Finding a job is hard. Sending resumes out, day after day, getting nothing back. We spend so much time reading over our resumes and making sure everything is perfect. By the look of some of these stories, there are some people who don't put in the level of attention that we do. These redditors detail the dumbest things they've ever seen on a resume to make them say, nope! Content has been edited for clarity.
OK But, Who Is He
“At a hobby shop (read: Magic: the Gathering) I used to work at, some earnest looking young guy stopped in one day and dropped off a resume. It was a fairly hot day in the summer, and he was covered in sweat. He had a backpack and big stack of resumes – it appeared he had been walking all over town dropping off resumes all day.
We weren’t hiring anyone, but out of idle curiosity, I glanced over his resume. It was just normal general stuff – nothing stood out – just your standard resume of someone fresh out of high school with very little experience. But then I realized… his resume had absolutely no contact information. I couldn’t interview him even if I wanted to. His name wasn’t even on it.
That poor guy had been walking all over town in the beating sun all day dropping off useless resumes.”
Can You Say Spoilt
“I once received an application for a position that required at least 5 years of experience. It was for a position at a nonprofit, probably something that would pay $50-70k/year.
The academic background included Harvard Law and some other snooty east coast schools. Then I get to work experience, where she wrote ‘Almost nothing because economic support has been sufficient from our family.’
Desired salary: $150,000/ year.”
These Are Pretty Amazing
>>> “Someone sent over their CV written entirely in the papyrus font from Microsoft word. May as well have gone all out and used wingdings.”
>>> "One resume read expert in ‘indoor horticulture’… Indoor horticulture was in quotes.”
>>> “A guy put his bench, squat and deadlift numbers in his personal skills section for a bar job. It spawned a long tradition of asking bartenders what they could bench when they applied for a job.”
>>> “I had one application dropped off by the applicant’s mother. She told me, ‘If you hire him, you probably shouldn’t trust him with money.’ I threw the application away after she turned around. I was hiring for a sales clerk position at my family bakery.”
>>> “Had a resume come in from a guy we fired about 2 years previously. Had a gap in his employment where the time was he had been with us, so not even like he didn’t realize!”
>>> “I had a funny typo on a resume I once reviewed. It read: ‘Assassinated the lead florist on site.’ Obviously it was meant to say ‘assisted.'”
>>> “Not a hiring manager, but for years I was applying for jobs with a high school qualification for art and design listed as ‘fart and design.’ Got 2 jobs in that time and countless rejections.”
~
I Pawsonally Support Him
“I received a resume from an applicant that included a letter of recommendation from his cat. The letter was hilarious and signed with a clipart paw print. I thought it was great and wanted to bring him in, but the manager for the position wasn’t as crazy about it. I guess the point is, humor in an application can work for you, but it really depends on the person.”
That’s An Interesting Target
“I was working for a small digital agency and we were looking for designers and illustrators – general multi-skilled creative types.
The boss wanders in with a sly grin and a big folder. It was from a guy who wanted a job. I came over and he started flicking through it. Page after page of suggestive cartoons. Lots of them furry type stuff. Sweater kittens, butts, lips, figures intertwined, lots of detailed musculature.
So I was like, ‘Well, it’s quite good for what it is… but what else is there? Is there another section?’
Nope. Nothing else. Just a folder completely full of adult cartoon people and sensual anthropomorphized animals.
He was not hired. It wasn’t because of the cartoons, it was because it was all just those cartoons. Would have liked to see some commercial applications of illustration, or something showing he could work to requirements, or a variety of work showing different styles.”
An Interesting Skill
“I had a candidate who worked in counseling in the past, mostly with kids who had been through trauma. They had a line on their resume that said:
‘Expert in child kidnapping.’
I had to at least give them an interview because I understood the intent but the wording was just hilariously unfortunate.
For those seeking clarity, he was an expert in kidnapping cases.”
That’s Greasy
“Not so much the content of the application, but what was on the application.
A hand print.
It was for a food handling position and he was grungy enough to leave a print from where he held down the paper to write on it. Instant no. Looking back, yeah, there was a chance he’d have been fine, we could have taught proper hand washing and all that, but at the time we declined to grant an interview.”
