Why the Job Market “Trust Gap” is an Existential Threat to Clinical Research

This week was very much like most: my team and I flagged twelve fraudulent candidates. These weren’t just “embellished” resumes or slightly padded dates. These were sophisticated, coordinated attempts to bypass the vetting process for high-stakes clinical trial roles like Clinical Research Associates (CRAs) and Mid-level Management.

And what makes this scarier?

For most clinical trial hiring managers at small to mid-sized pharmas, biotechs, or medical device companies, these twelve individuals would have looked like the “perfect” hires. But in today’s market, the “perfect” resume is often a mask for a catastrophic risk.

The Anatomy of the Job Market “Trust Gap”

We are currently operating in what I call the 80% Noise Market. Based on our internal data and the current landscape of the Clinical Research sector, the applicant pool has fractured into three dangerous tiers:

• 60% are Falsified: These candidates have faked all or part of their experience, education, or references, often using sophisticated digital footprints that appear legitimate at first glance.
• 20% are AI-Generated: These are “ghost candidates.” They don’t exist but are AI-driven personas designed to farm interviews or collect sensitive company data.
• The “Real 20%”: These are the genuine professionals with real credentials. AKA…these are the ones you want to evaluate and qualify.

If your internal HR team is drowning in hundreds of applications, they aren’t just looking for a needle in a haystack. They are trying to identify a real needle in a pile of five hundred high-quality fakes.

Why the “Fast Hire” is the Enemy of the Safe Trial

I have spent over three decades in the hiring seat, including a decade in leadership at IBM. Before co-founding our firm, I was an executive at IBM, leading projects involving over 17,000 people.

I know the pressure you are under. 

When you have a clinical trial to monitor or a department to scale, an empty seat feels like a bleeding wound.

However, in the Clinical Research world, a “bad hire” isn’t just an HR headache. It is a liability that can tank your company.

Let’s look at the Clinical Research Associate (CRA) role. CRAs are the primary line of defense for patient safety and data integrity. They operate with high independence, so a fraudulent CRA hire can go unnoticed for months, but the damage they leave behind is permanent:

• Patient Safety & Ethics: An unqualified person may miss protocol deviations or fail to verify informed consent. This isn’t just a paperwork error; it’s a direct threat to human lives.
• Data Integrity Failure: If the FDA or EMA identifies that your Source Data Verification (SDV) was handled by someone with falsified credentials, they won’t just ask for a correction. They can reject your entire dataset.
• The “Rework” Multiplier: The cost of a bad hire is often cited as $50,000. In Clinical Research, it is 10x that. Every site that a fraudulent CRA monitored must be re-monitored by a qualified professional. You are paying twice for the work and losing months of progress.
• Regulatory & Legal Fallout: We are seeing an increase in “negligent hiring” lawsuits. If a fake employee harms a study participant, the company faces millions in fines, and in extreme cases of GxP non-compliance, leadership can face criminal charges.

Finding the “Real 20%”

So, how do you navigate a market where 80% of the entries are noise?

It requires moving away from “Active” applicant pools and leaning into Passive Sourcing and Niche Partnerships. The high-quality, mid-career professionals you need are those with the resilience and adaptability to thrive in a startup or mid-sized environment. And guess what? They aren’t usually spending their time in a sea of AI-generated applications.

They usually don’t apply at all. Instead, they are working, being referred, and being vetted by people who know how to spot the “formulaic” interview answer and the “mismatched identity” red flags.

At my agency, we don’t just “find” candidates; we verify the unverifiable. We use our three decades of hiring expertise to protect your trial, your data, and your reputation.

You don’t have time to be a fraud detective, but you do have a clinical trial to run. Let’s make sure the people running it with you are the real deal. Don’t let a ‘ghost candidate’ become a regulatory nightmare. Message me today to learn how we identify high-quality CRAs in a market full of noise.

