I failed my degree - I now earn £77000 4 years later - don't lose hope

Hi All,

This post is going to be part informative, part humble brag, partly me getting something off of my chest that I have NEVER told anyone, but mostly me showing you that there's always hope.

I went to a very mediocre university, I studied computing with business, I passed the first year and got all 50% grades, I passed the second year with grades from 40% to 60%. I failed the final year, I handed in no coursework, I missed all of the exams and I only wrote 320 words of my planned 10,000 word dissertation.

Fast forward 4 years and I'm a manager at a very well known business consultancy firm earning £77,000 per year (excluding bonus which is up to 20%).

How did I do this? Experience and confidence.

When I was in my third, I took a year out to do a placement. The placement was with a very well known management consultancy. At the time, I was predicted to get a 3rd and they required a predicted 2:1. I got my tutor to write me an awesome letter of recommendation and I was very confident in my interviews plus I had done a significant amount of research and preparation before the 4 round interview process.

I was incredibly excited when I got the placement offer. The experience I gained in that one year set me up for life.

When I failed me degree (saw it coming a long way off), I became depressed, I could no longer take the job offer from the management consultancy as they required a 2:1. Luckily for me, I'd picked up some wicked software development skills over the previous few years, I used my experience at the management consultancy plus my software development skills to get myself a 30k job straight after failing my degree.

During the interview, my failed degree was never talked about even though I had is listed on my CV. It was listed as a Diploma of Higher Education (that's what you get when you only pass two years of your degree).

After being at this job for 2 years. I looked for a higher paying job and got a 46k offer at another software company. Again, they did not questions my education. They only cared about my experience.

Rinse and repeat this process until the current day. I applied for a managers job at a very well known consultancy. They accepted me based on my experience. This was also the first time my education was ever questioned. I explained that I did not complete my degree for various reasons (I did not lie). They mainly cared about my experience and what I could bring to the clients I would be working with.

I'm now a manager earning 77k.

It's funny when I look at other people from my Uni who actually got their degree. Most of them are still far more junior than me and earning a lot less than me.

This is the first time I have ever told anyone about failing my degree. Even my girlfriend (recently broken up) and parents don't know.

This is not supposed to be a 100% brag. It's supposed to be showing you that no matter how ****ed you are right now, you can recover if you are smart about it. Don't seek advice from the average person, that person can only give you average advice.

One more thing, I've been in debt (over 4k) twice and both times managed to pay it off (long before earning a good salary) but that's a story for another day.

I have never lied, I have never cheated, I am a smart guy and I'm actually very good at what I do (which is why I get paid well). My experience speaks for itself and my education has been explained to my employer (and countless recruiters). Experience and ability trump everything (well, most things).

Don't lose hope and.... ask me anything...

(please excuse any typos, I typed this on a tablet).

Hi All,

This post is going to be part informative, part humble brag, partly me getting something off of my chest that I have NEVER told anyone, but mostly me showing you that there's always hope.

I went to a very mediocre university, I studied computing with business, I passed the first year and got all 50% grades, I passed the second year with grades from 40% to 60%. I failed the final year, I handed in no coursework, I missed all of the exams and I only wrote 320 words of my planned 10,000 word dissertation.

Fast forward 4 years and I'm a manager at a very well known business consultancy firm earning £77,000 per year (excluding bonus which is up to 20%).

How did I do this? Experience and confidence.

When I was in my third, I took a year out to do a placement. The placement was with a very well known management consultancy. At the time, I was predicted to get a 3rd and they required a predicted 2:1. I got my tutor to write me an awesome letter of recommendation and I was very confident in my interviews plus I had done a significant amount of research and preparation before the 4 round interview process.

I was incredibly excited when I got the placement offer. The experience I gained in that one year set me up for life.

When I failed me degree (saw it coming a long way off), I became depressed, I could no longer take the job offer from the management consultancy as they required a 2:1. Luckily for me, I'd picked up some wicked software development skills over the previous few years, I used my experience at the management consultancy plus my software development skills to get myself a 30k job straight after failing my degree.

During the interview, my failed degree was never talked about even though I had is listed on my CV. It was listed as a Diploma of Higher Education (that's what you get when you only pass two years of your degree).

After being at this job for 2 years. I looked for a higher paying job and got a 46k offer at another software company. Again, they did not questions my education. They only cared about my experience.

Rinse and repeat this process until the current day. I applied for a managers job at a very well known consultancy. They accepted me based on my experience. This was also the first time my education was ever questioned. I explained that I did not complete my degree for various reasons (I did not lie). They mainly cared about my experience and what I could bring to the clients I would be working with.

I'm now a manager earning 77k.

It's funny when I look at other people from my Uni who actually got their degree. Most of them are still far more junior than me and earning a lot less than me.

This is the first time I have ever told anyone about failing my degree. Even my girlfriend (recently broken up) and parents don't know.

This is not supposed to be a 100% brag. It's supposed to be showing you that no matter how ****ed you are right now, you can recover if you are smart about it. Don't seek advice from the average person, that person can only give you average advice.

