I’m sure I’ve mentioned many times how fond I am of entrepreneurship, a model that creates the basis for wealth generation through the free market system. Without getting into politics, although the short story I am about to tell you may involve them to a degree, capitalist economics is the foundation on which I have made my living. It is where I have come from, and apparently, where I am staying.
Yes, I am staying here. Not because I am unable to move on or find better things, though I would be hard-pressed to discover something more gratifying and fruitful, but because I can go nowhere else. The power behind creating a business and independently generating wealth and prosperity lies not just in the sheer amount and quality of its benefits, but it has one additional critical factor that may be frequently overlooked: it is open.
Allow me to demonstrate a life experience which has been in development over the past six months. In April of this year, after being dumped by a gorgeous girlfriend for reasons unbeknownst to me to this day, I was hired as a part-time Web Specialist at my college campus, LSC-Montgomery. My supervisor, Elisa, whom I am still acutely fond of, had been keen on teaching me the ins and outs of her job since day one. From the beginning, my technical background made the transfer of her knowledge and experience into my hands very swift and smooth. Within about a month, I had mastered the majority of the part-time job I was hired for, plus a great deal of the work she did on a regular basis.
I won’t go into the details concerning whether or not her teaching me so much was intentional or for another purpose. Those suggestions are not mine to make. The point here is that I learned Elisa was looking for another position within the college about three, perhaps four months after I’d been hired. She was applying for a technical training job on the same campus. In addition, she applied for a job at University of Houston as well, but evidently she did not expect to get the job, since she barely qualified for the position (or something like that).
Not long after, my supervisor ended up getting the job at UH. I was very excited for her (because she’s a great worker and deserves it, if not better). She mentioned that it was possible when her position became available, I may be eligible to apply.
Several months passed during which I had been doing both my part-time and Elisa’s full-time jobs in my part-time hours. A recent district-wide incentive to merge the infrastructure of the colleges in our college system brought on confusion and possibility of the removal, reorganization, or change of various positions, including the position I was hoping to apply for — the Program Coordinator, Web Content & Design position (that’s the official title). After this period, perhaps two months ago, the position was finally posted. When I saw it, I was excited that they had removed an associates degree requirement (since I had not the privilege of being born a few years earlier, as I am working on, but do not currently have, an associates degree). This made me eligible to apply for the position.
As a hard working and highly capable individual, I’ve managed to more than surpass the highest expectations. I have done a lot of work, and although I may sound like I am bragging, I have put a lot of work into efficiently completing all of the innumerable tasks that come my way. I have filled in some very large shoes while still wearing my own, and although part of the reason is simply because I am a hard worker, I had hoped that my display of capabilities and eagerness to exceed expectations would be a testament of how great a candidate I was. Surely this would provide a great advantage when the interviews began.
To review, my qualifications are quite important. First, I know what the job entails and how to do it. Second, I have proven that I am capable of doing it (and more) in less than half the time than my predecessors. Third, I am working on getting my associates degree, although I do not already have it (it does take a couple years); I have a GPA that has gotten me Phi Theta Kappa invites and assorted college letters with congratulations to my academic achievements. I have never gotten a grade lower than an A on a written paper in my entire academic lifetime. Fourth, I have years of experience in the field of Web design, content, development, programming, technical skills, graphics design, editing, journalism, and so on. I have written code that has been published in a book. I have spent six months providing that I can quickly and thoroughly learn anything that comes my way. I picked up a manual on the Lasso programming language and started writing programs for my supervisor in the same day. Fifth, I had glowing recommendations from my ex-bosses from past jobs, clients I have done work for, and of course Elisa herself (a huge factor). And sixth, according to both the dean of our department and the president of our college campus, my performance in the two interviews for the position was outstanding.
So what is all of this ranting about? I got the position right?
Wrong. After six months of work and meeting all the qualifications, I did not get the job. “Yeah, he’s got everything we need, but — aw, no letters behind his name.” The degree is not a requirement, but it is the only reason I did not get the position. So who got it? They “want to keep searching.” That means they probably won’t have anyone in that position until sometime next year, since everything moves as a crawling pace in such a huge bureaucracy. And considering the current situation that the college system is in with respect to the college Web sites (I won’t reveal the details), even if they hired someone today, that person would have to go through so much training that they would be useless until after all the work they should be doing was already done. To make a long story short, I’m the person they need; no one else can do it at this point, because you are not going to find a person who has the knowledge of the current systems like I do (and that is needed to develop the new systems we are moving to).
So let’s see what this all boils down to. As I mentioned before, I’ve got a lot going for me. The only thing I don’t have is an associates degree. We’re not talking bachelors or masters, just associates, which I’m about 1/3 (maybe 1/2) completed with at this point. I would already be done, but I was born in 1989 and didn’t know about dual-credit classes until after I became a college student. So essentially, I am eligible but not hirable because I was born a year late. Yes, I just randomly got shafted.
What’s the reason behind this? Well, the dean of our department put it to me something like this (paraphrased). “I think it’s because they want to show the importance of having a degree.” Yeah, so we’re going to punish those who work hard and are more capable (and have more experience) than those who have degrees purely for the purpose of demonstrating how important it is to have a degree.
And this brings me back to my opening statements. I love entrepreneurship. It’s not just the potential to become filthy rich working for yourself (since you can never become rich by working for someone else). It’s not the fact that I can work from home and sleep in every day. It’s just because entrepreneurship is open. It doesn’t matter that I don’t have a degree. I can show you my work, and show you how capable I am. The problem with getting a degree and obsessing over mere letters behind your name? By the time you get the degree, everything you have learned is obsolete. This is how people at a higher education institute think, and it is exactly the reason why I see so much waste of resources (both human and monetary) across the entire system. I won’t go into the details, as I needn’t bash higher education institutions or their constituents further — I think my argument can be plainly seen.
To conclude my thoughts on this subject, for those of you who are attending college (and for some reason reading my blog), please remember that everything you learn will be expired, old, and useless by the time you get out of college. We live in a fast-paced information age, and what you learn today may be useless tomorrow. Keep in mind that if you are going for a web design degree, you should change your major to something that will be useful in the future (something like agriculture so you can feed yourself and your family when we go into another Great Depression due to financial institutions’ circumvention of regulatory requirements). It doesn’t matter what your degree is in. If you plan on working for someone else (and living a cozy, comfortable 9-5 job for the rest of your life, then retiring on social security that won’t be there by the time you’re 60), then you need letters behind your name.
Now, to address those of you who are smart, consider entrepreneurship. We need you. The market needs you. The economy needs you. Every single American — no, every single person on this planet needs you. You are the core of the wealth creation process, and it is from you that prosperity grows. If you are willing to put your heart and soul into creating and managing a business despite not knowing where your next paycheck will come from, then join us. The future awaits, and it is only darkened by increased taxes, lavish government spending, and unregulated economic exchanges.
That’s all for now, folks. I promise to resume blogging more normally, particularly now that I expect to be spending more time working from home now than ever (seeing as I am unsure how long my job at the college will last — I don’t want to leave them hanging without the support of an on-campus Web professional, although the vengeful side of me really would like to). Feel free to post comments on just how much you sympathize with my situation, and if you’re a perpetual college student or president of a college who has spent half of your life getting letters behind your name for bragging rights, please don’t bother commenting on anything, as I am really uninterested in hearing your defense. Only in a court of law can injustice be defended, not on my blog.