We are almost ready for the vote on your favorite Fake CV, but I just wanted to check and see if any major CV-issues have remained unexplored. There are submissions that I have not posted (apologies for that) but some would be repetitive with ones I posted already, and others didn't seem to be related to STEM-field CVs, the topic of this "contest".
Sorry for the anxieties these fake CVs may have caused anyone, but perhaps it is better to see some potential CV pitfalls in this way? In some cases, CV fails are because the applicant's record just isn't that great and the applicant tries, via creative CV formatting and organization, to hide some of the shortfalls. In other cases, however, what may well be a highly-qualified applicant undermines their application by the way they construct their CV. Example: when someone with a decent number of interesting publications in respectable journals hides these among non-equivalent types of "publications" just to make the publication list appear longer (see Fake CV#7). The hiring committee (or whatever) is unlikely to be fooled by this.
Perhaps we will vote tomorrow. In the meantime, please comment on any unexplored CV-fail issues or submit a last minute Fake CV to exemplify a useful and/or entertaining issue.
Sorry for the anxieties these fake CVs may have caused anyone, but perhaps it is better to see some potential CV pitfalls in this way? In some cases, CV fails are because the applicant's record just isn't that great and the applicant tries, via creative CV formatting and organization, to hide some of the shortfalls. In other cases, however, what may well be a highly-qualified applicant undermines their application by the way they construct their CV. Example: when someone with a decent number of interesting publications in respectable journals hides these among non-equivalent types of "publications" just to make the publication list appear longer (see Fake CV#7). The hiring committee (or whatever) is unlikely to be fooled by this.
Perhaps we will vote tomorrow. In the meantime, please comment on any unexplored CV-fail issues or submit a last minute Fake CV to exemplify a useful and/or entertaining issue.
9 comments:
I have seen CVs where people list in great detail their amateur athletic accomplishments. This just makes you look like a preening assebagge.
My favorite CV "fail" moment was when someone competing for a technician's position listed "Deputy Magistrate of the Society for Creative Anachronism" under "Leadership Positions."
I have to admit some inadvertent hilarity ensued at this poor lad's expense when those of us who knew of the "Society for Creative Anachronism" explained it to the others who didn't.
And I'd hate to say it, but it may have influenced our decision not to take him, because we rejected him based on his poor social skills. We did interview him, but at decision time recalled him as somewhat bombastic and abrasive. We felt he wouldn't make a good team player. Who knows if a little innocent CV padding doomed him in the end.
Damn, all this talk makes me glad I'm not involved with all this nonsense at the moment. Too bad I'll have to be going back to it just to put bread on the table. The question you should really be asking, is not, "are you experienced?", but "are you competent?" I have met plenty of seemingly highly qualified people who basicly didn't know what the fuck they were doing... Plus a lot of publications in so-called "top-tier" journals are rubbish (the peer-review process is a joke...) But I could go on and on...
but at decision time recalled him as somewhat bombastic and abrasive.
This describes 99% of the SCA members I know.
p.s. I'm not a member but it seems to be common around my field to belong to SCA.
And the team player nonsense. There is a lot of research that suggests that people do not work better in groups and that brainstorming is not creative, at least if done as a "team." It used to be you didn't have to be a "team player" to get by in science, but for some reason academia has started aping the corporate world. I think a lot of people--especially those that are any good--go into science because they don't like to work in groups. Now not only do you have to be a "team player" to work in science, you also have to be popular: publication metrics are just like the popularity ratings you might see in a dating or "social networking" website...
If I was a team player, if I was any good at PR or marketing, I wouldn't be in science. I would be in sales or advertising...
There is a lot of research that suggests that people do not work better in groups
"working in teams/groups" is such a vague term that is hard to define. Are you arguing that building a skyscrapper has been proven to be done better individually than as a team? or building a car? I sure hope not.
On the other hand decisions are better made if discussed as a team but the final word belongs to a single person who can take the decision offline, which is pretty much the opposite of how most decisions are taken nowadays.
In terms of science it is an unequivocal truth that scientists are more productive if they avail themselves to the right expertise when needed.
In this world of email you don't have to be a people person to do this, so really you need to gather the courage and fire the email to the potential collaborator when needed.
The single most important facet of doing science is creativity and creativity always suffers once you get stuck in a group...
The single most important facet of doing science is creativity and creativity always suffers once you get stuck in a group...
I don't think this is universally true. When I brainstorm with trusted collaborators or my students, ideas actually get better as they are aired out and inconsistencies or lack of clarity pointed out. It doesn't work with everyone, though, but talking and working with like-minded scientists is very stimulating.
The single most important facet of doing science is creativity and creativity always suffers once you get stuck in a group...
I'm sorry but this is unadulterated bull.
Of course if you pair two random people they are not necessarily more creative than one alone. But that is the beauty of scientific collaboration: you get to choose your colleague specifically for compatibility as well as strength in areas that are complimentary to yours.
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