最近一项调查显示，有30%的求职者在简历中美化事实或者造假，这让我深感震惊。这一数字真的可能这样低吗？我向来认定，简历中充斥着遁辞、半真半假的事实和彻头彻尾的谎话。作为一名怀疑论者，这则70%的员工都谨严正直的消息，动摇了我对人类的信心缺失。唯一能让我聊以自慰的是，人们通常在匿名调查中扯些小谎，就像他们在简历中那样，而这意味着，真实的比例可能会更高。

　　One prediction rang true from the research by the Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors. It was that the incentive for mendacity is growing, as unemployment balloons and competition for jobs rises. In coming months recruiters will therefore be bombarded with CVs making claims more misleading than the kind that got Corpus Christi college disqualified from the BBC’s University Challenge。　　把口译笔译站点加入收藏夹

　　英国教育评估人特许学会(Chartered Institute of Educational Assessors)所做的研究中，有一个预测听上去真实可靠：随着失业人数迅速膨胀，及就业竞争加剧，说谎的动机在不断增强。因此，在未来数月内，招聘者将接到大量内容不实的简历，这些简历的欺骗性要比导致牛津大学圣体学院(Corpus Christi college)被取消由英国广播公司(BBC)主办的《大学对抗赛》(University Challenge)比赛资格的造假严重得多。

　　It was the same during the downturn of the early 1990s. Then, one acquaintance obtained a graduate traineeship at a large bank by bumping his third-class degree up to a 2:1. A journalist colleague meanwhile admitted to me that his degree from a top university was entirely fictional. Another contemporary explained away a year lost to bone idleness by telling prospective employers that he had been writing a field guide to the wild flowers of the Pyrenees. I might have lied on my own CV, if an east coast Scottish upbringing had not lumbered me with the subliminal conviction that I would burn for eternity in hell if I did。

　　这与上世纪90年代初经济下滑时期的情况相同。当时，我的一个熟人在将他的三等学位抬高至二等一级(2:1)学位后，得到了一家大银行培训生一职。一位记者同僚同时向我承认，他的顶尖大学学位完全是捏造的。另一位同龄人在解释游手好闲浪费掉的一年时光时，搪塞称他在写一本有关比利牛斯山脉野花的野外指南。倘若不是苏格兰东海岸的成长教育让我在潜意识里坚信，如果我造假，就会在地狱里永世受折磨，我可能也这样做了。

　　Charles Thomas of Kroll, a company whose services include background checks on job applicants, says that inaccuracies on CVs divide into three main groups. First, there are honest mistakes, typically made when candidates muddle dates. Second, there is deliberate fibbing about qualifications. Mr Thomas says: “A lie told 20 years ago to get a job can become part of the liar’s reality. So he tells it again when he switches jobs, even though he has become a successful finance director。” Third, applicants close up suspicious gaps in their employment history. In one case investigated by Kroll, a candidate turned out to have spent a three-month gap in prison for fraud。

　　服务内容包括求职者背景调查的Kroll公司的查尔斯？托马斯(Charles Thomas)表示，简历不实大体分为三类。第一种是无意造成的错误，通常是求职者搞混了日期。第二种，是故意在资历方面撒些小谎。托马斯表示：“一个在 20年前为得到某份工作而撒下的谎，可以变成说谎者现实生活的一部分。那么当换工作时，他还要再讲一遍，尽管他已成为一名成功的财务总监。”第三种，求职者为了填补工作经历中可疑的空白。Kroll调查过的一件案例中，一位求职者有3个月的空白被证明是因欺诈罪而关在监狱中。

　　About 65 per cent of businesses take up references for shortlisted job applicants, according to research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. Fewer than half said they found out anything useful. This is hardly surprising now that the fear of litigation prevents past employers from saying anything more revealing than: “Yes, Derek worked for us. He has a beard and knows a bit about databases。” Less than 40 per cent of businesses bother to check academic and professional qualifications。