Sources and Additional Reading

• PharmiWeb: Recruitment Fraud Risks Report: Analyzes the “Applicant Avalanche” and the rise of automated/fake credentials in Life Sciences.
• CCRPS (Center for Clinical Research Practice): Their “5 Strategies to Prevent CRA Fraud” lists the specific red flags of candidates using generic “Formulaic” interviewing.
• FDA: GCP Inspection Findings & Data Integrity: Official reports highlighting how data integrity failures lead to trial rejection and market delays.
• ACRP: Elements of Fraud and Misconduct: Professional standards defining the red flags and ethical requirements for CRAs and monitors.
• U.S. Dept. of Justice: The Jessica Palacio Case: A case study on the criminal indictment of a study coordinator for falsifying clinical trial data.
• Inop.ai: True Cost of a Bad Hire: Quantitative research on the financial impact of hiring failures in specialized technical roles.
• Crosschq: Quality of Hire Report: Statistics on candidate misrepresentation and the “Trust Gap” in modern screening processes.
• Resume Builder: Candidate Survey: Data showing the percentage of applicants who admit to falsifying details on resumes and during interviews.

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Many job seekers find that avoiding ghost jobs and job scams is proving to be more challenging than the actual job search. So how do professionals find a job that is hiring? I mean actually hiring? 

FlexJobs and MyPerfectResume (MPR) conducted a survey that reported one of the biggest challenges faced by 55% of job seekers is ghost jobs, which are posted positions that really aren’t hiring. 

This same survey stated that at least 25% of people have fallen victim to job scams. 

So what are some warning signs that can help you avoid fake jobs and scams?

How to Protect Yourself

Here are some common job scams you should be aware of.  

Fake Jobs and Companies

We have been blogging about fake companies for over a decade. From our perspective, fake companies allow fake candidates to have an employment record. 

But what about real candidates? How do you spot a fake company? Heck, why does a fake company want to attract candidates to begin with? 

The quick answer is that fake companies post fraudulent job posts in order to gather your personal information. Sensitive information…which could lead to financial loss or identity theft. 

We provide a lot of advice regarding the importance of researching the company before the interview. And, we talk about researching the company before applying so you can tailor your resume. Now, I recommend researching the company to confirm it is real. 

Upfront Fees

The increase in remote positions has increased the amount of fraudulence surrounding ‘remote’ work. One very popular scam is to offer candidates a fake remote job. Once the candidates are tricked into believing they have been hired, they are asked to pay fees for equipment to be shipped out to them. 

But of course, the equipment never arrives. Employees should never be asked to pay a fee in order to start a job. 

Applicant Tracking System (ATS) Services

There is a lot of buzz about artificial intelligence (AI) and how important it is for resumes to meet ATS standards. 

And because of this buzz, a new scam has surfaced. Scammers who pose as recruiters will tell job seekers their resumes need to be updated or they won’t be found via AI or ATS scanning programs. These fake recruiters refer job seekers to a fraudulent service (for a fee, of course) that will revamp the job seeker’s resume. 

Yes, job seekers can be overlooked if important keywords are missing from their resumes or cover letters. And yes, to be ‘found’, you must include relevant keywords in your resume. But populating your resume to be found is an activity you should take for every application. There isn’t a “one-time” magic fix and you certainly don’t need to pay a service to make your resume “ATS compliant.”

You just need to take the time to incorporate relevant keywords into your resume and we show you how to do that here (free of charge). 

Staffing Agency Scams

Staffing agencies and third-party recruiters like ourselves never charge the candidate a fee. We earn our fees from the hiring entity. Meaning, that we are paid by the hiring company once you are placed with them. 

So if a staffing agency promises a placement once you pay a fee, abort. They aren’t real and they do not have a job that is hiring.

In Conclusion

If it sounds too good to be true, dig a little deeper. Even when you confirm the company posting the position is real, ensure the email domain used matches. 

For example, our domain is craresources.com. Valid team members will use an email address that ends with that domain (@craresources.com). But scammers may use a slight variation such as carresources.com. Fraudsters will leverage the reputation of a real company, real job board, or reputable social media site to trick job seekers so pay attention to the details. 

Because if you are scammed, you will lose more than a job opportunity. 

We would love to hear from you – what job scam scenarios have you heard about? 

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Do you believe that Fake CRA Applicants really exist?  If you are a hiring manager, I can guarantee more CRA candidates are lying to you than you realize. My goal is to provide Interviewers and Hiring Managers with a checklist of things to keep in mind when evaluating resumes. Please feel free to download this Checklist to Prequalify CRA Applicants!

When we first started noticing the trend of fraudulence, we identified that approximately 21% of our candidate pool had falsified all or part of their credentials. In 2023, my team estimated that over 40% of applicants who apply to our open positions are fraudulent. Today (December 2024)? We are seeing a 60% fraudulence rate.

