www.fastcompany.com: When Giancarlo Martinez applied a few years ago to be a web developer at Genome, a digital marketing firm in New York, he was confident that he had the ability. But he couldn’t help but wonder whether company recruiters would be able to recognize his chops—and even if they did, he worried that they still might not give him a chance.
6 comments:
This article posed a good point: do you pick the employee with a college degree or do you pick the self-taught employee. I think a lot of our society is focused on how going to a good college can change ones’ circumstances, however, I also think that it’s important to recognize skill. One thing I often forget is that the theater industry and the entertainment industry as a whole is just as much about connections as it is experience. However, I do think that in the entertainment industry our experiences are somewhat reflective of our credentials. People who work on Broadway are probably really good at their job. They need to be and their skill level should be very high if they are performing at that caliber of work. However, who's to say that they got to Broadway based solely on their connections and not on skill at all. It’s such a toss up. Really interesting article. Food for thought.
I am confused by what Al said about college degrees being worth a lot less because he seems to say that college degrees aren't worth a lot but most jobs require a college degree know. It is true that having a college degree doesn't make you stand out anymore but I don't think that removes the worth of having it. If more jobs require you to have a degree then the worth of having a degree is a lot more. Back when getting a college degree was a standout, it wasn't worth it for some who to scrounge together money to go to college because they could get a well-respecting job but now it is worth it. I think the most helpful line of the whole article is ““It’s what you can turn out.” So many people are worried about what college they go to, what internships they get or what shows they’ve worked on here at Carnegie Drama but it is really about those practical skills. People use connections, not because of the degrees on the table but because a supervisor saw the output of a worker. I think something I always forget is that people see the positives as well as the negatives and not just the negatives. This is a helpful reminder. I know the article said that we are on the cusp of a new revolution but I feel that the theatre industry has always been like this. People get things through connections and through their soft interpersonal skills just as much as through hard skills and degrees. Of course, Carnegie Mellon is a top-notch educational program but what makes it super amazing is its connections that it has to the entertainment world.
We are moving more and more into a world were yes college degrees mean less and less as they become more common and more of a common requirement for higher level jobs in larger economies as they are expected simple as common place. Special skills now are something that I think is meant purely to set people apart in an ever growing applicant field. The most interesting thing to me is special skills or certifications don't always make for the best workers. They mean you are proactive and are able to do that certain skill but in my mind the things that set people apart the most is their willingness to learn and their and their ability to work with others and these are still two things that I don't think their is any paperwork to prove. One would think a college degree would be a good representation of these things but nowadays with the price of college and the wide spread demand its hard to tell and its no longer were you go but what you do with the degree. Most of what college can provide now is through networking and obtaining information and connections with people higher up the totem pole earlier on in life then going into the field and working your way to that point.
I agree with Mattox and his comments about the decrease in value of college degrees. It's a shame, but having a bachelors doesn't hold the same weight that it used to. Earning a college degree is now the norm, not the exception when applying for jobs. To help supplement your resume, successful job hunters have began to learn more unique skills. These can include sewing, welding, coding, etc. It's hard when hiring to choose between degrees and experience. By going to school an earning a degree in a specific field, the applicant has shown that they are more than willing to put in the time and money to learn these skills. However, you can't be sure what exactly their education encompassed. With an applicant who has experience but no education, you know that they can do the job you're hiring for, but you can't gauge their knowledge against a standardized education.
I think this article is really relevant to our industry. Here at CMU we are being highly trained for one very specific niche. Sure, a lot of us go into this niche right out of school and a lot stay in this industry, but there are also a lot of people that leave the industry and use the valuable skill sets they learned here elsewhere. Some go into business without an MBA, some go into medical project management without a degree in that field, but they still have the budgeting, leadership, management skills that they learned here. It is hard to realize as a freshman, but now I see how this program creates some extremely well rounded professionals while training them to work in the theater. When I worked on the grounds crew for the Baltimore Orioles (yeah, I know it’s cool) I learned a lot of skills that I use ever day even though I’m not sweeping dirt and mowing grass. There are general skills you can learn without a degree and they are so valuable, atleast they have been for me.
This article brings to mind the simple labor question of and workforce that you wish to have a high level of skill, how do messaure skill and the way a worker would attain said skill? With the market place of skilled labor being seen and that of monopolistic competition in economic terms (ie that of much the same that needs to differentiate there product to sell) we saw a steady increase in higher education use to be that differentiation. I feel that this article brings into mind that with the fact that multiple industries are progressing so rapidly there is a higher amount of influence in learning skills in the natural flow of life because it demonstrates the skill of being continuously improving in your education on any matter. And as the article states this doesn’t necessarily state that higher education is thus completely with out merits but rather we are living in a world that has grown into having more fluid needs in education once you learn basic principles. Sub note I’m not sure what skills could ever be learn on a baseball team’s grounds crew that applies in other industries, sorry Drew.
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