Page 8 – THE MOTIVATOR – October 2017
Why Google doesn’ t care about college degress
By Gregory Ferenstein
Google isn’ t big on college degrees, although the search giant is inundated with applicants touting perfect GPAs from Ivy League schools.
Google’ s chairman and head of hiring, Laszlo Bock, has given a few insights in the New York Times on how he sorts through a multitude of bright applicants.
The upshot is that Google values the skills and experiences that candidates get in college, but a degree doesn’ t tell them much about talent or grit.
You don’ t need
a college degree to be talented“ When you look at people who don’ t go to school and make their way in the world, those are exceptional human beings. And we should do everything we can to find those people,” Bock said.
Many businesses“ require” a college degree; at Google, the word“ college” isn’ t even its official guide to hiring. With the rise of self-paced college courses and vocational learning, plenty of driven people can teach themselves all of the necessary skills to work at the company.
Demonstrate a skill,
not an expertise
“ If you take somebody who has high cognitive ability, is innately curious, willing to learn and has emergent leadership skills, and you hire them as an HR person or finance person, and they have no content knowledge, and you compare them with someone who’ s been doing just one thing and is a world expert, the expert will go:‘ I’ ve seen this 100 times before; here’ s what you do,'” Bock said. College degrees are, almost by definition, a certificate of expertise. A degree in journalism is a giant badge meant to tell the world that you know at least a little bit about the trade of telling stories and interviewing people.
But a degree really doesn’ t say what a graduate can do. Can they present an idea in front of a crowd? Can they build a website? Can they think interestingly about problems, or did they just pass some tests?
Logic is learned, and stats
are superimportant
“ Humans are by nature creative beings, but not by nature logical, structured-thinking beings. Those are skills you have to learn,” Bock said.“ I took statistics at business school, and it was transformative for my career. Analytical training gives you a skill set that differentiates you from most people in the labor market.”
Logical thinking goes way beyond programming. For instance, back in 2010, Facebook put up a blog post claiming that political candidates with more fans were more likely to win their race, implying that getting more Facebook fans would improve their chances. In no uncertain terms, this was a phenomenally bad argument. Maybe candidates who were already more popular just happened to have more fans. And what about candidates with fewer fans that won their races? In these cases, why did fans not matter?
The Facebook employees who ran the statistics understood some basic logic, but they didn’ t demonstrate analytical thinking. Sifting through data requires training in the latest techniques for understanding causality and creatively exploring patterns( FYI: Facebook has gotten a lot better about these types of political claims since 2010).
Prove grit
“ It looks like the thing that separates out the capable students from the really successful ones is not so much their knowledge … but their persistence at something,” Google chairman, Eric Schmidt said.
For some people, college is just really easy. They can play 10 rounds of beer-pong until 4 a. m. and still ace an organic-chemistry exam the next day while their studious roommate is up to their eyeballs in color-coded flash cards and squeaks by with a B.
A college degree can’ t tell Google whether an applicant is naturally smart or is a hard worker. Apparently, Google would rather mold someone with grit rather than someone who is a lazy high-achiever.
If you go to college,
focus on skills
“ My belief is not that one shouldn’ t go to college … most don’ t put enough thought into why they’ re going and what they want to get out of it,” Block said.
Both Bock and Schmidt are adamant that most people should go to college but that skills and experience are more important than the stamp of expertise. Bock says Google is looking for the kinds of projects candidates completed or what they accomplished at an internship.
I honestly can’ t remember the last time someone asked me what my major in college was. If you want a job at Google( or some other prestigious company), don’ t focus so much on your major, and make sure you graduate with all the skills and experiences you need to do awesome things in the world.
Richard Branson To Young Entrepreneurs: Just Do It
By our national correspondent
Through the decades, entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson has not lost that certain wunderkind vibe about him and the way he runs his brand. This aura makes him especially inspiring to entrepreneurs who are looking to start young.
“ Most young people with good ideas … will find that 99 percent of people will give them every reason why their idea’ s been done before or why it’ s not a good idea or why they’ re going to fall flat on their face,” Branson recently told Inc.’ s president and editor in chief Eric Schurenberg during an exclusive sit-down interview.“ In the end, you have to say,‘ Screw it. Just do it.’”
At the age of 15, Branson dropped out of high school to start his first business, a magazine for young activists titled Student.
Four years later, in 1970, Branson began selling records by mail. In 1971, he opened his first record store. In 1972, he opened a recording studio. In 1973, he started his own record label. The Virgin business empire had begun, and Branson had not yet turned twenty four.
Today, the Virgin Group is a wellregarded global conglomerate of about 350 companies, branching into the entertainment, travel, and mobile industries.
Not all of Branson’ s big ideas have been successful. Virgin Airlines and Virgin Mobile are now flagship brands for Branson, but remember Virgin Cola? With big risks come big, public failures. Branson has a follow-up secret to success: determination even when failure seems inevitable.
“ If you have enough determination.... It’ s more likely that
you will succeed because of what you learned from the occasions when you didn’ t succeed," Branson said.“ The most important thing is to not be put off by failure.
“ THE adversities and tribulations that you are presently experiencing are not meant to annihilate you but to allow you to uncover your true potential and concealed and covert GREATNESS. No matter how discouraged you may feel now, you cannot quit. You must stay in the game. Your time will come”
– SPENCE FINLAYSON, BISHOP OF MOTIVATON