Hiring: Experience vs. Education
Every employer wants to have an employee who will be an asset to the company. That’s when Education and experience become the most critical factors in choosing the best employee for the job. During the interview process, employers normally seek candidates who have good education and also have great experience that suits the job opening.
But what is more important? Education or experience?
In this article, we will be discussing the pros and cons of these two very important topics in employment.
Knowing the value of Education Vs. Experience is important in a workplace. Having both will help you find a higher-paying job. But what if you only have one of these two things? Experience leads to having higher salaries as employers value the skills and knowledge that you have gained for the years of experience you have. Having good education also helps you land a good paycheck since most companies pay employees who have higher education for specific jobs.
When honing your skill development, experience and education still helps a lot. Education helps you in a theoretical way while experience helps you apply it. But when it comes to career advancement, experience may be more important because employers may value the track record of an employee and their success rate in their field.
When in a job search, employers rank candidates based on their qualifications, including experience and education. It is important to highlight your relevant education and experiences to land the job you are longing for.
Glassdoor’s Employment Confidence Surveys of 2014 and 2015 revealed that close to 70% of the employees feel the need for specialized on the job training even with them having degrees. And nearly 48% of the people said their degrees were not relevant to their current jobs. Though a degree still remains the entry criteria in landing a job, organizations are more willing to bet undergrads who have relevant experience than choose a graduate with no experience.
Below are some examples why experience is valued more compared to education
- Concept Vs. Application- while education may help you learn more about things and help you in building theories of your work, experience still puts it in place and proves it works. Experience helps you know how to apply the knowledge you learn to have a more favorable outcome. Just like what Albert Einstein said “The only source of knowledge is Experience”.
- A True Differentiator- while education helps you land a job, having better experience from others puts you in front of the line. Having better experience than others always makes you more employable.
- Know yourself- there are lots of people who have completed their education only to find out in the end that they are not meant to do the things they have studied for? This is where experience helps a lot. As you go through your job, you learn about your strengths and weaknesses, and this helps you improve your skills and teach you where your passion lies.
- Workplace reality- experience helps you learn about the everyday realities of your work life. This helps a lot in equipping you with the skills needed to succeed in any organization.
- Network- while having a college degree might increase your chances in landing a job, having good experience gives you access to a greater network of people who have more experiences than you. This helps you have more knowledge because you can learn from them and avoid common mistakes that even they have done before.
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