Workplace Best/Worst: What's the Worst Resume Lie?

Nov. 3, 2004 — -- Are resumes always "the whole truth and nothing but the truth?" According to a study by the outplacement firm Christian & Timbers, the answer is NO.

After researching the resumes of 500 corporate executives, they discovered 23 percent of executives lied about their accomplishments. What did they lie about? Quite a few things, actually …

Forty-four percent embellished their job descriptions, 48 percent inflated their salary, 52 percent embellished their academic history, 60 percent increased the size of the team that they managed and 64 percent lied about their accomplishments. And the No. 1 resume lie? Seventy-one percent of the executives misrepresented the number of years they'd served at their jobs.

All this creativity on resumes got us thinking: What's the worst lie that you've ever seen on a resume? And yes, that includes your own!

E-mail your worst resume lie to bob@workingwounded.com. We'll be back next time with our best responses and with the results of our online ballot asking how honest is your resume.

Workplace Best & Worst is a new Wednesday feature at ABCnews.com. Each week we'll ask a question -- What is the worst workplace prank, what is the best advice, who was your worst boss, etc. And then in week two we'll run the best responses.

Bob Rosner is a best-selling author, award winning journalist, popular speaker and a guy who is willing to go under oath over the contents of his resume.