest statement: "I am proficient in Microsoft Word 2007 and Excel 2007 primarily due to extensive use of both products in my previous position. In fact, I developed several excel formulas that produced mail merge data which we merged into brochures that I produced in Word. This process alone allowed the company to increase their marketing by 250% without additional cost because it was so much faster than the previous manual method."

As you can see, the honest statement stands out. Comparing the two statement above, which candidate would you select?

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