I should note that I am speaking about true applicant fraudulence…not just the mere embellishment of qualifications. We classify CRA fraudulence as a CRA candidate who has completely falsified all or part of their credentials. This may include the falsification of their employment history, stating they have a degree they haven’t actually earned, or even providing fake references.

Tips on how to Identify Fake CRA Applicants’ Resumes

Career Builder published a survey showing that 75% of Hiring Managers have caught a candidate lying on a resume. This is almost a 20% increase from their previous report, which showed 58% of candidates had been caught lying.

Along those lines, the SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) published results from a survey that stated 85% of the 4,000 hiring managers surveyed uncovered a lie on a candidate’s resume or job application during the screening process.

Some of the trends we have identified are easy to spot…but others are more difficult to quantify. Here are some things to carefully consider when reviewing CRA candidate resumes and job applications.

My last thought…

As you review CRA resumes and job applications with the above checklist in hand, remember that you are looking for trends. There are a lot of gray areas and truthfully, honest CRAs can make some of these mistakes. For example, a lack of supporting digital footprint will not necessarily keep us from progressing a candidate but finding a fake company listed on their resume will.

Need help? Contact us – we are here to help!

The post Are your CRA Applicants Lying to You? – A Checklist appeared first on craresources.

Diploma mills have been in operation for decades. Just last December, a story reported that non-accredited Florida nursing schools sold 7,600 fake diplomas. Defendants linked to the Palm Beach School of Nursing participated in a scheme to sell phony academic credentials so that individuals could apply for a nursing license without completing required clinical instruction and coursework.

Another jarring story broke several years ago when CBS outed physicians holding fake degrees from Corllins University, a known diploma mill.

Imagine your mother or child being treated by someone who purchased an MD or nursing degree instead of earning it! 

The Trend of Fake Degrees

While the above reports are frightening, they represent an ongoing trend. Unfortunately, it is easy for individuals to represent they have a degree when they don’t. It is fast and relatively inexpensive for individuals to purchase a bachelor’s, master’s, or doctorate from diploma mills. Diploma mill applicants are not required to complete coursework, and while some diploma mills require the individual to complete a quick “life experience” survey, the only firm requirement to obtain a degree is to pay the fee. 

Havocscope is an online organization that monitors black market products and activities, and they report that selling fake diplomas as a ‘product’ is currently a 1 Billion dollar industry! They also state that bachelor’s and master’s diplomas can be purchased for around $500. And according to John Bear and former FBI agent Allen Ezel in “Degree Mills: The Billion-Dollar Industry that has Sold Over a Million Fake Diplomas”, it is estimated that more than 50% of individuals claiming to have earned a PhD purchased a fake degree from a diploma mill.

The most frightening aspect of someone falsifying their education is that a 3rd Party Background check may not identify degrees from Diploma Mills. 

What are Diploma Mills?

Diploma Mills operate without supervision from a state or authoritative agency, therefore they do not meet educational standards. Some of these institutions will claim accreditation from non-recognized agencies to make them appear valid. However, don’t let an ‘accreditation’ fool you as there are hundreds of fake accreditation agencies, which makes it more difficult to tell which educational institutions are real.  

Get Educated is currently tracking more than 300 active diploma mills. The FBI established a dynamic Wikipedia site that tracks over 400 Diploma Mills with another 300+ websites offering counterfeit diplomas.

Many diploma mills look authentic because most of them have a professional-looking website. They also have staff who answer phones and verify the Job Seeker “earned” the degree listed on his/her resume, making it virtually impossible for a 3rd Party Background check to identify the degree is fake. Some of these diploma mills even have online databases where you can enter the Job Seeker’s name and instantly “validate” the degree purchased.

How Do You Spot A Fraudulent School Or Degree?

Accreditation is important. 

Valid educational institutions should have proper accreditation. For example, in the US, when a job description requires a degree, the unspoken requirement is that you have obtained a degree from an accredited university.  

