Solutions To The Problem Of Underemployed Graduates?

Problem is, graduates are not being underemployed so much as people are expecting far too much out of their university education. With the exception of a handful of fields, university is largely useless at preparing you for the workplace. Being able to do maths/physics/chemistry/English/history/psychology/x/y/z... to a suitable level to pass exams doesn't entitle anyone to a high level job. Work skills can be learned in society, at school, university, on placements and from books but the vast majority of your employability relies on who you are (as a person) and where you have worked before. It's how it's always been.

University is more of a rubber-stamping procedure to say you're of reasonable intelligence and have potential. Sending 50% of the population to university doesn't mean there's a problem when only a fraction of those leaving are able to take 'good' jobs. Managerial and senior technical roles only account for a fraction of the jobs available, and you can't create more 'important' roles just because you have more graduates. If a business only needs one manager, it's only going to have one manager.

Graduates aren't a special breed, and they don't usually have employable skills that non-graduates do not have, aside from the vocational courses (medicine, law, etc). A graduate has a piece of paper saying they might have potential, but honestly most are not equipped to lead and never will be. They have to fit into businesses the same as anyone else, and the very best will rise to the top, but the vast majority will always be subordinates. I don't think it's a problem. Quite how a degree equips a graduate to deal with a situation better than someone with experience in the industry is beyond me. The idea of letting someone wander around with autonomy because they have a degree probably sends a little chill down the spine of anyone who has recruited graduates before.

The problem isn't in the world of work, but in the minds of people who have sadly had an inflated sense of entitlement driven into them. No matter how much you educate someone, you can't have a workforce of 50% generals and 50% infantry.

Problem is, graduates are not being underemployed so much as people are expecting far too much out of their university education. With the exception of a handful of fields, university is largely useless at preparing you for the workplace. Being able to do maths/physics/chemistry/English/history/psychology/x/y/z... to a suitable level to pass exams doesn't entitle anyone to a high level job. Work skills can be learned in society, at school, university, on placements and from books but the vast majority of your employability relies on who you are (as a person) and where you have worked before. It's how it's always been.

University is more of a rubber-stamping procedure to say you're of reasonable intelligence and have potential. Sending 50% of the population to university doesn't mean there's a problem when only a fraction of those leaving are able to take 'good' jobs. Managerial and senior technical roles only account for a fraction of the jobs available, and you can't create more 'important' roles just because you have more graduates. If a business only needs one manager, it's only going to have one manager.

Graduates aren't a special breed, and they don't usually have employable skills that non-graduates do not have, aside from the vocational courses (medicine, law, etc). A graduate has a piece of paper saying they might have potential, but honestly most are not equipped to lead and never will be. They have to fit into businesses the same as anyone else, and the very best will rise to the top, but the vast majority will always be subordinates. I don't think it's a problem. Quite how a degree equips a graduate to deal with a situation better than someone with experience in the industry is beyond me. The idea of letting someone wander around with autonomy because they have a degree probably sends a little chill down the spine of anyone who has recruited graduates before.

The problem isn't in the world of work, but in the minds of people who have sadly had an inflated sense of entitlement driven into them. No matter how much you educate someone, you can't have a workforce of 50% generals and 50% infantry.

What the OP wrote is exactly what's wrong with the graduate of today. These self-entitled snowflakes. . .

This post comically and accurately makes the case in my last post. We bring children up drilling into them that they should go to uni and aim high and that the key to a prosperous career is by getting a degree. Then when they graduate they are met with hostile attitudes like this, called spoilt and entitled for believing what society has constantly drilled into them that if they work hard at school and uni and graduate, they have proven to society that they are worthy of a bit of a leg-up in the employment market.

It'd be nice if society and schools and employers simply sat kids down and started drilling into them that:

1. It's an employers world, you can be perfect and still shafted.

2. You will be expected to jump through hoops, spending hours drudging through inefficient and pointless application processes and forms and somehow navigate the whims and moods of HR departments and employers and still have no guarantee of even an interview but the employer has no obligation to so much as even shoot off a chain email to rejected candidates letting them know as much.

3. They should have just went to work in Tesco or something as soon as possible and kept that job for as long as possible, and to just settle for a 'McJob' and only seek a step up in life if you happen to know someone or someone who knows someone involved with a new position, because in the real world merit counts for little compared to nepotism and 'doing a friend a favour'.

thus...

4. Probably should start networking and hanging out with the kids of executives/high paid professionals when you're in primary school.


I'm somewhat taking the piss but basically the guy I quoted is the problem. We have a qualification system which apparently doesn't carry any weight in the real world making it an expensive redundancy.

It's an attitude problem. We do have this obsession with university, and it's caused a lot of people to suffer because of it.

What the OP wrote is exactly what's wrong with the graduate of today. These self-entitled snowflakes think it's someone else's fault. Oh no, it couldn't be the fact they essentially think a piece of paper guarantees them a job, it's the fact employers aren't thinking in the right way. Yep, definitely, totally.

I employ a couple of people and I can honestly say I could give a flying **** whether they have a degree or not. One does have a degree, but it isn't relevant to very much (religious studies). I employed that person because I worked with him on another unrelated project and I liked the way he worked. So far, I haven't been disappointed.

The other was actually an older person who wanted to do something on a voluntary basis. We've ended up entering a paid agreement and everything has worked out very well. In fact, I'm not even sure if they have a degree because they never asked. It made zero difference to me.

Here's the number one thing I ask as a small business employer:

1) Can you do the job or is it worth wasting the time training you up?

If you can, let's give it a whirl. If not, **** off. Whether you have a piece of paper or passed a few exams means zero to me. I care about what you can do not how well you studied for your exams. And, no, I'm not hostile to academia. I value academic knowledge very much in terms of how I approach life, but in a working environment whether you managed to write about the American Civil War well means absolutely nothing. I don't work in an academic industry, therefore I'm looking for skills over grades.

And, OP, I can't believe you actually suggested we would hire you and allow you to get on with it. The majority of graduates have little to no skills coming out of university. Employers have mentioned this time and time again. You have no real world experience. If we allowed you to run free you would **** up, and that's a fact.

Furthermore, you fail to understand what an employer is. You complain about hierarchy and micromanagement. I'm sorry, but this is the sort of statement which would make me not want to hire you. You don't seem to understand our businesses are our creations. They are like our children. We dedicate the majority of our lives to them. In a way, you could even describe them as children. Now would you let someone who you've just met have free reign over the progress of your child? I don't think so.

Please, for your own sake, understand how the real world works and get out of your bubble. I know it's frustrating for graduates, but there's nothing more stressful for an employer than taking a risk on someone who has almost no experience outside of the education system.

Perhaps we could stop sending intellectually average students to university?

Then they wouldn't develop an inflated sense of entitlement when it comes to their career and they also wouldn't view their Mcjob as a form of 'underemployment'.