Paul from Paris

As a candidate, I interview poorly. This I’ll freely concede. But after having conducted many interviews, in academia and in business, I’ve developed a sense of what makes a good impression, and what doesn’t. Here are nine points that I would like candidates to keep in mind:

1. Present yourself in the best possible light with information and data: explain, don’t assert.
2. Lead with your strengths, not your weaknesses. Lead with recent accomplishments, not history from long ago.
3. An interviewer is more interested in what you have done than where you have worked or gone to school. These facts can make a good impression on your CV, not in an interview. Apart from your excellent school and excellent employer, what excellent things have you done?
4. Being in the top of your class is a reason not to reject you (to say no); it’s not really a reason to admit you or to offer you a job (to say yes).
5. Be generous with information on study abroad. I want to know: where? for how long? as an auditor or observer? in a program for foreigners? in a degree program? There is not a right answer, but an interview gives you an opportunity to provide much more detailed information than your CV.
6. If a job was routine, describe how it mattered to you. What did you learn?
7. If you say, “I want to do X”, don’t follow up with, “but I’d accept to do Y”. This undercuts your motivation for X. You can either focus on one thing, or try out several things. Avoid sending mixed signals.
8. “I don’t know” is an acceptable answer.
9. Why mention interests on a CV or in an interview? The rationale seems to be a bias in favored of well-rounded people. Being truly well-rounded means that you are good at a few things. Maybe you aren’t; it should be OK to say, “I like math, and I’m really good at it” (as demonstrated by papers and prizes and accomplishments) without also having to justify athletic prowess or humanitarian zeal. If you list interests on your CV, they should be current (a swimming medal won at age 10 probably should not influence a hiring decision) and demonstrate personal investment and implication.

Après avoir participé pendant des années aux jurys d’admission et de recrutement, voici quatre conseils à l’attention de mes étudiants :

1. Ne pas devenir un candidat professionnel ; le CV est un moyen, pas une fin. Tout CV peut être analysé, décortiqué, critiqué, perfectionné. Son objet est de présenter le candidat de manière succincte et de donner envie à son lecteur de l’interviewer (voire de lui faire une proposition). Le CV est un outil de sélection, de qualification. Chercher la perfection à travers un CV est un leurre et une perte de temps.
2. Au lieu de présenter beaucoup d’informations, privilégier plutôt la bonne présentation de quelques informations. L’entrepreneur Guy Kawasaki préconise une règle 1/2/3 : une page, deux points clés (dont le lecteur devrait se souvenir pour se rappeler de vous), trois parties. Trop d’information tue l’information.
3. L’ordre chronologique inverse. Ce que vous faîtes maintenant est autrement plus déterminant que votre situation d’il y a cinq ans.
4. Ne fabulez pas, n’inventez pas. Vous vous sentez obligé d’inventer ou d’exagérer afin de vous aligner sur d’hypothétiques attentes ? Vous ne vous sentez pas à la hauteur du recruteur tel que vous êtes ? Pourquoi ? Si vous méritez d’être sélectionné (c’est-à-dire, invité pour passer un entretien), pourquoi mettre en péril votre crédibilité ? Si vous pensez ne pas être à la hauteur, pourquoi postuler ? En cas d’une sélection chanceuse, qu’est-ce qui vous permet d’espérer une réussite future ? Si vous estimez souffrir de lacunes, comment pensez-vous les combler ? Comment une lettre d’admission ou un offre d’emploi peut-elle vous apporter des qualités que vous estimez manquer ?

I posted last month on resume fraud, particularly whether French and Americans react differently when faced with a CV that is not entirely truthful.

Yesterday’s news brought me the remarkable story of Adam Wheeler, a student at Harvard College. Wheeler is accused today of gaining entry to Harvard by falsely claiming a superb record at the Phillips Academy prep school and study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. These and other alleged falsifications came to light when Wheeler sought Harvard’s support when applying for prestigious post-graduate Rhodes and Fulbright scholarships.

Here is the first remarkable point of the Wheeler report: Wheeler has been studying at Harvard since 2007, until at least 2009. His conduct as a student does not seem to have drawn much attention at the élite college, although there may have been charges of academic dishonesty. Wheeler apparently wanted to go on to law school, because he was active in the Harvard College Law Society.

