When Experience Becomes Fiction: Can We Still Trust Candidate Stories?

Behavioural interviews, competency frameworks and reference checks are designed to uncover the truth. But what happens when the story itself is fiction?

In this episode, Edan Haddock explores one of recruitment's most uncomfortable questions. Can candidates bluff their way through modern hiring processes? Where is the line between selling yourself and inventing achievements? And if references are chosen by the candidate, how much validation is actually possible?

This episode looks at confidence, credibility and why recruitment may need to move beyond simply asking candidates to tell us what they've done.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Hello everyone and welcome back to Eden Haddock Total Talent. I'm Eden Haddock, Head of Talent and People Experience at Movember. No guests, no sponsors, just one practitioner, still on the tools, talking about what I see happening across recruitment and talent. Today's episode started because of something that genuinely stopped me scrolling. I came across a LinkedIn profile. Now, before anyone starts wondering, no, this isn't about naming people. It isn't about exposing someone. In fact, the individual almost doesn't matter. What matters is what it made me think about. Because while sitting on that profile, I had a read. And they worked in a role at an organization I used to work for. A role I knew extremely well. I knew the projects, I knew the priorities, I knew the leadership team. I knew what had been delivered. Then I started reading the achievements, one after another. Transformation projects, programs, initiatives, outcomes, business impact. Except none of it happened. And I'm not saying someone else delivered it. I'm not saying they exaggerated their involvement. No. The work literally didn't exist. It never happened. And of course, that's led me to a question I just haven't been able to stop thinking about. If someone is willing to publicly invent experience, could they also successfully interview for it? Recruitment has changed enormously. Twenty years ago, interviews were often what are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? What motivates you? We've become much better. Behavioral interviewing, star responses, capability frameworks, competencies, evidence-based hiring, structured interviews. We've spent years trying to remove bias, trying to make hiring more objective. And that's a good thing. But the irony. Every behavioral interview still starts with exactly the same thing. A story. Tell me about a time. Walk me through. Give me an example. Describe a situation. Everything begins with a candidate telling a story. And unless someone else in the room lived through that exact experience, we're relying on trust, not proof. That's uncomfortable to admit. But it's true. Behavioral interviewing doesn't validate experience, it validates someone's ability to explain experience. They're not necessarily the same thing. Some people have incredible achievements and tell terrible stories. Others tell phenomenal stories about average work. And then there's another category altogether. People who simply invent them. Something I've noticed over twenty years in talent acquisition, aging myself again, confidence impresses interview panels. We all like to think we're immune to charisma, but we're not. People who answer quickly, speak clearly, maintain eye contact, have polished examples, they naturally feel more credible. There's a psychology to this. We unconsciously associate confidence with capability. But confidence and competence have never been the same thing. Some of the best leaders I've hired have been quietly brilliant. Some of the loudest people I've interviewed couldn't deliver once they joined. And yet, recruitment often rewards performance. Not performance in the role, performance in the interview. That's a very different skill. The interview becomes the audition, not necessarily for the job, but for telling convincing stories. And if somebody has rehearsed those stories enough, who's to say they aren't believable? Especially if nobody in the room has any way of verifying them. So I know you're thinking, well, you've gone through the interview process and then you validate through referencing, but references aren't the silver bullet we think they are. Because you know, references make us feel safe. We've checked them. But have we? Candidates choose their referees. Think about that. The person whose credibility we're assessing also chooses the people who will assess them. That's hardly independent validation. And before anyone misunderstands me, truly most referees are ethical and most candidates are honest. The overwhelming majority of people aren't inventing careers. But references are rarely designed to detect fabrication. They're designed to confirm employment, culture, working style. Would you rehire them? They're not forensic investigations, and nor should they be. As recruiters, we also have ethical obligations. We don't ring random people inside organizations. We don't go around someone's current employer asking questions. We don't breach confidentiality, and nor should we. That's fundamental to our profession. So there is an interesting paradox. We have a responsibility to validate. We also have a responsibility to respect confidentiality. And those two things don't always sit comfortably together. Which means sometimes trust becomes part of the hiring process, whether we like it or not. So maybe we're asking the wrong questions. Perhaps the answer isn't more background checks. Perhaps it isn't longer, deeper interviews. Perhaps it isn't another competency framework. Maybe it's changing what we ask. Instead of what did you deliver? Maybe ask what failed? What would your stakeholders say you got wrong? What would your manager disagree with? What compromises did you have to make? Because fabricated stories usually focus on perfect outcomes. Real careers don't. Real careers are so messy. Projects go late. Stakeholders disagree. Budgets disappear. Leaders change. Priorities shift. People who genuinely lived through work usually remember the complexity. People who memorized a story often remember the highlights. That's the difference. Now, not often, not always, you know, but there is a difference. So it's a reflection and it's a short reflection today. And I don't want this episode to leave people cynical. Most candidates are honest. Most people are trying to present themselves in the best possible light, and that's human. But there's also a difference between putting your best foot forward and inventing the foot entirely. The LinkedIn profile I saw reminded me of something important. Recruitment has become very good at evaluating stories. I'm not convinced we've become equally good at validating reality. Maybe we never completely can. Maybe hiring will always involve an element of trust. Maybe that's unavoidable. But perhaps our responsibility as talent professionals isn't to become detectives. It's to become better listeners. To look for nuance, complexity, reflection, learning. The things that are incredibly difficult to fake over a sustained conversation. I'd love to know what you think. Have you ever discovered experience that simply didn't add up? Have you ever hired someone whose capability was completely different to the person you interviewed? Or have you been the candidate who struggled to explain genuinely brilliant work? Because someone else was simply just a better storyteller. Please jump into the comments, join the conversation, and let me know. Short and sweet today, but if you've enjoyed today's episode, I'd really appreciate it if you followed the podcast on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Left a rating and shared it with someone else working in talent, HR, or leadership. Every follow helps this independent podcast reach more practitioners. As always, no guests, no sponsors, just real conversations coming from someone still on the tools. Thanks for listening. I'm Eden Haddock. I'll see you in the next episode.