Is "Résumé Botox" Quietly Killing Your Hiring Process?

I graduated in 1994. You won't find that on my résumé. And after reading this, you'll understand exactly why, and why it matters for your hiring process.

 More than one in four Canadian workers are deliberately scrubbing their résumés. Trimming job titles, dropping early roles, leaving off graduation years - not because that experience doesn't matter, but because they're afraid it'll work against them. This is what we now call "botoxing" your résumé.

Over 1,000 Canadian adults were surveyed earlier this year and found that 28% of workers are doing exactly this. Smoothing out the lines. Making themselves look younger on paper. And honestly? You can't blame them.

The numbers are hard to ignore

When it comes to something as simple as including a graduation date, the drop-off by age is striking:

• 67% of workers aged 18-34 would comfortably include it

• That drops to 45% for workers aged 35-54

• And falls to just 33% for workers 55 and older (this is where I fit in)

This isn't about formatting preferences. Workers are making calculated decisions to hide the timeline of their careers because they believe, often correctly, that it will be used against them.

And it's not just older workers feeling this. Concerns about ageism show up across every generation: 29% of workers aged 18-34 already feel less attractive to employers because of their age. That figure rises to 41% for those aged 35-54, and hits 77% among workers 55 and older.

It's happening on LinkedIn too

Workers are quietly removing senior titles, deleting early-career roles, and adjusting how they talk about themselves in interviews, all to avoid being flagged as "too experienced" for a role.

Think about what that means for you as a hiring manager or business owner. The candidate sitting across from you may have significantly more capability than what's on the page. Your screening process might be filtering out exactly the people you need.

Just remember, experience is an asset - not a liability

If you're running a small business or managing a lean team, you cannot afford to overlook experienced candidates. Mid- and late-career professionals bring something that's genuinely hard to find and even harder to train: pattern recognition, emotional intelligence, and the ability to work through hard problems without hand-holding.

These are the people who've seen things go sideways and know how to course-correct. That's not a liability - that's an asset.

"Adopt competency-based hiring" sounds great in a report. But what does it actually look like for a small business?

Here's where I'd start:

• Drop the arbitrary experience ceilings. If your screening process quietly penalizes anyone with more than 15 years of experience, you're not being strategic - you're being biased.

• Rewrite job descriptions that are unintentionally signalling "junior only." If you'd actually benefit from someone more experienced, say so.

• Challenge every "overqualified" conversation in your hiring team. That word is often bias in disguise.

• Focus interviews on what someone can do now. A résumé is a record of history. Your job, is to figure out the impact someone can have on your business TODAY.

The talent is out there. Make sure your process isn't the thing standing in the way.

Have you ever botoxed your own résumé?