As usual in this sort of topic, @blossom seems completely on target. I run a boutique consulting firm that works on a fairly senior level in big companies, write books, and do pro bono projects (helped settle a civil war once). The ability to think well and then communicate orally and in writing and verbally are paramount are at a higher level (though writing seems less important than PowerPoint making clarity in the companies I work in). One of the key problems for hiring becomes getting through initial gates. There are now major-related hiring hurdles – it appears to be much harder to get considered without at least some technical skills for a lot of jobs.
The technical gate means that kids with non-technical skills have fewer opportunities. It creates pockets of real strength that are undervalued by the market. I always hire an executive assistant who is bright, proactive and charming. These days, the pocket are young women who are English or other non-technical majors. The job involves dealing with senior execs and government officials, organizing complex international travel, personal stuff (taxes, investments, vacations, dinner meetings, personal events, helping me help my wife and kids). Lots of problem solving in ever-changing situations. Twenty years ago, the pocket that had the highest IQ points per dollar were single mothers.
To the original topic, prestige of school does matter in some industries as does prestige of employer. I attended three of the most prestigious universities in the world and taught at one of the top business schools. Attending each improved the probability of getting a good next position and even now, people pay attention. In other fields, prestige does not matter: technical and/or competence or past success is all that matters.
No offense, but I don’t think blossom refers to travel arrangements and personal support, though it’s true bright young folks with flexible skills (and charm) are needed in those roles. And not just females.
Thanks lookingforward. I was indeed referring to roles leading to management, not EA’s.
Re: the “technical gating”- yes, it exists to some extent but students (and parents) need to understand exactly what that means. Taking a one semester “Buyer Behavior” course for a BS in Business Administration is NOT as powerful as taking a two semester statistics sequence, even though the goals of both courses is statistical literacy. Taking “topics in macroeconomics” is NOT as helpful as taking a true macro course which has actual pre-requisites so the student can understand the underlying concepts (important) AND actually do modeling, simulations, answer “what if” questions (VERY important).
A big university is going to have a wide variety of content courses- some of which ALSO help with the technical gating issues and some of which will not. I’m not impressed with an “International Business” major who doesn’t speak and read a foreign language; I’m not impressed with a marketing major who has never taken a big data or analytics course; I’m not going to fall out of my chair to hire an accounting major who cannot express coherently why a change in tax policy (i.e. Trump’s suggested 15% corporate tax rate) is going to have a huge impact on the economy. I don’t care if they get the answer wrong (nobody knows is the right answer) but not to be able to discuss intelligently why corporate tax is a factor in economic growth, what the trade-off’s might be for a company evaluating a lower tax rate in terms of where to put a facility or to expand, how that might change interest rates, inflation rates, etc… that does not suggest to me a “prestigious” accounting degree.
What would you recommend for a student at a non-elite college or university majoring in classics, biology, history, philosophy, chemistry, or other major without much in the way of obvious major-specific jobs to do in order to be recruitable and hirable for the types of employers that you recruit for?
1- seek out intellectual opportunities. Write that honors thesis. Apply for fellowships. Take the job editing a professor’s book over the summer instead of heading back to your lifeguard or camp counselor job back home.
2- make sure you cover the ground on analytics and problem solving. Even the formerly “creative” fields (there is a great article in either the Times or WSJ today about marketing and how data has transformed it) now all need strong quant skills. The sales jobs which used to be fantastic career paths for kids with liberal arts degrees (media sales, commercial real estate, P&C insurance, corporate banking services) are all shifting to a more analytical/spreadsheet model.
3- Read, read, read. Wall Street Journal, Economist, even Vanity Fair and New Yorker. The best way to sound like you know what’s going on in the world is to know what’s going on in the world.
4- Visit your college’s career center and actually take their advice. When they tell you that if you’re interested in a career in media and here is a list of 40 alums who work for networks, ad agencies, and TV/film production companies, you need to actually email these folks and ask them to spend 20 minutes on the phone with you discussing their jobs and their company. When they tell you that twirling your hair is irritating during an interview- stop twirling your hair. When they tell you that you CANNOT blow off a final round interview senior year because you think being with your sorority sisters in Cancun is more important- cancel your trip. Or accept the consequences- not getting an offer in April to start in July.
5- Talk to your professors. They have rolodexes too. Recent alums who stay in touch. Colleagues who are on the boards of startup companies. Professional associations, folks in corporations who have retained teams of professors as consultants. You cannot afford to let this connection with your professors lapse until after graduation- you be the kid who walks in to office hours saying, “I’m looking for a job in supply chain management with a consumer products company. Do you have suggestions for me in my search”. If the professor hands you a manual and says, “if you can teach yourself this program you will be a strong candidate” then go back to your dorm and teach yourself the damn program!!!
