In a white-collar industry, most hiring managers are looking for a college-educated worker to fill an open role. But they’re also often let down when they find those same workers, who should ostensibly have gotten everything they needed from their undergraduate education, are falling short in critical new skill areas. How can they compromise?
It’s actually not much of a stretch. About 75% of U.S. jobs in our country that pay more than $35,000 a year require a college degree, Lisa Gevelber, Google’s chief marketing officer for the Americas, told Fortune in an interview this week. That’s simply bad business, given that just 38% of Americans have a college degree. “So there’s a giant mismatch,” Gevelber said. “Two-thirds of Americans—about 70 million workers—are basically locked out of all the jobs in our country.”
That mismatch harms non-degree-holding workers just as much as understaffed companies, and it’s been building for years. The much-maligned skills gap gained additional attention during the pandemic as the student debt crisis reached a fever pitch, leading many workers to call the actual value of their degree into question. And, as the labor market contracted and expanded and contracted again, bosses found themselves grasping for specific talent—which they realized was in shockingly short supply, despite the number of degree-holding applicants.
Or, as Gevelber put it, the two sides of the issue are that “everyone’s looking for people with college degrees, but only about a third of Americans have one. And employers are looking for people with very specific kinds of skills, and they just can’t find enough of them.”
Here comes the skills-based revolution
Upskilling workers is the natural answer to the problem—and then going full-steam ahead on skills-based hiring, of course. It’s why Gevelber founded the tech giant’s skilling initiative Grow with Google in 2017, which provides lessons and certifications for in-demand skills like cybersecurity and data analytics—anyone can enroll, regardless of their education level.
Companies on the fence about changing their long-held recruiting strategies may do well to follow the examples set by everyone from former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and former IBM CEO Ginni Rometty to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, who have all expounded upon the benefits of hiring with an eye towards skills rather than degrees. Across industries, firms that opt to forgo antiquated degree requirements could stand to see “an explosion of talent,” an April 2023 LinkedIn report found, with 19 times the workers placed in fitting roles.
Even university professors have gotten on board with the idea that a college degree, on its own, is hardly enough to bridge the gap between the skills employers are desperately seeking, and what most workers are trained to do. Philip Cohen, a sociology professor at the University of Maryland–College Park, told Fortune earlier this year that his students acknowledge the degree they’re earning is plainly no longer a ticket to a secure future.
“To be sure, pursuing education and a career is still a safer bet for your future,” Cohen said, pointing to data showing significantly better job outcomes and salary baselines for advanced degree holders. But those benefits are “just not a guarantee anymore.”
A degree still holds merit
Yet, it’s difficult to imagine a work world in which college degrees carry no weight at all. Despite more companies moving to skills-based hiring, degrees are still a proxy for screening someone’s job qualifications. “Having a college degree is life-changing—there’s really no question about that,” even Gevelber, a staunch believer in skills-based hiring, said.
But “the reality is, there’s lots of ways to know whether someone’s qualified for the job,” she adds. It’s in companies’ best interest to expand their horizons and take non-traditional workers who can fit the bill more seriously. Plus, the skills and concepts someone grasps in college aren’t always a perfect fit for their future job. “In today’s day and age, we are so far past the time where you could learn everything you need to know for your career when you’re 22,” Gevelber said.
It’s also critical to widen the talent pool during tight job markets, LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky said last year. Sure, hiring through a professional or alumni network got the job done when there were plenty of high-quality applicants to choose from. “But when the labor market is moving much quicker, we really need to figure out something to focus on,” he said. “[And] that alternative, flexible, accessible path is really going to be based on skills.”
Companies who put emphasis on skills over pedigree “will help ensure that the right people can be in the right roles, with the right skills, doing the best work,” Roslansky said. It also brings the added benefit of democratizing the workforce, including candidates from more diverse backgrounds, “which then creates better opportunities for all.”
Upskilling, or providing means for employees to upskill on their own, is also a crucial retention tactic, especially for sought-after younger workers. For Gen Zers, an employer who’s willing to upskill them is a huge draw, Gevelber said. “As a matter of fact,” she went on. “Gen Zers rate the ability to get upskilled in your job as even more important than paid vacation.”
