Job hunter alert: You are most certainly spending too much time and energy on your resume, and sprinkling it with half-truths and inflated accomplishments is worse than a waste of time, because you may end up as an anecdote in a CareerBuilder survey.

Yes, it’s that time of year again, when job search guru CareerBuilder releases its annual report on the state and art of the resume. This year, it crunched input from more than 2,100 hiring and human resource managers to bring us the latest trends in resumes and the best lies reported by respondents.

First, consider these stats: 43 percent of respondents say they spend less than a minute looking at a resume, and a quarter of those say they spent less than 30 seconds. All your hard work, dismissed in the blink of an eye.

When asked what job applicants could do to get their attention with a resume, these are the most common answers:

  • Customize your resume to the open position: 63 percent

  • List your skill sets first on the resume: 41 percent

  • Include a cover letter with the resume: 40 percent

  • Address the application to a specific hiring manager: 22 percent

  • Include a link to your blog, portfolio or website: 16 percent

Now that we have gotten the advice piece out of the way, let’s get to the fun part: The mistakes and disingenuous embellishments spotted by our steely eyed respondents. Consider that 77 percent say they had found a lie or a clear mistake in a resume. Here are some examples:

  • An applicant's name was autocorrected from "Flin" to "Flintstone." His name was Freddie.

  • An applicant stated he had great attention to detail, but "attention" was misspelled.

  • An applicant claimed he worked at a federal prison. A background check determined he was actually incarcerated at the prison during that time.

  • An applicant stated he had been a prince in another life.

  • An applicant listed a skill as "taking long walks."

  • An applicant used direct quotes from Star Wars in their resume.

  • An applicant claimed he would work harder if paid more.

  • An applicant wrote the following at the end of her resume: "I didn't really fill this out, someone did it for me."

  • An applicant used a resume template with cats in the corners.

  • An applicant listed smoking under hobbies.

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Dan Cook

Dan Cook is a journalist and communications consultant based in Portland, OR. During his journalism career he has been a reporter and editor for a variety of media companies, including American Lawyer Media, BusinessWeek, Newhouse Newspapers, Knight-Ridder, Time Inc., and Reuters. He specializes in health care and insurance related coverage for BenefitsPRO.

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