Graduating Into Nothing – Degrees are Not the Best Credentials

Graduate schools are havens for people who didn't have the guts to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams. Others are there to avoid disappointing their families.

An undergraduate degree is no shelter from the storm. Sure, a bachelor’s degree impacts your salary over a lifetime. But the service industry is littered with waitresses and bellhops and even a few grocery baggers who are not overly impressed with the earning power of their degrees.

I’m not going to waste time on the merits of an undergrad degree; even a basher like me has to admit a degree helps more than it hurts. No, it doesn’t guarantee you won’t serve spicy fries, but a bachelor’s degree is a career insurance policy. You won’t be blocked from an opportunity later in life because you don’t have one.

And what if you do end up in school? Should you study what you are passionate about or what ensures your future marketability? Should you approach education as an intellectual challenge or as trade school? I’m not going to settle that argument, though I would suggest learning how to market your passions over shelving your passions for commerce.

Let’s say we (reluctantly) accept the four year degree as the prudent move. Then we face a more important question: what about advanced degrees? Most undergrads look to graduate school as a family-funded parachute over the taco-stained terrain of the service industry. Can’t blame them: a college degree feels more like a high school diploma these days. It may land you a job, but not necessarily a good one, unless your dream job is restraining violent adolescents. Most graduates land in the working world with a thud and don’t like their prospects. The first impulse is to jump right back into school, and that’s the impulse we’re going to take issue with.

Graduate schools are havens for people who didn’t have the guts to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams. Others are there to avoid disappointing their families. There’s nothing quite so bitter as getting stuck in a career you didn’t want with a degree you no longer want because your family offered conditional support – if you took the path of most credentials.

That’s one good thing about degrees: the more of them you have, the more likely you are to be trotted out like a show pony at family functions. Of course, some folks are in grad school because they are in pursuit of their life’s work, and those people are to be respected. But when you go to school because you think an extra degree is going to save you from grinding coffee beans, you may be on the wrong track.

The best way to avoid grinding coffee beans is to learn how to sell them. If you think school can teach you how to do that, you’ve probably had too much schooling. In business, you either learn to cut deals or you get used to hearing about them afterwards. Since deals have a lot to do with relationships, every year you spend inside a classroom impressing your relatives is one less year you have to cultivate the relationships (and take the humbling knocks) that are behind what we call “success.”

Five years out of college, I visited a family friend who was knee deep in med school. When he learned how much money I was making and met my girlfriend, he flipped out. He was busting his ass with no social life. The only reason he was in med school was to someday make the kind of money I was already making so that he might someday date the kind of woman I was already dating. Years later, he dropped out of med school in a daze of debt and regrets. He was in the game for the wrong reasons.

If your game is making money, an advance degree is not required. It may even be a detriment. Much of what we learn in school has no bearing on professional success. Obviously scientists need PhDs, lawyers need JDs, ministers MDivs. The same goes for trades, from electrical to acupuncture.

Otherwise, advanced degrees are dangerous. PhDs can even be a hindrance to finding work in other fields; small minds get intimidated by excess credentials. You may be wondering how I feel about MBAs. They are vital to high-level executive careers, less so for anything else – as long as you are willing to put in the time and learn as you go.

The more lacking you are in self-discipline, the more useful school is. But if you can master the art of self-education, you don’t need to depend on formal schooling. Whenever you pursue ambitious goals, whether it’s parenting or writing or sailing, there is a role for specialized knowledge. The best way to acquire that know-how is in the trenches.

Each week in business, something happens that underscores something I don’t know. Recently, I found myself on the ignorant end of a business dealing which showed me I don’t know enough about global economic trends, so now I’m listening to a series of audiotapes on economics. This kind of self-education should be integrated into our lives. It’s far more affordable (and effective) to learn this way, but the catch is that you have to turn off “The Sopranos” and fire up the DVD lecture series. If that sounds like hell on earth, then the structure of school might be a better option. There is always adult education, which is a happy medium between a full-time degree program and education on-the-fly.

If you don’t think through this on the front end, you can end up with some pretty expensive trophies. I know a local artist who has a PhD he doesn’t use. His real love is painting. Yet he has an advanced degree he worked hard for; he feels the need to use it. More than a few times, he’s come to me for advice on “what’s next,” even though I haven’t set foot in a grad school classroom. Granted, he’s pretty stupid to come to me for help, but the fact that he is desperate enough to do so doesn’t inspire confidence. He doesn’t need his PhD to paint, and he definitely doesn’t need it to serve gin and tonics. As one girl looking over my shoulder while I was writing this said, “We need to become savvy consumers of our own education in America.”

Agreed. That includes understanding the limitations of formal schooling at any level. The four areas of knowledge most essential to adult happiness are: financial mastery, emotional fitness, spiritual development, and physical well-being. Success in these four areas is not something that is accomplished casually; you have to actively seek out the right knowledge and put it into practice. Yet I know of few schools that address these areas in the context of their core curriculum. We run the risk of becoming intellectually unbalanced – well versed in esoteric areas but lacking in crucial skills.

In high school, I spent more time memorizing the rivers in Oklahoma than I did learning how to write a resume. In college, I spent more time developing a critique of our economic system than learning how to succeed within it. What we *do* learn in school is not meaningless, but if we want to master the aspects of life that are central to our happiness and autonomy, we’re going to have to teach ourselves something.

The time we put into acquiring advanced degrees may rob us of the chance to master things that are more relevant to the real bottom line of our own happiness. As someone who comes from a lineage of dysfunctional PhDs, I can state with authority that the phenomenon of the miserable well-stocked mind is alive and well. Advanced degrees may or may not fit into the plan, but we need to understand their tradeoffs and limitations.

The process of asset creation does involve conquering new fields, and new fields are best conquered through the integration of theory and practice. Self-education plays a hugely important role, but formal degrees are not the only turnstile. Starting your own company doesn’t even require a bachelor’s degree. Still, I think it’s worth sucking it up and getting that behind you. Beyond undergrad, all bets are off.

Degrees should be pursued when they are the one obstacle in the way of our best livelihood. Otherwise, we’re better off in the beautiful uncertainty of the garage, tinkering around with old computer parts alongside the ghost of young Steve Jobs. In the end, we make credentials out of our accomplishments.

Want to buy Free From Corporate America or see reviews of the final published version from readers like yourself? The printed book is now available on Amazon.com with product reviews.

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