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The job market is booming, and the perfect IT candidate is harder to find than ever. With so many job opportunities available, simply finding good candidates to present to our clients feels like a victory in and of itself. Sometimes it's luck. More often it's skill. Either way, securing the right person for the job has become a lot more difficult. Factor in the growing number of fake candidates saturating the market and things start to get even more complicated.
What Do You Mean By "Fake"?
Fake candidates have always been around, but the problem escalated with rise of remote work and interviews in 2020. In its most mild form, these candidates simply find ways to pass interviews and technical screenings. It's not until they've been working for a while that the employer realizes that they don't have the proper skills for the position. More insidiously, the candidate who shows up for the job is an entirely different person than the one who interviewed, which has become more of an issue in the remote working world. This happens every day and is a quick and easy way for third party vendors to make some money until they get caught.
How to Spot Them
Fortunately, there are ways to prevent this from happening. It can be easy to spot fake candidates if a recruiter has a thorough process. Often, the resume will read like a manual for the job you're trying to fill, complete with every keyword, buzzword and skillset you want to see. Generally speaking, if a resume seems too good to be true, it probably is. And if it actually is that good? Well, at least you did your due diligence and now you know for sure.
Sometimes, it's the dates on a resume - they don't match up or there seems to be a discrepancy. It's worth calling the candidate to confirm the dates they put on there, but doing your own LinkedIn sleuthing can be a crucial step too. Nine times out of ten, a fake candidate's resume will change to match the job they're trying to get, so pulling up their LinkedIn profile to compare to the resume can help uncover red flags. If the candidate doesn't have a LinkedIn profile, this can be a major red flag in the context that you’re already skeptical of discrepancies on their resume. While not everyone has to be on LinkedIn, this can be a compounding factor when considering a candidate that’s already setting off alarm bells.
Be Thorough with Your Interviews
Yet even the most thorough recruiters can't always spot the fakes via their resume, so it comes down to an interview. Telephone interviews are useful but there is very little guarantee that the person you talk to is the person who will eventually show up for the job. Thankfully, video interviews today are a standard practice, and are ideal for screening potential hires, both for competency and to ensure you're not getting scammed.
The most common way for a candidate to scam during a video interview is to wear an earpiece and have the answers to technical questions fed to them by a more knowledgeable third party. Granted, not everyone who wears headphones or an earpiece is cheating as headphones do make for a clearer connection during a video call. However, if there is an extended pause after a technical question is asked, and it appears that the candidate is spending a little too much time coming up with a response, that can be a red flag. The same goes for chat windows on the screen. If the candidate's eyes are flickering away, they could be reading a chat window to recite their responses.
Ways to Verify Your Candidates
During interviews, you can ask candidates to share their screen so that you can make sure there aren't any red flag activities. Don't be afraid to ask them to verify their identity when you start the interview either. Have them show an ID to the you via the camera so you can make sure they are who they say they are. Last but certainly not least, ask for references - and then check the references. This is the best way to find out if a job history has been fabricated or even if the candidate has even pulled this switcheroo routine before.
While there is no 100% foolproof way to stop the smartest scammers from fooling us, these are simple ways we can do our jobs in order to protect ourselves and our clients. Taking the extra time to do your job properly is worth it to protect your reputation as a quality staffing provider.
Ready to hire real, high quality candidates? Our team of recruiters are the best in the biz, and will help your organization reach your goals. Connect with us today to learn how!
