China Recruitment Thinking-Resumes Are Too Limited
I saw a great quote suitable for China recruitment thinking from Earl Richburg on LinkedIn.
“Resumes and online applications do not tell the whole story.”
This is so well said. Our company, from our viewpoint in China, could not agree more. We further always add that interviews do not tell the whole story either. SHI Group China uses resumes and asks candidates to update them to give us accurate resumes, but people rarely do. We interview for 90 minutes or more. It takes time to really piece together a candidate’s work history to understand what he or she really has. This also gives us lots of details to go background check.
Most candidates, especially at senior positions are masters of the interview process. They can tell very detailed and believable stories about things that never happened at all. Often our customers are enamored with these people as a good story is always more interesting than real life. They are shocked to learn that while they really enjoyed hearing the stories, the best stories are not true at all.
Also see Recruitment in China
Our China Recruitment Thinking Made a Breakthrough in 2008
When we first learned to look behind the resume and interview, the results shocked us. In 2008, I remember placing a supply chain manager in Beijing who would report to the US. We had two good candidates. The customer favored the man. 
Tentatively, we looked behind the resume and found absolute proof that he had lied to make himself look good. This result shocked us as suddenly we could imagine what that guy would do with suppliers with his oversight an ocean away. We withdrew him. They hired the woman, and she still works for them today.
That day showed us our high-level interview skills had limits. According to our concern to get good people, we interviewed that guy long, deep and skillfully and could not discern what was behind his words. We would never be the same. From that day forward we committed to not just find people of apparent integrity and talent. At SHI Group, we continue to take responsibility to prove if these people objectively have a higher level of honor as well as real talent. Now, we possess a yet stronger system to find the truth. Great hires are out there, and they are not usually the best at interviews. See China Recruitment.
9 years after that breakthrough day, we know a lot more shocking stories and have found a lot of great hires.
For China Recruitment thinking, we heartily agree that the resume and on-line application do not tell the most important stories.
See also Ideal China Recruitment: Perfect Hires and Perfect Companies?