Said differently, a bachelor’s from a non-accredited university (or a university accredited by a fake accreditation agency) will not qualify you for a position that requires a bachelor’s degree. In the US, most often the accreditation expected will be from a regional agency. The six regional accreditation boards in the US are:

• • MSA – Middle States Association of Colleges & Schools
  • NASC – Northwest Commission on Colleges & Universities
  • NCA – North Central Association of Colleges & Schools
  • NEASC – New England Association of Schools & Colleges
  • SACS – Southern Association of Colleges & Schools
  • WASC – Western Association of Schools & Colleges

You may also see educational institutions with national accreditation, but these aren’t viewed to be as rigorous as the regional accreditation agencies. The three most common national accreditation agencies are: 

• • Distance Education & Training Council (DETC)
  • Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges & Schools (ACICS)
  • Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC)

There are also specialty accreditation agencies for theology training programs and careers governed by state licensing boards. 

While it is good advice to be familiar with the types of accreditations available, the easiest way to tell if a US-based educational institution is accredited is to contact the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) or the US Department of Education (USDE). We use the US Department of Education’s Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs (DAPIP) to validate someone’s US Degree.

Confirm the educational institution offers the degree. 

Once you confirm the school is accredited by a valid accreditation agency, verify that the degree is offered by the institution. For example, a CRA candidate listed a Bachelor’s in Chemistry from a small school I hadn’t heard of. After confirming the school was accredited on the DAPIP site, a quick phone call confirmed the school doesn’t offer a Bachelor’s in Chemistry. 

Demand Clarity

The Government Accountability Office reports that their: “ability to identify degrees from unaccredited schools is limited by several factors. First, diploma mills frequently use names similar to those used by accredited schools, which often allows the diploma mills to be mistaken for accredited schools. For example, Hamilton University of Evanston, Wyoming, which is not accredited by an accrediting body recognized by ED, has a name similar to Hamilton College, a fully accredited school in Clinton, New York. Moreover, federal agencies told us that employee records may contain incomplete or misspelled school names without addresses. Thus, an employee’s records may reflect a bachelor’s degree from Hamilton, but the records do not indicate whether the degree is from Hamilton University, the unaccredited school, or Hamilton College, the accredited institution.”

Always ask for additional information when a candidate lists an institution that has a similar name to others. For example, there are over twenty valid institutions with ‘Cambridge’ in the name, but according to the FBI’s listing of Diploma Mills, there are three that are known to be fraudulent. 

You also want to demand clarity when a candidate lists an educational institution but no degree, a degree without a year of graduation, or a degree without a specific area of study. Examples include:

• • Faber College; 1989 – 1992 (what degree?)
  • Faber College, BS Chemistry (what year?)
  • Faber College, Bachelors of Science; 1992 (BS in what?)

Other things to watch for:

Always compare degrees listed on the Job Seeker’s Social Media profiles to what they have stated on their resumes. You should also compare older resumes to newer ones. We often see where the candidate will change their degree in order to appear more competitive. 

International degrees can be tricky. Unfortunately, no single authority oversees the recognition of foreign degrees in the US. And while we have several clients who accept foreign degrees, we have just as many who don’t.

While I would NOT recommend you refuse candidates based on the origin of their degrees, I do advise that you be extra diligent when validating degrees obtained in other countries. 

Resources to Help Identify Diploma Mills

The key is to know what to look for and what questions to ask to validate the Job Seeker’s education. Here is a listing of the resources referred to in this article: 

• • US Department of Education – Diploma Mills and Accreditation Resources and Publications. 
  • The US Department of Education’s Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs (DAPIP)
  • Wikipedia’s list of unaccredited institutions of higher education.
  • Get Educated’s current list of active diploma mills.
  • Wikipedia’s list of unrecognized higher education accreditation organizations.

Quick Note About Certifications

Many clients and candidates ask about certifications. I am a fan. But be careful because there are many fake organizations offering certifications. I ran across one the other day that was charging three times as much as an industry-known certification from the ACRP, SOCRA, or IAOCR…and they didn’t even define the CRA role correctly. 

It is smart to obtain an industry certification or accreditation but stick with reputable organizations. 

Need Help?

Reach out to craresources. We are happy to help where we can!

The post The Rise of Diploma Mills and Fake Degrees appeared first on craresources.

Unintentional Discrimination:

In today’s podcast, we team up with a tenured CRA professional and trusted colleague, Mashaan Guy, to discuss an undesired side effect of the candidate fraudulence we are experiencing in this industry.  I am going to call this side effect unintentional discrimination. And to define the term, unintentional discrimination happens when unconscious biases or stereotypes held by companies or hiring entities negatively impact folks within certain protected classes. 

