India, one of the largest pools of IT professionals in the world is seeing an increased need for background checks. One of the reasons we launched employeescreen University was to educate employers across the globe on the virtues of doing proper employee background investigations. One bad hire can cost your company millions in lost revenue and a lot of embarrassment. Global background checks or “international background screening” is a growing trend. (Read employeescreenIQ 2009 Trends).
This story is a perfect example of why organizations need to tighten up their hiring practices.
IT Firms Have No Place for a Fake Resume
The IT-BPO industry is becoming increasingly clear that a fake resume can cost you your job with India’s largest IT serivces provider, Tata Consultancy Service (TCS), being the latest to recently ask close to 20 employees at its Kolkata centre to leave. The company, during the background verification, found that these employees have used fudged resumes to get jobs.
In the recent past all the major IT firms including Infosys, Satyam and Wipro Technologies and many mid-cap firms have taken a hard stand on fake or fudged resumes. However, the incidents continue. First Advantage, a leading background screening firm, in its recent report states that 30 per cent of all the resumes they have screened have discrepancies. In 2006-07 the company screened over 2 million applicants across industries. Ashish Dehade, managing director (West Asia), First Advantage says, “The percentage has been increasing. In 2006 it was 16-17 per cent, for 2007 its was 30 per cent and while we are just six months into 2008 the percentage is around 30 per cent.”
TCS is not the only firm doing this. Earlier Infosys had asked close to 100 employees to leave in FY07 due to discrepancies found in the resumes. Same goes for Satyam and Wipro Technologies. Some time back it was reported that Wipro would be sharing with other IT firms the database of job applicants who have faked information in their CVs.
IT industry unfortunately, is an industry that thrives on deceit. Faking the resume is not only necessary for survival in the ruthless IT market, sometimes it is the only way to get a foot in the door. This is because of the lack of a concerted effort to screen all job seeking candidates for resume validity and eliminate nepotism and favoritism in the recruitment process, thereby giving a fair chance to all deserving candidates. Ethics apply not only to candidates but also to hiring managers and recruitment personnel who scout for talent.
I seriously agree with the first comment on the pervasiveness of deceit in an industry as vital as I.T. This viral nature of the lack of transparency rampant in this industry will continue to threaten the sustainability of the profession especially for young, eager and promising graduates who really want to learn yet they can seem to get the opportunity because they lack “experience”. If this trend of resume lies is not mitigated, then there will be a time when the tide will be too much to control. We need an overall ethical adherence by employers, consultants, employees etc… in order to protect the integrity of the profession.