One time, my husband and I went to Puerto Rico and, since my foreign language classes consisted of Latin and French (read: useless), I was a bit worried about the prospect of Spanish. He assured me that he was On. It. His extensive training in high school and college Spanish would fare us well.Flash forward to our vacation…going through the drive through line at Burger King (again).

-What do you want?

-Uh, gimme a medium Coke, please.

-They don’t have Coke. How about a Pepsi?

-Ew. No. Don’t they have Dr. Pepper?

-I don’t know how to ask for Dr. Pepper in Spanish.

-Uh. I thought you said you knew Spanish.

-I do. Sort of.
He turns to the drive-thru speaker and orders...

-Dos Grandes Pepsis, por favor.

-No, no…medium, not large.

-I only know “grande."

To summarize-I drank a lot of Pepsi I really didn’t want on that vacation.

There are times when people may overestimate their abilities a tad. A candidate may “tweak” a resume to fir a specific position in order to be considered. We all know it happens. But the truth is, doesn’t it happen on BOTH ends of the hiring process?

I have taken a gander at the official job descriptions written by HR and have spoken to candidates down the road who thought they were going to have an opportunity to get more interactive experience or more management skills and it hasn’t worked out that way.

It’s not really a matter of being dishonest or misleading. The job description is an attempt to be all-encompassing just as a resume is an attempt to, somehow, list every skill imaginable that the candidate may possess, even if it’s a stretch.

The flip side of this is also true. What’s NOT listed in the job description is that you will be putting up with crazy Mary Lou who sits in the cube next to you and has photos of her and her dog dressed up in tutus plastered everywhere. And what’s NOT listed on the resume is the candidate’s background as a party clown which could really come in handy when special event planning is needed.

The moral of this story is that there is always more to it (and less to it) than you think. And the only way to know, is to ask. Resumes tell part of the story. Spend ten minutes being honest with the candidate and they will open up to you about what’s real, what they can do above and beyond what’s on paper, and whether or not they really are bilingual.