[mywittyname]

> but hardly anyone speaks to references.

I'd be surprised if this were universal. I've been the reference for several people and had references checked for every job that I've had.

I can totally understand why a company wouldn't check references (bias, mainly), but HR is full of a lot of cargo cult superstitions.

[caymanjim]

I'm probably biased here due to the length of my career; at this point, my resume is extensive and speaks for itself. References may be more important if you've got less experience.

[Sodman]

I think that's kind of the point of references though, right? Your resume speaks for itself, but you wrote your resume. It's a good sanity check for a potential employer to quickly verify that it's actually accurate.

People exaggerate on their resumes all the time. Maybe the 2 interns they supervised materializes as them managing a team of 4. Maybe the project on which their boss did the brunt of the work on becomes a project they architected and lead. It's easy enough to make all of this sound true in an interview, so it's totally logical for an interviewer to want to fact check and keep the interviewees honest.

[exolymph]

> I think that's kind of the point of references though, right? Your resume speaks for itself, but you wrote your resume. It's a good sanity check for a potential employer to quickly verify that it's actually accurate.

This is 100% true. However, people are lazy and skimp on due diligence. Just because something is a good practice doesn't mean it's always done :P

[acdha]

The times where I’ve learned someone was lying on their resume, it was always someone claiming extensive experience. Several were managers, where it’s easier to bluff, but there were applicants for senior technical positions who were apparently hoping nobody would expect them to deliver.