In layman’s terms, what I am finding is that instead of employing robust hiring processes that are better equipped to catch fraudulent candidates, companies are instead making broad brush decisions that may be ruling out certain groups of people. 

Unfortunately, I see honest CRAs getting caught up in this.  

So what I want to do today is address those Honest CRAs who may be making simple mistakes on their resumes that make them look fraudulent. 

Listen to Secrets of a CRA Recruiter on:

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Many hiring managers feel employment verification and background checks are a waste of time and money. Alternatively, other clinical operations managers feel an employment check protects them from candidate fraudulence. Our firm feels performing a background check is necessary for certain roles. We also believe you should always verify a candidate’s past employment…

…BUT, to properly leverage these tools in order to ensure accurate results, you need to understand each of their flaws. 

Our approach to performing employment verifications is why we can identify that roughly 60% of our applicants are fraudulent. Our process has enabled us to see that currently six out of ten applicants are falsifying all or part of their credentials. You will be surprised how many of these fraudsters can successfully sidestep a typical employment check. 

If you and your hiring team believe a typical employment check will keep you and your team safe from fraudulent candidates, your approach to hiring is faulty.

We recently updated an article outlining how fake job applicants can pass a background check. In this very special podcast, our leadership team digs deep into why properly performed employment and background checks are worth the time and money. We openly discuss the flaws of both approaches and provide tips that will help your team be more diligent in identifying top talent…

…all while avoiding fraudulent candidates.

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As we continue the discussion on how to identify fake job applicants and applicants representing a fake background, I am constantly asked, “But why not just call and verify past employment?” Seems like a reasonable question, doesn’t it?

Many Clinical Operations Managers who are aware of the candidate fraudulence epidemic feel they are protected because their company does background checks. I agree that you should do background checks. But conducting background checks and employment verifications isn’t always going to protect you from candidates who present a fake background or job history. 

Here’s why…

The Existence of Non-Existent Fake Companies

Never assume the companies listed on candidate resumes are real businesses. And be aware that these ‘fake companies’ have folks who will answer the phone and “verify” employment. We first noticed this trend in 2010 when candidates from certain “companies” consistently failed our competency assessments. As we dug deeper, we realized the companies didn’t exist and that the candidates were fake job applicants who were using these bogus companies to represent monitoring experience they didn’t have.

To date, we have identified 47 of these phony companies…with an additional 119 classified as highly suspicious. The trend of candidates using fake companies on their resumes is one of the most elusive and alarming trends we have seen.  

Why?

Because it is sometimes hard to identify that a company is fake (which is why we have so many categorized as highly suspicious). These shell companies have websites, and the individuals who establish these counterfeit companies trick Google into assigning locations to them. Business Insider first reported on this issue in 2015, not only confirming what we were already seeing in our industry but also blowing the whistle on an organization that admits to creating hundreds of phony companies.  

And don’t underestimate how committed these fraudsters are. Not only do they have staff members who answer phones to “verify” employment, but for an additional fee, they will provide positive references from “past supervisors”.

How to determine if a company is real:

It is easier to confirm that a company is real than it is to prove it is fake. However, there are specific steps you can follow that will provide insight into a company’s validity.  

Check State Registrars.

As a rule, if you have never heard of a company, you should search for its registration. If a company has legitimately been organized, it will be listed on the appropriate state’s registry. However, realize that companies do not always have to register their business where the business resides. For example, our company’s headquarters is in Florida, therefore, our business is registered with the state of Florida and can be found on Florida’s Division of Corporations site. But we were once registered in Georgia and would also be qualified to register in the state of Delaware. 

So, while you want to start with the state where the company’s headquarters is located, you may have to broaden your search if you want to rule out fraud. 

This brings us to Manta and OpenCorporates.

If searching the Secretary of State or Divisions of Corporation site for the state where the company resides doesn’t yield results, consider using the Manta Business Directory. Manta scrapes each state’s corporation database and also allows companies to register with them directly. While not as reliable as the Secretary of State listings, it can be a good resource if you are unsure which state a company may be registered with.

One of my personal favorites is to use OpenCorporates.  Their database consists of filed corporations across the globe and is extremely accurate. However, if you use this resource often, you will be required to pay a membership fee. But if you hire CRAs, the fee is worth it. 

