Have I lied on the job application?

[LisaB]

I’m currently looking for a job, and one of the questions on the application is “Have you ever been discharged from employment?” I usually mark “No.” However, three or four years ago, I got a job as a legal secretary and only “lasted” at that position for one week. It wasn’t a good match – I didn’t like the job and the employer didn’t like me. So the employer told me that “it wasn’t working out.” Since I’d only been at that job for a week, I never thought that this counted as being fired. Does it? Should I say so in my job applications when asked?

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

Usually, when requesting information about terminations, potential employers are looking for an incident more substantial than the situation you have described. Should a new employer find out about your previous job experience and ask why you did not count that as a termination, you could explain that because the job only lasted one week you considered that a mutual agreement between you and your former employer had been reached during the probationary period that there had not been a good match.