During the job application and interview process, candidates who lie to prospective employers and those who don’t properly highlight their accomplishments can find it difficult to land—or keep—their next role. We asked experts how to sell yourself positively and honestly.
In an employer’s market where there’s a lot of competition for jobs, some biopharma professionals are overselling themselves, while others are underselling themselves, according to two recruiters. Either way, these job candidates are hurting their chances to land the roles they’re targeting.
If they oversell by lying during the application or interview process and the company discovers their dishonesty, they may not get an offer or might get terminated shortly after starting their new position. If they undersell by not properly emphasizing their accomplishments, they might not get an offer at all.
Overselling to Get Noticed, Get Jobs
It’s not uncommon for job candidates to lie to prospective employers so they can get noticed and land interviews. In a recent ResumeLab survey, 7 in 10 workers confessed they’d lied on their resumes. The most common falsehoods were embellishing responsibilities (52%), job title (52%) and the number of people they managed (45%).
With biopharma professionals, those who lie do so not only during the job application and interview process but also on their LinkedIn profiles, according to a biotech recruiter who requested anonymity. His firm helps companies’ hiring managers and HR departments fill positions.
The lies tend to come from job candidates applying for nonclinical roles or support positions, not scientist or executive roles, the recruiter told BioSpace. Regarding the dishonesty itself, he noted that any kind of untruth, whether it’s omitting or changing a fact, counts as a lie.
“Call it mistruth, call it untruth, call it half-truth, whatever you want to,” the recruiter said. “I mean, it’s a lie.”
For example, he noted that some job candidates provide details that aren’t true or omit information, such as not mentioning that they don’t have the required years of experience. On LinkedIn, he once contacted biopharma professionals with profiles specifying they had experience with Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) regulations. However, about 20% didn’t.
“When you start talking to them, they’re like, ‘Oh, I worked in a CLIA lab, but I wasn’t CLIA certified,’” he said. “Well, that’s fraud. That’s a lie. That’s saying something that you’re not to get people to try to hire you.”
Why People Lie: Desperation in a Flooded Job Market
While job candidates lying is not new, the recruiter said his firm has seen a recent increase in biopharma candidates being dishonest when applying for positions. He also noted people are applying for roles they’re not qualified for.
“Within the last year, we’ve seen a really big difference in candidate behavior and more desperation,” he said.
The recruiter attributed the desperation to people flooding the job market.
Some biopharma professionals are looking for new positions by choice, while others are doing so because of recent layoffs. Either way, it’s making the market more competitive for job candidates. For example, the recruiter pointed to a recent job posting on LinkedIn that got 100 applicants the first day it was posted.
While the recruiter’s firm has noticed increased lying, it’s not a widespread issue for respondents to a recent BioSpace LinkedIn poll. In that poll, 65% said they haven’t seen a recent rise in candidate dishonesty on job applications.
If people are tempted to lie to get in front of hiring managers, the recruiter recommended against it, noting it’s not worth it given they’ll be found out during the interview process or as soon as they get the job.
“Just apply for jobs that you’re qualified for,” he said. “Don’t try to pad your resume. Don’t lie, because it just creates ill will towards you as a candidate from the hiring company and from all involved. And it’s a small industry.”
Underselling Unintentionally or to Avoid Bragging
While some job candidates are overselling themselves in today’s competitive market, others are underselling themselves, according to Molly Robb, managing director of LifeSci Search, an executive search firm that’s part of LifeSci Advisors. She told BioSpace that these biopharma professionals, including people at the highest levels, don’t know how to present themselves and bury their accomplishments.
“What I’m finding is an overemphasis on the job descriptions and not enough emphasis on accomplishments, and that people are forgetting to force rank and prioritize the top accomplishments,” Robb said.
Women especially undersell themselves, according to Robb. She explained that they don’t want to come off as bragging about or overselling themselves.
“Ten times out of 10, when I present two job descriptions, one to a man, one to a woman, the woman starts off with ‘I am not qualified on this, this and that,’ and the man starts off on ‘I am qualified for this, this and that reason,’” she said.
Viewing Resumes as Business Cases for Getting Hired
Job candidates need to view their resumes as business cases for why companies should hire them rather than as data dumps of job titles and descriptions, according to Robb. She recommended framing each position through accomplishments, leading with the metric and then sharing how it was achieved.
Robb noted that thinking critically about proving where they moved the needle is especially important as biopharma professionals rise through the ranks because when they get to those higher levels, they’re always in competitive situations.
“Whether it’s a headhunter like me or it’s the hiring manager, given two resumes, one that’s just a list of job descriptions and another one that sets it up as a business case that’s metric driven, proving their accomplishments, I’m telling you, the hiring manager’s going to go for the person whose resume is well thought out,” Robb said.
Sharing 90-Day Plans in Interviews
Once they get to the interview stage, Robb recommended another way candidates can sell themselves: sharing what they’d do in their first 90 days at the company.
“It’s going that extra mile because things are so competitive, and I think clients just want people to do a lot more research and think through ‘What would you do if you were actually in the job?’ versus ‘Do you have the right skill set? Do you check the boxes for the job?’” she said.
The job candidates who go the furthest have already envisioned themselves in the role, know exactly what their plan would be and will propose something new the company could try, according to Robb. She recommended not being afraid to throw that new idea out there when competing for positions.
“A lot of times people say, ‘Well, you know, I don’t know that I necessarily want to do that if I don’t have the job just yet,’” she said. “Well, in this extra-competitive environment, if you don’t do it, my two other finalists may, and they may go further in the process because they’ve showed that extra level of critical thinking that the client was excited about, and they decided to move forward with them.”
Interested in more career insights? Subscribe to Career Insider to receive our quarterly life sciences job market reports, career advice and more.