Harvard today is very, very angry with Wheeler, against whom many criminal complaints have been made (to which Wheeler has answered: not guilty). I have to wonder: is Harvard angry because its admissions process apparently does not select for an ability to perform at Harvard? This is fine. Maybe Harvard selects for students it thinks can best perform (or develop) at Harvard. Maybe Harvard selects for what it thinks will be the best possible class.

Harvard wasn’t the only party that Wheeler allegedly crashed. Wheeler applied for (but was not offered) an internship at The New Republic, which  posted the résumé Wheeler submitted for that position.

Here is the second remarkable point of the Wheeler report: Wheeler’s apparent falsifications are so brazen that his résumé challenges belief. Wheeler’s résumé is so over-the-top that I doubt any reader would believe it, or seriously consider Wheeler.

What was this young man thinking when he claimed:

• language proficiency in: French, Old English, Old Persian, and Classical Armenian;
• sole authorship of two academic books;
• co-authorship of four additional academic books?

Has any undergraduate –even at Harvard– ever shown competency in these four languages? How many Harvard undergraduates have written academic books? Of those, how many have written more than one?

The stated grades (perfect), academic honors, and distinguished service could be true, but the compilation of them all strains credibility. For me, the clincher is Wheeler’s claim to have “formed a faculty committee to solicit input from Harvard faculty and students, as well as from external experts, on how best to integrate graduate training in arts-practice into the existing curricular structure of the university”. No matter how stellar the student, why would the university have entrusted an undergraduate student with such a task? It makes no sense, other than as a smoke-and-mirrors stunt.

Would you interview Wheeler for a job? Would you offer him one?

This story discusses an unfortunate case involving a Harvard student, books (non-academic books for young people), and dishonesty. There’s an interesting postscript here: the protagonist is alive and well and thriving, in law school. Dishonesty does not always lead to dishonor.

Do you remember Marilee Jones? She used to be dean of admissions at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Hers was a long and noteworthy career. Jones started as an admissions officer and ended up in charge of admissions at an elite, selective school. MIT honored Jones with several, prestigious awards. Jones wrote a book on the admissions process for students and their families that won praise from reviewers. By all accounts, Jones was particularly good at her job.

In 2007, Jones left MIT after it became widely known that she had lied on her resume, adding academic degrees that she had not, in fact, received.

In France, where I live, the potential consequences of falsifying a resume are not always clear. If a candidate invents professional qualifications –as a doctor, a lawyer, a surveyor– his employment can be terminated. If a candidate invents past performance –employment at a specific firm, or achievement of specific results– her employment can be terminated, if the the misrepresentation concerns an essential point, without which the employer would not have offered the position to the candidate, and if the falsification is discovered fairly soon. By contrast, a candidate who lands a job with a falsified resume, and who performs well in the position, probably cannot be fired for the falsehood.

Marilee Jones’s case was not contested before courts in the United States –maybe legal defenses were open to her– and of course it did not reach a French court. So I will not go so far as to pronounce a legal difference in employment rules in France and the United States. But I am struck by a difference in expected response to resume fraud.

American commentators on the Jones affair accepted the justice of Jones’s departure. Hers was an original sin, repeated in each iteration of her resume. She deliberately made a false statement in order to obtain employment. She lied. This suggests dishonesty, unreliability, a penchant towards fabulation.

But does it, really?

I’m not sure. By all accounts I’ve seen, Jones was not only competent, but a star performer in her chosen field. Does schooling done (more than) 25 years earlier have any bearing on what she had accomplished and was doing in 2007? I think not.

By contrast, French commentators on hiring practices seem to be moral relativists. Employers and candidates all accept that the resume should be truthful. But all seem to expect –or accept– embellishment. Many employers are complicit in “made up” (the French term, maquillé, refers to make-up that women wear, not the act of invention) resume entries because they do not verify new hires’ resumes.

Do the French tolerate what are just white lies?

I’m not sure. Shouldn’t a candidate be hired for what she can do, instead of where she has already been? Are degrees awarded really so important? Are honors and distinctions received in the past really good predictors of future performance? Is exaggeration or self-flattery to gain an edge over other candidates in a hypothetical pile of resumes truly unrelated to character?