What's the oddest thing you've seen listed on a CV?

[FelicityShagsWell]

What's the weirdest thing you've seen on a CV? I received one in application for a job and they had put a hobbies section in which they'd listed "smoking".

I'm somewhat concerned that this was from my (autistic) son 😆

But that was a cultural norm of the time wasn't it.
Or how are you using the term cultural.
Obviously it was wrong but not unusual culturally then.
I remember similar.

This has warmed my heart. Your husband is a very decent man.

In my first job my colleague and I had to go through CVs we'd been sent for two roles suited to recent graduates, which had become vacant just as everyone was graduating. Consequently we had around 800 applicants and the vast majority of them just got binned for very minor things like a naff typeface, a CV printed on coloured paper, a misplaced apostrophe etc. But there was one that we ended up reading about four times because it was just so weird. It included the following things:

'From 1997 - 1999 you'll see there is a gap in my CV. This is due to time spent living in a cooperative commune in the Australian outback, prior to leaving upon realising I had actually become indoctrinated by a dangerous religious cult. Naturally I have learnt from that experience and I would like to reassure you that I would not make this mistake again.'

'Among my many talents are my excellent generic skills.'

'I am a keen fisherman' which was then followed by a list of different fish species and the weights of the largest one of each he'd caught.

A list of around 15 - 20 people to approach for references, all of which either lived at the same address as him and/or had the same surname.

When we declined to interview him, he phoned me up to complain at such length that I ended up just hanging up on him.

I've had lots of clangers but the one that has really stuck with me is "my hobbies include landscape painting and I dabble in pole dance."

And not a CV, but memorably someone who repeatedly threatened us with a tribunal/court because asking for experience was apparently discrimination.

Under "hobbies" they had never had a job. No, we do not work in this field - it is luxury service provision and any political showboating is banned. He wrote a whole paragraph about it, all nonsensical twaddle. And 3 of my other employees are Jewish. So a hard pass on that.

Back in the 80s, my dad once received a CV from someone applying for a PA job. It said "I can drive a typewriter with good noise" 😂

He was hiring an office cleaner, and someone listed "efficient hovering" as a skill!

Do you think the one that runs fast like a horse means he’s as fast as a horse. Or he runs on all fours jumping over fences?

It used to be a thing - asked to provide details of spouse and children.

I work in Risk Management and we advertised an entry level job on a popular website. Someone completely misread the add and thought it was a security role. They gave great details on their well trained Alsatian.

Even better if it's at Augusta

He got mixed up and put his application for a role in a Miils and Boon film in the wrong envelope.

Fucking awesome

That's so sweet!

I think he's really good at the Monty Python school of being a horse while someone runs behind you with coconut shells.

And 3 of my other employees are Jewish.
There have been Orthodox Jewish people out protesting about Gaza.

I wasn't. They wrote it on the form under "other relevant information ". Not the quite gotcha you think it is.
By law, employees have to be automatically enrolled in The Construction Workers Pension Scheme which pays survivor benefits to families for death in service. I don't know if the applicant was thinking of that, and their dodgy personal life at the time, or just being a smart arse.

I love this.

The world would be a better place if people were honest on their CVs and in interviews (and LinkedIn didn't exist).

Depending on what the job was and whether she had the right experience, I'd have interviewed her! She sounds fun and she just needed to find the right fit.

I agree.

Someone wrote in an 'achievements' section of their CV that they were 'vomit-free since 2019'. My boss and I were thoroughly bemused, couldn't work out what it meant in the slightest. He suggested it was a reference to beating bulimia; after having a look online, I thought it could be a joke reference to 'How I Met Your Mother', where one of the characters tells people he is 'vomit free since '93'... Still unsolved, and unsurprisingly the candidate was not invited to interview!

Abseiled down the side of a church tower dressed as a nun.

Shoe size.

(Different CVs).

In some countries it is normal to give your parents' names and professions, your marital status, and your children's names and ages, even if they are 40 years old!

Someone claimed to have a Bachelor's degree from a Business School that only offers post-grad studies. If you're going to lie, make it a plausible one that might be difficult to check. Don't send it to someone who actually went to that Business School.

Another one I recall was part of a Sixth Form Careers Week where I volunteered with mock interviews. He claimed to have done work experience at a particular winery in a not-so-well-known French wine region but unfortunately managed to pick an interviewer who not only knew this winery and its owners well, but was also able to systematically rebut everything he said. Small example: he claimed to have been involved with the harvest and vinification but the harvest in this place began in late September that year, and his 'experience' had been in July.

Ive had one of them as well:
[email protected]

Also separately- an A4 glossy head shot, like a model / actress attached to the cv. And a poem about the moon. For an office admin role.

What says she was? Maybe it was his CV and not an application form. It used to be a common thing to put on a CV, now a no-no in the UK, but still very common in some countries.