I'm evaluating some resumes, and I noticed that one of them has copied a company description directly from their website. It stood out because it was in much better English than other sentences around it, and a Google search confirmed this.
Is this an accepted practice, or should it be considered plagiarism?
It basically looks something like:
Company name
Description copied from the company's About Us page.
Job duties
- List of skills/experience in worse English than the above.
This seems entirely reasonable to me. The purpose of that sentence is just to tell you who the company is if you've never heard of them before. Unless you can write a better description than their PR team did, it makes perfect sense to quote this; it's how they would like to be described.
This isn't plagiarism, just quotation, in a situation where an unattributed quote is entirely acceptable. As writing sins go, this hardly rises to the level of peccadillo.
It also isn't an attempt to mask the applicant's writing skills or lack thereof; if that had been the goal they would have had someone proofread the rest of the resume before submitting it. In fact, their failure to do so raises more questions for me than the quote you're worried about.
A company description is just that: a company description. The goal is to tell you what the company does, that's all. Usually companies spend time and much thought trying to define the purpose of their company in a single sentence - I don't see how it's bad for a person to use it as it is on their website. The goal here is to inform you about the company, not to write an essay.
If you received 100 000 resumés, well, maybe you can use it as a throw-away rule, but it's kind of sad because the person could be the most competent you'll ever meet... and you would disregard him for a small reason like that.
To me, bad grammar and spelling is way worse than this.
Is this an accepted practice, or is it as bad as my instincts tell me?
The example you show is pretty common/accepted practice, in my experience. In particular, non-native speakers often copy such statements. It's easy to see why.
I'm not sure why you judge this as "bad" though.
Unless extremely strong skills in original written English were a clear requirement for the position, I don't see anything bad here at all.
For me, this statement is pure fluff anyway. Even omitting it wouldn't be a problem for me when I'm reading a resume. Pasting in a good statement about the company which was copied from their website would be just fine - as long as it didn't waste too much space on the page.
For me, I don't consider pasting in a company statement as "plagiarism" any more than I consider pasting in the company name or address as "plagiarism".
Your mileage may vary. Perhaps for the position you are attempting to fill it would be important for the applicant to hand-craft the statement about the company. That's never been the case for any positions I've tried to fill.
Many companies have an "elevator statement" policy, where employees and ex-employees are asked to describe the enterprise and services in a boilerplate, verbatim fashion. This is as widely derided now as the "mission statement".
A copy and paste of the official line is generally OK. Copying and pasting from your supervisor's CV is a different matter.
Plagiarism is the "wrongful appropriation" and "stealing and publication" of another author's "language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions" Wikipedia for 'Plagiarism'
Does this occur to you as a 'wrongful appropriation'? He isn't writing an intellectual paper or stealing an idea from another author. It's just a description of a company on a resume.
Now, if you detect that his work experience is copy pasted from somewhere else or made up, than maybe it would be wise to verify his employment with that company's HR department. But it seems rather silly to ding him for using a company's description on his resume.
I'd rate the applicant's cut and paste of that paragraph as a minor offense,if it's two or three sentences. At any rate, the applicant implicitly admits that his ability to write in English can use serious improvement.
I am more focused on the job description which, if it is not written in the applicant's own words, would raise a red flag - While positions may be very similar, no two pplicants are doing exactly the same job nor have the same exact work experience.
How you react is up to you. If writing ability is important to the position, the applicant just screened himself out unless his other abilities are outstanding to you.
Plagiarism in resumes can range from mildly detrimental, such in the case you cite, to a serious problem.
As others have said, the company description is something they've created for public use. That doesn't make it good to use on a resume. It is using valuable space where the applicant could use that space to show why they are a good choice for your job opening. The company name is needed, but why a description at all? In this case it is also providing a stark contrast in writing styles, making their own look worse than it would without the comparison right there. Still, if the rest of the resume makes them look like a likely choice, it should not be a disqualifier, just a point of information about them.
In other cases, plagiarism is a serious issue, and is worth discarding a resume over. Some examples of how it is bad are found in various AskAManager columns such as this and this. A person who can't do enough of the work to write a resume is probably going to be unable to do the work of the job, and also has unclear concepts of appropriate professional behavior.
Unless the rest of their resume is also copied directly from somewhere else, this isn't a problem that should affect whether or not you hire them. It would be nice if they had included a link to the website to show where they got that quote, but it's not entirely necessary.
It does show that they are trying to put their participation in this company above their own achievements therein, and that might set off some alarm bells for you. But, consider that in regards to what position they are actually applying for. English composition might not be a requirement for the position you've advertised, and as long as you can still understand what they are saying, you should take this as a valid resume.
I would personally throw out the resume. I would consider it plagarism. He did not cite the refernce. It is an indicator of lack of character.