If you got a soon-to-graduate applicant who did all of these things who was at a school like CSUDH, Rowan, Bloomsberg, Western Carolina, North Florida, etc. would you give him/her similar consideration as an applicant from HYPSM?
The only school on your list that I’ve hired from is Rowan. It is a very solid institution with fantastic kids who emerge with a rigorous education. I can’t speak to the others.
I think the more accurate way to describe the dynamic is that graduating from Rowan is not a professional obstacle, all things being equal. A student is going to have to work harder to get his/her resume in front of decision makers if he/she is applying for a job from a company which does not send a team of interviewers to their college.
UCB- what type of role is this student interested in- and what has he/she done so far? I can be more helpful with specifics than with generalities. It is a stretch to say that a student from Bloomsberg is going to be on equal footing with a student from MIT…mainly because companies which recruit at MIT are there for very specific reasons. And for the most part- students at Bloomsberg don’t get the technical rigor that students get at MIT-- different curriculum, different type of education, different inputs.
“What would you recommend for a student at a non-elite college or university majoring in classics, biology, history, philosophy, chemistry, or other major without much in the way of obvious major-specific jobs to do in order to be recruitable and hirable for the types of employers that you recruit for?”
If they are willing to move to a city with a thriving biotech or pharma industry, the bio and chemistry majors can get entry-level jobs in the R&D labs at those companies. Degrees from elite colleges are not required.
History, classics, or philosophy majors have a tougher time. I suggest law school.
Hmmm…One philosophy major I know is now pursuing a fully funded fellowship PHD (tech oriented) at an Ivy. Another is in medical school. Doing just fine.
There’s a lengthy thread somewhere on this board about how liberal arts majors can make themselves attractive to employers. I’ll see if I can find it.
It depends on the industry and the company, I think. These graduates are not going going directly to Goldman Sachs. They should research the employers that target these schools. I also like the suggestion that they should seek locations that the grads from HYPSM are not typically seeking. I know a recent Susquehanna grad from the east coast who got a great job in Arizona. She probably will stay a couple of years then come back to NY or Boston with solid experience under her belt.
Also … look at big, national-reputation companies, but take the job or the location that nobody else wants. I know someone who was looking for jobs in journalism. A job at a prestigious national newspaper came up. He never thought he’d be able to get a reporting job there right out of college. But they needed someone to live in Detroit to cover the auto industry. Nobody else wanted to do that—most people wanted to be in the main newsroom in NY. He took the job, stayed in Detroit a couple of years and made his mark there. Now he’s a well known journalist.
There is no specific student. The point of asking is to figure out what students in liberal arts (i.e. not preprofessional) majors at non-elite schools can do to market themselves to employers. Most of the comments here about students in liberal arts majors being successful in the job market seem to have an implied assumption of being at an elite school (where elitist employers recruit in a major-agnostic way). On the other hand, career survey results from non-elite schools show large variation by major, indicating that there are many liberal arts (and often students in some of the preprofessional majors as well) students at such schools who are not marketing themselves well (or enough to compensate for whatever disadvantage they start with being from a non-elite school).
UCB- I think the disconnect is that the parents of the history major are telling the kid that the only options are becoming a history teacher or folding sweaters at the Gap. And while being a history teacher is a fantastic career for a kid who wants to teach, it’s a bad option for someone who does not.
So a kid with a history BA from a non-elite school needs to get a lot of writing experience (all large companies hire writers, even if the titles are different. Internal communications (which is either part of human resources or part of corporate communications), Executive Communications (used to be called speechwriting), Government Relations (people who track legislation at the local, state and federal level to figure out how it impacts the company), Investor Relations.
Kid majoring in chemistry? Pharma sales. Grant writer for a foundation which has a science focus. Entry level media relations for a university with a big science presence. Newsletter editor for a large hospital system. Recruiter for a company which manages clinical trials (i.e. a patient recruiter). Business development or strategy for a large chemical company, analyst for a company which makes environmental remediation equipment.
Bio? Human Resources (anything entry level) for a company which makes devices/cardio monitoring equipment. Affiliate relations for the Red Cross, Leukemia society, American Heart Association. Analyst for the CDC, market research at a pharma company, employee relations at a big HMO, patient data analyst for that same HMO.
Still not sure what question you are asking- surely you aren’t suggesting that the 95% of college grads in America who don’t attend HYPMS are unemployed forever???
However, it does appear that there are significant numbers of college graduates who are not all that successful (either financially or in other job aspects like satisfaction and career progress in the job) in the job market, often finding jobs not even peripherally related to what they studied in college or not needing a college degree (in anything) at all, and/or having financial difficulty paying off their student loans. (It is not limited to liberal arts majors, of course; pre-professional majors whose majors are targeted to declining job markets can have similar issues.)
