Resume tips : Best plausible explanation for leaving

I have tried to be as professional, and as to the point as possible in stating the reason why I left a company and leaving out the particulars in the process. Now and then, I get flamed for it from various individuals, but it's the truth. I think what I put on my resume is that I left for legal and ethical reasons, or something to that effect.

There was a company that I worked for, and I had several good reasons for leaving it.

Every client that the company had was an entity whose business model was a pyramid scheme.
Every client that the company had terminated it's relationship due to something like non-payment, fraud, insider trading, etc.
The company did no advertising and the clients that they had were all associates in which the owners knew off.
The methodology that the company used to promote its services as an investor relations firm borderlined what the SEC considers to be pump and dump.
Knowing what I knew, I knew I was about to be tapped to write software to promote what appeared to be a pyramid scheme in violation of FTC regulations.
I had a bounced paycheck once, and I started to cash the check at the companies bank after that. Every check I got from there was on equity override. The company was also the subject of at least 1 lawsuit for not paying an employee, and various like complaints with the department of labor.

Given my position which was strictly technical support, I had an ethical problem in doing something that I felt was criminal or unethical. I was afraid of some agency coming in with a Title 30 warrant and shutting the place down. In the process I figured I would have been caught up in something that I had nothing to do with.

So once I started putting 2 and 2 together, I started looking, found a better position and left. I never put the details on the resume, and people talk about being professional, but being truthful.

How can you sugar coat the fact that you worked for an employer who you later on suspected of some serious improprieties? If I simply put I left for a better position, then I'm job hopping. If I put will explain, it's a red flag. If I put the truth (I left for legal and/or ethical reasons), it's unprofessional.

What gives or is this just a case of too many different people having too many vaired opinions on?

Why are you putting on your resume the reason for leaving a job? You should never, ever put that on a resume, with perhaps the exception of being in a short-term contract position, and the project was completed. Or, if you switched jobs within the same company due to a promotion, you state that (as in, "....promoted to Chief Bottle Washer.")

The time to explain why you left a prior job is in the interview and/or on the application.

The reason I put in there is simple. I had a number of recruiters ask for these things to go on the resume as they said they didn't like the fact that it wasn't on there to begin with.

Before that, I never put that on there.

"I left for a better job."

Thanks for that, I have considered that.

The only reason I never put that on my resume was simple. I had some recruiters accuse me of job hopping when other places just weren't financially sound and went under. So knowing that that was an issue bought up (by a recruiter and others), I figured if I put that on there, it would play into that logic.

Now given that, is that just possibly 1 of n opinions? I have had people question why I have had so many jobs, and one recruiter refused to refer me to a client based on that when the reality is they all went under or were about to go under.

Career Tips

Best plausible explanation for leaving