One more thing, I've been in debt (over 4k) twice and both times managed to pay it off (long before earning a good salary) but that's a story for another day.

I have never lied, I have never cheated, I am a smart guy and I'm actually very good at what I do (which is why I get paid well). My experience speaks for itself and my education has been explained to my employer (and countless recruiters). Experience and ability trump everything (well, most things).

Don't lose hope and.... ask me anything...

(please excuse any typos, I typed this on a tablet).

The amount of snobbery and panic that I see on here by people that think going to a Russell Group/Oxbridge uni is literally the only way they'll ever be successful is ridiculous. If you're good enough, you can succeed with far less.

Good for you, OP

I hate stories like this. You're basically encouraging students to not work as hard as they can because it will all work out for them anyway. You are a VERY lucky person, you're not 'smart' (like you describe yourself) if you went to a bad uni and still failed all your uni work, you're simply lucky. 99% of people who were in your situation would have ended up with a terrible job.

I hate stories like this. You're basically encouraging students to not work as hard as they can because it will all work out for them anyway. You are a VERY lucky person, you're not 'smart' (like you describe yourself) if you went to a bad uni and still failed all your uni work, you're simply lucky. 99% of people who were in your situation would have ended up with a terrible job.

100% yes to this!

Getting experience is the MOST important thing. Don't get me wrong, you should definitely get a 2:1 (or better). But even if you have a degree, what is going to make you stand out from the thousands of other graduates that year? Experience, that's what makes you stand out.

Doing a year long placement will accelerate your career growth in ways that you can't even imagine at this point in your career.

EDIT: You get bigger pay rises when you move companies rather than getting promoted internally. Make the most out of every experience you get so you can leverage that experience to improve yourself, and your pay, quickly. Make smart choices though, moving around too much can look bad and you could miss valuable experience. One size does not fit all.

-

Hi All,


Don't lose hope and.... ask me anything...

Though I do think there is a big difference between people like yourself that drop out (and the likes of Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg) and the norm, in which I think ye are really just complete anomalies.

First you need to be very very intelligent and have applied this in your own time to something practical - like programming. You also need a hell of a lot of luck, like getting your foot in the door, as you did.

The average guy who fails university does so because he/she is generally lacking motivation or the capacity (though capacity/intelligence doesn't have a great deal of variation, so I tend to downplay 'intelligence').

Though well done on the amazing job! Done very well for yourself.

Would be interesting to hear about your previous academic achievement though: like what you got for your GCSE's and A levels (or equiv).

Source?

I agree that people shouldnt drop out willy nilly though, and congrats to you OP. Did you have a plan before you left?

Assumption on my part about people failing due to a lack of motivation or intelligence. The other addition would be personal problems which interfere with studying, or financial pressures. But generally speaking students have adequate funding - and even with holding a part time job, you can at least pull through a 2.2: many of my friends did.

I don't feel the assumption I made is unfair. If you have a counter view or evidence showing the cause of student drop outs (in 'normal' degree's), ye very welcome to!

Never lose hope *

All I can say is well done, you've clearly worked hard after uni, and I agree with mostly everything you've said. As you said it bothers you not having a degree to some extent, do you feel that you may want to get your degree in the future or?

Though I do think there is a big difference between people like yourself that drop out (and the likes of Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg) and the norm, in which I think ye are really just complete anomalies.

First you need to be very very intelligent and have applied this in your own time to something practical - like programming. You also need a hell of a lot of luck, like getting your foot in the door, as you did.

The average guy who fails university does so because he/she is generally lacking motivation or the capacity (though capacity/intelligence doesn't have a great deal of variation, so I tend to downplay 'intelligence').

Though well done on the amazing job! Done very well for yourself.

Would be interesting to hear about your previous academic achievement though: like what you got for your GCSE's and A levels (or equiv).

It weights heavy on my shoulders, plus I think it will hold me back one day so I am making plans to top up to a fill BSC then do an MSC.

Source?

I agree that people shouldnt drop out willy nilly though, and congrats to you OP. Did you have a plan before you left?

With the OU, or are you going back to a full time degree?

As someone who was interested in going into counselling for a while, I volunteered for Nightline/various other student services during my time at uni. A great percentage of those who drop out of uni have mental health issues such as depression (often undiagnosed, or just generally handled appallingly badly by the university campus GPs or counsellors. I talked to a guy on Nightline who ended up dropping out before having waited almost half a year to see a counsellor. A lot of people hadn't even told their friends about this sort of thing).

Some people also want to change subjects/unis - basically leave and then reapply immediately after or a bit later - which I don't think is a sign of lack of motivation. I researched my uni and subject thoroughly, visited, everything, but there were still some things I wasn't happy about in the way it was taught or the uni as a whole, and had no way of finding out about till I got there there.

Or some just want to go into the working world. Which basically means being motivated to do things other than study. Nothing wrong with that, university's not for everyone.

What is your point based on? Sure, there's at least a couple of students per hundred who leave/get Thirds due to their fair share of boozing it up and too little hard work. But I'd be interested to see your evidence for that sort of thing being the majority.