What isn’t likely to be found:

Fictitious Names and Trade Names can be difficult to trace. For example, while you can easily find our corporation name on our state’s corporation site, you won’t be able to find our trade name. This means that while trade names are required to be registered, they aren’t easily searchable like corporation names are. Much like single-member LLCs, they can be difficult to track down and even more difficult to prove as fraudulent. 

What happens if you can’t verify that the company is real?

If you are unable to verify the legitimacy of a company through a corporation search, you can certainly research its online activity. 

Start with a LinkedIn presence. While not all valid companies have LinkedIn, if the company does have a LinkedIn presence, you will be able to gain insight into its validity. Start by assessing how fleshed out the company’s profile is. Then, take a look at the individuals who are connected to it, along with their titles, etc. You should know that anyone can build a fake LinkedIn company page and have many people connect to it, but real people will be posting as well as sharing information about company milestones. LinkedIn companies also include an Insights tab that will show a history of employees connected to it.   

If the company is a sponsor claiming to conduct trials in the US, you can also check out clinicaltrials.gov. Just be aware that not all studies are required to be on this government site. You can also search for press releases, and check out other resources such as Crunchbase. 

We also keep a history of companies we can’t verify (note the 119 companies I referred to as ‘suspicious’ at the beginning of this section).  Let’s just say that trends will start to reveal themselves if you just track history. 

Even if the Company is Real, Be Diligent in Background and Reference Checks

I am finding more and more companies failing to conduct thorough reference and background checks. And here’s the problem…often, the operations managers don’t know these important steps are being skipped or side-stepped. 

If you are an operations manager, find out what the background and reference check processes are.  We provide some important items to consider in a different article, but here are a few important things to confirm.  

See if there is a financial threshold for background checks. 

I just spoke with someone last week who told me their HR would only pay for a ‘first level’ employment verification. Some of our larger industry CROs and Sponsors require a verbal employment verification, and background check companies will charge extra for that extra step. 

In this particular instance, my friend told me that she had gut churns when interviewing the candidate and was counting on the employment verification to either confirm or deny her suspicions. She didn’t know human resources wouldn’t conduct an employment verification if it required an extra charge. Unfortunately, sidestepping this employment verification resulted in a bad hire. She later found out that the individual had never worked with the large CRO represented on his resume.  

Being thorough in the background check would have avoided the situation.  

Find out if there is a limit to how much your company will spend on any aspect of the background check. Keep in mind that a thorough background check goes well beyond a criminal history and employment verification analysis. If there is a threshold set for any portion of the background check, either obtain permission to exceed that threshold or speak to your leadership about alternative methods of obtaining a thorough result. 

Always do both. 

Companies will often skip reference checks, but as noted above, background checks aren’t always effective. Because of our experience with fake job applicants, we actually put more stock in reference checks if done properly.

Especially when it comes to confirming the experience of contractors. Just know that background checks aren’t going to be effective in some instances, and reference checks aren’t effective in others. Do both, and you will increase your chances of confirming the candidate’s qualifications. 

Reference checks should always be verbal. 

Why? For two reasons. First, references can be easily falsified. Fake job applicants will go to great lengths to represent someone as a past clinical operations manager when they are really a sister, a wife, a friend, a colleague, or someone from their ‘fake company’ arrangement. 

Business emails can be spoofed, so even if the candidate is using an email from a well-known company domain, don’t assume it is valid. Create a reference template that includes open-ended questions that cover hard and soft skills. Then, verbally speak to each reference. Verify the candidate’s title, the dates they worked together, and the company where they worked together. Then, dig into the reference questions. Be sure to listen with your ears and with your gut. Pay attention to what they are saying as well as their pauses while also tuning into energy shifts. If you are ‘using your gut’ during these calls, you will be able to feel it if something is amiss.

This brings me to the second reason why you want to check references verbally. People are more likely to be forthcoming with the truth when in a verbal discussion versus responding to a questionnaire through email. When you ask a direct question, honest people will want to answer it. They may still pause, but they will still be more honest with their answers.  

Was the Company in Operation when the Candidate ‘Worked’ there?

I just had an applicant whose resume showed she was employed by a company two years before it was formed. We also consistently see folks state they worked for a company after it was no longer in business. Always make sure the candidate’s employment dates align with when the companies were active so that you can catch fake job applicants who claim they worked for a company before or after the company existed.