Didn’t Even Try
“I was on a hiring committee for a college instructor. The candidate was asked to provide a statement of commitment to the college and its mission. An entire paragraph was plagiarized – copied and pasted from a website. I noticed that the writer’s voice drastically changed, so I pasted a sentence into Google and immediately found the source. He did not get an interview.”
Impressively Bad
“I was an AV Engineering Team Lead for a startup for a time. A couple of years ago, I was hiring to fill about 30 slots of a very basic AV tech position. I had about 20 applicants at the time, so if you were reasonably competent, you were in.
I got one resume and cover letter through our website from a guy who I will henceforth refer to as ‘the dunce.’ Every third word on this thing was spelled incorrectly, punctuation was optional, and spacing was randomized. Thinking, ‘This can’t be real,’ I called one of the guy’s references.
Oh, boy, did I ever get an earful from a grumpy business owner. The dunce in question was so much of a dunce that he was applying for positions in my area because he was effectively blacklisted from just about every job site and labor company in his hometown – a medium-sized US city with a very, very large audiovisual job market.
The reference told me that he’d told the dunce not to hand his name/number out as a reference because the dunce had caused more than $200,000 of damages to the reference’s company’s equipment the previous year. He went on to name, correctly and from memory, the other references that the dunce likely listed on his resume – friendly competition of the reference – and told me that they would all say the same thing. So I called around. The dunce is apparently quite the liability.
We did not end up hiring the dunce, but I made some new business friends in another city. We’ve since collaborated on a couple of larger conference gigs that hit their city first and then our city afterwards so… Thanks, Dunce.”
“Red-Headed Ogre”
“A few years ago, I bought an already working franchise location in the next town over, which is a very small and quiet town. The previous owner let go his employee with a severance, so I didn’t have to take over her contract. Being my new and only store, I decided to work by myself until getting settled and hire help if I seemed to need it.
The first day I opened the store, about an hour after opening, the former employee comes by to introduce herself and drops a resume. I tell her that I’ll consider it since she worked there for about 5 years mostly on her own (previous owner was not a hands-on boss) and put it in a drawer.
During the rest of the day, I noticed people standing on the sidewalk looking in, and after doing that they came in and made a purchase. After 4 or 5 people did this, I asked a woman what made her look before coming in and she said, ‘Oh, I wouldn’t have come in if that red-headed ogre was still working here.’
Needless to say, I put an ‘under new management’ sign on the door, using the back of the redheads CV and no one else looked before coming in that day.”
Always Double Check
“I helped a buddy revise his resume. I formatted it and organized it, but I left some spots bolded and told him he had to fill them out. Under one of his jobs I said ‘add some garbage with fancy adjectives here.’ He didn’t revise the resume and applied to a ton of jobs with that line left in there. I have never laughed so hard.”
I Worked Here
“Sometimes I review applications and resumes for design positions. As they’re typically made by competent designers, they usually look a bit nicer than the average resume.
Reviewed one resume for a woman fresh out of college. The top quarter of the resume was a big, artsy signature in blue with her name on top of it. Her portfolio was an Instagram account (which I don’t really recommend unless your job is making art intended to be on Instagram).
The next quarter was her experience. Obviously if you’re fresh out of college you might not have ‘real’ experience to put down, but some people are able to bridge that gap mentally and will write down freelancing, volunteering, part-time work, etc. and talk about it professionally. This woman listed at least five jobs with descriptions that basically amounted to ‘I worked there.’ Though, for one part-time job, she claimed she learned how to run a business. This woman’s ‘volunteer experience’ was picking up trash in a forest once seven years prior (likely when she was in high school).
The next half of the resume was a list of skills that made no sense because of how they were written and because there wasn’t anything to back them up. Things like ‘working independently and in a group,’ ‘problem solver,’ ‘marketing skills,’ ‘detail oriented’ (her resume was also full of typos). I’m all for soft skills, don’t get me wrong. But if you have half a page of skills and can’t get a job, maybe it’s an indicator that you don’t actually have those skills.
For the same position, we also got a lot of applications that made no sense. One applicant’s resume listed himself as single and included a headshot; he was located halfway across the country and worked in drilling oil.”
“Extremely Beautiful”
“I work in an analytical field where programming and mathematical skills are pretty important. I had a candidate for a lead analyst position submit a 9-page resume (which was already a deal breaker). The last page was entirely dedicated to ‘Skills and Attributes.’ The highlights were:
- Extremely beautiful
- Highly skilled in math (obviously)
The candidate was an adjunct professor at a local tech school. They had a Master’s degree in statistics from a mid-level state university. So yes, they were qualified – but definitely not as remarkably qualified as they thought they were.
