Claiming degrees you dont have

[51daystoChristmas]

Hi, I have a colleague who is claiming to have degrees she doesnt have. She has two degrees on her email signature that don't match the ones on our company CVs that go out to third parties which is what led me to noticing. So I did a bit of checking and on LinkedIn she has a completely different degree listed, with the university name. So I emailed the university which is in Australia, that information is on public record there, and they confirmed that degree and date. She works on winning business for the company so I think any sort of fraud would be really bad for the company, she's worked here for 10 years though. She has recently been promoted, and is good at her job. I'm in a different team and it makes no difference to me, I was just wondering if I should let anyone know as they've just won a really public facing project. What do you think?

Big companies never bother checking unless it’s a legal requirement.

i have an honours degree, a person who was at uni the year before me was enrolled in a masters. I know they didn’t finish because their supervisor was my honours supervisor and he used to complain about how they never handed in their thesis and did the presentation.

anyway a year after I start my job at a big company he starts there too, and his introduction was that he had a masters degree. I know he didn’t. I was still in contact with people at the uni and he never finished. Not handing in the thesis isn’t something you can just pop back at your convenience and do.

anyway I thought it was funny. But it didn’t occur to me to let anyone know. I figured if the company were not taking due diligence to check his qualifications.

Your post is very patronising, and I believe you know you are wrong in what you have done so far. As most people on here who have responded to you have advised, leave this alone, or simply go and ask this colleague about her degrees etc. But you don't come across well in your posts so far and going to HR may well back fire on you. In your position I would mind my own business, do the job I'm being paid to do.

If you were so concerned, you should have gone to HR with your suspicions and let them do the fact checking. It sounds like you have way overstepped and I can't see HR being too impressed by your actions.

Your really over stepping here. Like you said, it doesn't even effect you. Are you jealous she got promoted?
It would freak me out to think a colleague is emailing people's places of education. Sounds really stalkerish and red flags. I'd just keep it to yourself otherwise your colleague might find out and be scared. Don't you see that all this research your doing on some colleagues can be proceived as scary to some?

Of course it is wrong that someone has falsified their qualifications to secure employment/ promotion.
It is an odd thing to do though, checking on a colleagues qualifications. Do you do this with everyone you work with, or just this person? What prompted you to do the check?
If you intend to continue working for the business, I'd give serious consideration on how to proceed. If you report it, you could damage your working relationship with other colleagues, lose trust and people may become very cautious around you. Things have a tendency not to remain anonymous.

It is possible the qualifications on her email sig were slightly changed at the request of management.

I have seen this before, where it was the company who inflated the qualifications of a director who did not have a degree. You know, when that summer job at Intel becomes " blue chip experience".

I also worked with a PHD, and he ended up on a self employed retainer thing, because his qualification looked so good on the company profile. The company claimed he was full time working on key projects to look good for the investors.

Imagine how that would pan out for the OP. If it turns out it is the company tweeking the truth.

To me, it sounds a bit stalkerish behaviour to go and email a university to find out that information about a colleague.
If you have concerns, then escalate it through the relevant channels at work. Don’t go snooping into someone’s background on your own accord and then try and play the moral high ground.
I’d be careful who you share what you’ve done with in real life.

Not sure why the country is falling apart because one colleague in a team unrelated to you has
in your eyes listed something she shouldn’t.
you’ve no idea what she really has other than an email to a uni across the world - which is the weirdest behaviour I’ve heard in a long time tbh. If she’s good at her job why are you checking on her past credentials and what business is it of yours?

if we are jumping to conclusions the above statement of the country falling apart and you emailing random university’s for others qualifications that have nothing to do with you lead me to conclude you are a huge drama queen and seem to be making a fuss out of nothing, or that you wanted to work on the shiny new contract and she got it so attempting to bring her down.
Disgraceful either way. I wouldn’t trust anything around you if I knew

Apart from the fact it's none of your business, you say she's good at her job so the risk seems to be minimal that she will damage your organisation. What do you want to achieve by flagging it to HR?

You absolutely don't know that she hasn't got those degrees? Perhaps she only just graduated and her work CV hasn't been updated? You need to say how you know she hasn't got the degrees otherwise you are being unreasonable. You say it doesn't matter how you know but it absolutely does. You have asked a question and we are entitled to weigh up the evidence. Saying we don't need to know is like a mother saying to a child 'because i told you so'. You might be a random bot so why should we trust what you say?

I would ignore it because it's got nothing to do with me. I didn't realise you had actually already sent this info off. What a jobsworth. I would hate to work with you.

Well it depends. If they were a doctor then yes I would care if they didn’t have the legally required qualifications but if they’re an accountant and they’ve added a non-existent gender studies degree to their qualifications then no I wouldn’t.

I'm dying of 2nd hand embarrassment here! 😬

Because you sound like a stalker, checking up on colleagues background education. It's none of youe business, If I knew a colleague did this sort of thing I wouldn't trust them one inch.

Exactly. She already said the person was good at her job and it doesn't appear to be anything where lives are in hand. No suggestion it's a regulated position or anything else like that. Just someone with nothing better to do snooping on a colleague she doesn't even work directly with.

!00% agree with this.

I agree.

stop being so busy OP.

You don’t like this woman do you? Maybe a bit of background on that would help us understand why you, out of the entire company, has made it your personal mission to see her downfall.

Can't think why there isn't a vote option 🤔

Weird stalkery behaviour.

I know someone this happened to - a ‘helpful’ (i.e. jealous and spiteful) colleague reported there was no record of ‘Elizabeth Jones’ having the degrees claimed. Which there wasn’t.

Myrtle Elizabeth Bottom (not the real name but a similar old fashioned first name and a surname leading to annoying jokes) had earned them prior to changing her name when she married Robert Jones and prior to starting to use her middle name, though.

It didn’t end well for the wannabe whistleblower.

You are a wonderful example of the Workplace Handmaiden, OP. Well done.

It would be a good idea to tell as many people as possible what you have done so that they can decide how they want to be involved with you going forwards. It is always better that this sort of murky interior is brought into the light so that colleagues know what is really there.

But how can you know for sure she doesn't have those degrees?

My parents divorced and remarried, and I have been divorced and remarried, so I have had a few names over the course of my life time. My school, college, undergrad, postgraduate and professional qualifications are in 4 different names depending on the year I took them. It's a pain in the arse sometimes but I'm not sure I could change them all to the same name even if I wanted to.

If you searched under my current name you would certainly not find the others. In fact a colleague once asked to my face why they could not find one of my professional qualifications online. Fuck knows why they thought it their business to question it when my employer was satisfied. I said it's under my other name and showed them and they were clearly disappointed they had not discovered some terrible fraud.

I remember thinking what a fucking dick they were.

I hope this bites you in the arse.