We have also seen a strong trend where candidates list multiple companies on their resumes that did exist but have been acquired or gone out of business. This act alone doesn’t necessarily mean fraudulence, but digging deeper to verify employment can be a challenge. And in some instances, impossible. 

In Conclusion

You are probably thinking that being thorough with background checks (especially employment verification) and references is a lot of work.

It is.

We analyze every candidate who crosses our threshold using the above steps. Every time. Being thorough in our approach is how we have been able to identify that approximately 60% of the candidates applying to our open positions are fake job applicants. This qualification process is time-consuming and can be overwhelming. But it is important because our practice of being thorough has enabled us to build history on candidates and identify fake companies. 

It takes time to identify those candidates who are valid. And while it isn’t always possible to prove that a candidate is fake (until it is too late), knowing who is ‘real’ and truly qualified is extremely important.

Make sure you and your leadership team are diligent because fake job applicants can pass a background check. If you see something that seems off and would like our advice, just let us know. We are here to help! 

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Blowing the whistle can be one of the most difficult decisions anyone can make. According to the Office of the Whistleblower Ombuds (a government site), blowing the whistle can have long-lasting personal impacts for the whistleblower as well as their loved ones. This makes the following detail something that I seriously appreciate because I feel her story will help many hiring managers in our industry.  

Not too long ago, someone reached out to me because a close personal friend of hers had participated in what she believed to be a Fake CRA program. To protect this whistle-blower, I am going to refer to her as Amanda. Here is her story: 

I Would Have Never Believed It…

Hi Angela – I happened to run across your article about fake CRA candidates being relatively (unfortunately) common in the market. Happy to provide more detail, but long story short, I know someone who went through a paid “program” to become a CRA. He did online classes for 6 months, was provided with a resume with 13 years of job experience that didn’t exist, and this person somehow made it through the interview process and got a 6-figure offer. 

This “program” also is somehow apparently able to get these candidates through the employment verification process (if one is even conducted). It’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard of and I wouldn’t have believed it unless I saw the process happen right in front of me. 

While Amanda’s story is concerning, I also find it refreshing that the industry is starting to accept that CRA candidate fraudulence is a big problem.  

Blowing the Whistle on the Program

The impact of Fake CRAs on our industry.

While Amanda understood that her friend was being unethical by misrepresenting his experience, she wanted to know exactly what harm or danger he (or others like him) could cause. 

From a cost perspective, if a CRA is fake and has to be replaced, it costs the company money to remonitor the work. But what if the CRA is fake and not immediately identified or replaced? What if the FDA conducts an investigation and finds the study wasn’t monitored properly? 

And what about the safety of the patients involved in these studies? Do you want your mother taking a chemo drug that wasn’t properly monitored? It goes without saying, but in an industry where patient safety is paramount, do we really want to sidestep this issue? Isn’t having well-trained and highly qualified clinical research associates monitoring our studies critically important? 

Some might argue that poor-performing CRAs can cause similar issues. I agree. But why settle for either when you can avoid both?  

Amanda’s details on the program: 

I’d prefer not to share the name of the person I know who went through the program as it’s, unfortunately, a close personal situation. But I do hope that the program overall will be found out and shut down so that they don’t continue this cycle of fake candidates on the job market. 

I did see that there were about 30 students in the virtual class. They are given different versions of resumes tailored to different roles they are applying for under various English names. Upon offer, they give their legal name with the explanation that the name used is just an English name. I assume this is so they can pass a background check. 

The experience that was put in the resume of the person I know was with [ removed the list of CROs ]. 13 years of roles in total. He’s never worked at any of these places, or in this industry at all. 

In fact, he has never had a corporate job at all. Has been unemployed for the last 2 years and before that, helped with a small family business. 

Interviews Will Not Always Identify Fraudulence

What we find is that these organized groups spend considerable effort training these fake CRA candidates on how to pass interviews. Additionally, many of these programs offer substitute ‘proxy’ interviewers. Alternatively, they often have someone on standby to feed the answers to the candidate through headsets or on-screen messages.

We provide an extensive interview fraudulence checklist in another article but I do want to state this: even if a proxy isn’t used, if the person conducting the interview doesn’t dig deep enough, the candidate may seem highly qualified. We just recorded a podcast that speaks to how difficult it is to identify a fake CRA through an interview alone because these candidates have been taught how to answer the basics.