The candidate did get an interview, believe it or not. But they weren’t hired.”
Always Proofread
“I had someone hand me a resume with the html code of an adult film url mixed in mid-way through. I guess he was watching it while updating his resume and somehow dragged in a link. Guess he didn’t proofread it.”
Thats What I Do Though
“I once had someone indicate that they had 8 years of experience with a specific, unique, product. That product had only been around for 2 years and initial development had only begun 4 years ago. When asked about it, they claimed that they were on the development team and were the person that came up with the product. I had been on the 6 person team since its inception and knew everyone involved.
Also had someone list a previous position from two years ago on their resume at the company I work for. It was the exact position I currently held, same organization, appeared to be almost copy pasted from my job description. I had been in that position for almost 5 years.”
A Filter, Really?
“This isn’t hiring an employee but it is hiring a company. I was contacted by a girl from a sales company that wanted us to hire them to drive leads to our site. At the bottom of her email was a very trashy, Snapchat filtered (like with sparkles and fake flowers on her head and big cartoonish eyes) picture of the girl who sent the email.
We all had a good laugh at the office and ignored it. After her third email, I actually typed in a response, ‘GET RID OF YOUR TRASHY FILTERED PICTURE IF YOU WANT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY,’ but then just deleted it and blocked her.”
He Tried To Help
“I had a family member who lost his job and never found a job again, this was about 10 years ago. It didn’t make sense that he never got a callback. He even told me one time he just couldn’t understand how he never got even a single call for an interview in the hundreds of applications he filled out.
At his house in his office, I picked up a copy of his resume, and god was it terrible. This is a person who was a chemist with 25 years of industry experience, and worked for one employer right out of college, so he didn’t have any idea how to apply and look for a job.
After listing all his experience in the first half of a page like a normal person, he had 7 pages of his hobbies, with crazy things like his favorite recipe for chocolate cake, how he had trained his dog to speak short words, how he had been working on a system of encryption that he was going to give to the NSA, how he had traveled to Brazil which lead to his love for the Portuguese language, but he didn’t speak Portuguese, he just found it fascinating, and plots to various screenplays he was working on, amongst other things. This went on for 7 pages.
I saved a copy for myself because it was just ridiculous.”
Handwritten
“I went to engineering school. Had a professional writing class. So the instructor actually was practicing and told us about what they thought was the worst resume they ever got. It was for a building inspector.
- Written in pencil
- many misspellings
- Yellow legal paper, 1 page
- Skills included ‘farmin”, ‘workin’ on motors’ etc
- Obvious coffee cup stain
Company’s HR showed this to several people, and they had to invite this guy in to see who would send such a resume in.
A large burly man, dressing in jeans, work boots, collared shirt, and a knitting needle in his pocket comes in, and they proceed to interview him and question him on all sorts of things. Turns out the guy has an encyclopedic knowledge of the state’s building code, was already licensed as an electrician. He blows them away. They ask him – what’s with the knitting needle? Fair question. He says he uses it to check to see if insulation was actually put into a wall. He pushes it into a wall, twists it and pulls it out with insulation on the hook.”
Every Word Capitalized
“I got one at my job from a guy I went to high school with.
- His resume was all size 30 font
- All his experience was vacations. Like he had a section titled ‘Experience’ and it was a list containing stuff like ‘school trip to France’ and ‘family vacation to Florida.’
- Under ‘Interests,’ he listed video gaming
- Every thing he listed under ‘skills and attributes’ ended with an exclamation point.
- Worst of all, every. Single. Word. Was capitalized. Like in the previous category, he had ‘Very Nice and Joyful Person!’
He didn’t get the job.”
A Multitide Of Bad
>>>> “I was interviewing a guy, and I asked him a question about his Master’s degree he had on his resume. His response? ‘Oh, I don’t have my Master’s degree yet – I just plan on getting it someday.’ Needless to say, he did not get the job.”
>>>> “Wage desired: menemum. This girl who applied put Walmart down in her work history. The dates she worked were for around a year…and her reason for leaving: Mexico. That’s it…one word….Mexico.”