One of the reasons an employment verification may not protect you:

I’m not sure if they falsify the employment verification. Perhaps they create the resume by listing companies where they know people that they can pay off to falsely verify employment. Or maybe they just hope companies do not verify the employment history. 

[ Removed CRO’s name ] is one company that interviewed him. They conducted an employment verification and he didn’t get an offer so I’m not sure if they caught the lies or just didn’t end up having an opening. He has now been placed with a medical device CRO as a Senior level CRA. 

I hope this information helps to stop at least one of these programs from continuing. 

Amanda’s Story Isn’t Unique

Amanda’s story is one we are unfortunately quite familiar with. Currently, 50-60% of the CRA candidates applying to our open positions are found to be fraudulent. And for clarity purposes, we classify candidate fraudulence as someone who has completely falsified all or part of their credentials. It could include fabricating their employment history, stating they have a degree they haven’t earned, or providing false references. 

That is up from 21% when we first identified the issue over a decade ago. 

We Want to Hear Your Story

While our firm is actively providing checklists to companies so they can protect themselves against candidate fraudulence, I don’t believe those checklists alone are going to resolve the situation. If we want to gain control over the CRA candidate fraudulence that is plaguing our industry, we have to band together.

We have to dialogue about what is going on and share solutions to address the issue. What experiences do you have that would be helpful for others to hear? 

Blowing the whistle can be hard. But this topic is important to our industry and I will ensure your confidentiality. I hope to hear from you soon.

The post Blowing the Whistle on Fake CRA Programs appeared first on craresources.

About twenty years ago I had a mentor who told me that interviewing was the worse way to identify talent. I thought he had lost his mind. But with the rise of the fake interview, I see some wisdom to his point.

Now I am not going to go on record stating that we should throw out the interview. But I will state that an effective vetting process starts long before scheduling an interview. And when it comes to the actual interview, strict guidelines should be followed to ensure the interview is effective and the results are trustworthy.

We just had a candidate who couldn’t get his speakers to work during a video interview. After fifteen minutes of troubleshooting, the issue seemed to generally resolve itself, but his sound kept going in and out throughout the entire discussion.

Perhaps the issue truly was technical. But if you had heard the many fake interview stories that I have heard, you would be suspicious.

We were. 

So how do we, as recruiters and hiring managers, make sure we are giving job seekers a break when they are genuinely experiencing an issue during an interview? Alternatively, how do we know to classify the interaction as a fake interview?

This is an important topic because I feel that many recruiters and hiring managers are so shell-shocked from interview fraudulence that they are ruling out good and honest candidates. Join us for this week’s round table where we dig deeper into the topic.

Listen to Secrets of a CRA Recruiter on:

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The post Roundtable: Is it a Fake Interview or Technical Issue? appeared first on craresources.

From a CRA staffing perspective, I believe all of us can agree that we have some work in front of us to clarify the barrier to entry into the role.  We also need to define the CRA role more consistently. Wouldn’t it be nice if all sponsors and CROs were in agreement on titles and the qualifications of CRAs at various levels?

With all of that in mind, I have recently been seeing bloggers and ‘experts’ state that a ‘scandalous byproduct of the COVID-19 pandemic’ is candidate fraudulence.

How ridiculous.

We have been experiencing serious CRA candidate fraudulence in this industry for well over a decade. Unfortunately, some folks are just going to do what they can to fake the system (any system, actually). But what about those candidates who have honestly tried to break into the role and been unsuccessful?

Jeslyn Atanu joined us to discuss her perception of the confusion around the barrier to entry into the CRA role. We also bridge the topic of how it may be one of the root causes of some of the fraudulence we are experiencing.

Make no mistake. I certainly do not agree that it is okay to commit fraud to gain entry into such an important role. But, I do agree there are some problems we should band together to solve within our beloved industry. And better defining the barrier to entry into the CRA role is one of them.

Join us as we lay it all on the line. And while we didn’t magically solve all of our industry’s issues, we sure did shine a light on several of them.

Listen to Secrets of a CRA Recruiter on:

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The post Podcast: Barrier to Entry…a Root Cause to CRA Candidate Fraudulence? appeared first on craresources.