>>>> “His girlfriend’s sweater kittens. It was for a job at a ski shop. He was a student and does photography as a hobby. Resume had link to his portfolio. It was worth a look.”
>>>> “Got a resume on a napkin from the sports bar down the hall (worked in a mall) with the name of our company spelled wrong and food stains on it as if it had already been used. Worst/best part was she was completely serious and was angry she didn’t get the job.”
>>>> “Guy submitted a resume claiming to be a ‘ghost writer’ for a local college. In lieu of a college degree, he listed the units he wrote assignments for and the average grades his clients got.”
>>>> “Was looking for a casual sales person, this 18 year old put a selfie of her which was taken in a car showing a lot of cleavage. Not what I was looking for. I guess she was hoping I was a middle aged, single man.”
>>>> “I had a resume state for work experience be ‘hacker – The Internet.’ They also stated they’ve been both ‘hired and fired for hacking various things’ and have ‘never been convicted of a computer crime.'”
>>>> “Used the word ‘illiterate’ instead of ‘literate’. They are Computer Illiterate, Social Media Illiterate, Microsoft Office Illiterate, Embroidery Machine Illiterate (which was an odd addition in itself). Bless her heart.”
~
Set Fire To What?
“To understand my excitement, please realize I hired teenagers to work in a punk rock/goth store.
Under ‘Have you ever been convicted of a felony,’ for the first time someone had checked ‘Yes.’
Excited, I read on: ‘Arson. Will explain in interview.’
Eff yeah you will! How can I not want to know this story? I call him up and schedule the interview. The big day comes, and he’s not very talkative or interacting with me well. I conduct a full interview anyway, even though he’s shown me no spark or passion to give me incentive to hire him, and then I bring it up at the end: ‘Hey man, thanks for coming and talking with me today, I really appreciate it. Now, it’s a company requirement for me to ask, but you’re definitely not required to answer: why were you convicted of arson?’
He tells me one of his now ex-friends stole his X-box and wouldn’t return it. When he went to the guy’s house to take it back, he wasn’t home, and he didn’t want to break in and get arrested. He was still upset though, so he set fire to the wicker chair sitting outside the back of his house.
Not as fascinating as I was hoping, but still a pretty interesting story. No, he didn’t get the job, and it had nothing to do with his arson conviction.”
Can You Do This?
“I put out an ad on Craigslist and Monster, I was looking for a part-time camera operator and someone who could occasionally flip a switch for me in the video booth. Parties interested were asked to submit resume and references for consideration.
I got many, but the one that stood out to me was an email that simply said: ‘Ya i cud do this’ in lieu of an actual resume. I didn’t hire them, but that’s the low bar for the time being for me.”
He Tried Too Hard To Stand Out
“I used to work at the Princeton grad school admissions department. This one 22 year old kid sent in an 88-page curriculum vitae which was professionally bound and embossed. It included blue prints for experiments, full color photos of him meeting various politicians, scientists, and even buzz Aldrin. It was so huge that it didn’t fit in the folders we used, so I had to take it to the dean’s office by hand. The secretary wondered aloud if the kid had ever had a girlfriend in his life, and threw it at the bottom of her pile.”
Never Trust A Friend
“I have several CV’s that will never make the cut. I keep them in a binder hidden out of view. I work as an IT recruiter.
- Normal CV on the job site. Junior profile, 18 years old, just finished school. Pretty normal CV except, at the bottom, he writes that he has a small Johnson and likes guys. The CV goes back and forth in the office. Eventually we decide to call him and ask why he put that on his CV. Turns out he had to make the CV for school, left his PC open and one of his classmates thought it was funny to add that to his profile.
- A CV with a picture a man in only his boxers. No headshot, just his abs, boxers and legs. We did not call the guy.
- Several CV’s with people ranting against the government, religion or anything else. Obvious proof of mental disabilities. People writing things such as, ‘I will do the time for the crime I may or may not have committed’. I haven’t called any of them.
- Cover letters with the wrong company name on it. So many cover letters with the wrong company on it. Recruiters will forget to change your name when sending you an email , applicants will forget to change the name when applying. We really need to get rid of mandatory cover letters. I’ll still call them if their profile is decent.
- People being open about just putting their CV online, so they can keep their unemployment benefits. At least they don’t waste my time.”