Thoughts about schooling

[deelpickle]

Ok, I have a really good question for any of you that are in positions that can hire.

Here's the scenario: You have an applicant that has a college degree in engineering and had "ok" grades, nothing spectacular. He or she has decided to apply for a job as an AO/RO or something else in the Nuke world. You also have another candidate that is ex-military, not necessarily Navy Nuke, but does not have a degree yet. This individual is working on it and also reads and uses the MIT online courses and studies basically the same stuff the engineering student did, but did not receive a certificate or a degree. How would you determine which applicant you would prefer to have? Would you choose an applicant that has the college degree, that most likely partied throughout the 4 to 6 years of school, with average grades, or would you likely hire an ex-military whom is known to be able to work under pressure and trying to further their options by learning of the industry?

I know many would instantly say the college degreed individual, but do hiring managers look at life experiences and such to determine if they would take a shot at an individual without previous nuke experience?

I would like to know what people's thoughts are about this. At one time I was in the same situation within the aviation industry, trying to determine if someone that paid all that money to party and barely get their license was worth the effort or if I would stick with the "tempered under fire" individual.

Stacey

[Creeker]

Just on the face of it, I'd probably go with candidate A, unless:

Was candidate B in some sort of technical program?  Even if not a nuke, was he in an engine room, in HVAC, a missile tech, an electrician, a jet engine mechanic?  Or, was candidate B a MAA, or combat engineer, corpsman, or DK?  See the difference?  If our military person has experience in pressures, temperatures, powers and flows, heat transfer concepts...  valves, heat exchangers, electrical and electronic components, even if it is on the micro vs macro scale, then he's going to do well on the POSS and mini GFES. 

I sense the bias in your question regarding college kids with degrees, and maybe there's some basis to regarding someone who spent 4/5 years living the fun life, getting average grades, but getting a degree as having an unfair advantage.  But, I think that's the reality that you'd better face.  As an employer, I don't really care how many MIT courses you audit in your spare time... It'll just make you do well on the mini-GFES/POSS. That's all the credit you get for it.  If I have 2 people, and one has his Calc I course done, with a C, but the other reads Calc books as a hobby, who gets the credit? 

Stacey, I'm not sure if I'm saying this clearly, but a college degree counts against a whole lot of experience.  A lot of those HR postings have those tradeoffs... 10 years experience, or associates and 6 years experience, or BS and 2 years experience.  That's just the way it is.

[deelpickle]

I agree wholeheartedly on your comments. I was wondering what all of your thoughts were to this, since many of you are from the military. With the organization I am currently with, you see the college applicants getting into positions of authority and then risk many individuals lives when they make a "bad" decision that life experience would have helped them with.

You are also right, I myself would rather have an average engineer than a 4.0 basketweaver. The reason I threw in issue with the MIT courses, was because the individual that was applying for the job we had at the time had 15 years experience in army aviation with an excellent understanding of the job. He had his Aircraft and Powerplant License from the Federal Aviation Administration, had gotten a two-year Associate's degree in Heating and Air Conditioning Technology and was using the MIT courses to prep himself for his degree in Occupational Safety and Health - Bachelor's level. While these were not necessarily the top criteria for a job in my organization, it was well above what a normal person off the street had applying for the job.

However, the engineer applicant was hired for the job and during his background check and while in the course of normal interactions with fellow employees, he was noted to state that it was the best 4 to 5 years of his life in college. He had no bills to pay, mom and dad gave him an allowance to buy his alcohol, etc, etc. This was kind of disgusting to me now that I have to work with this individual that should never have gotten the job to begin with. But, alas, background checks are only allowed to go so far. When you call a previous employer, you are pretty much hog-tied and can only be told yes or no that the individual worked there.

I think with the "recession" we are in or whatever they want to call it, there are more "great" applicants our there that do not get a chance at times when that piece of paper automatically opens the door for some. However, I've seen many ex-military get their feet in the door based on their "trials by fire". Great comments and I'd love to hear more, it is definitely an eye opener.

[JustinHEMI05]

I agree with Creeker. It is simply the nature of the beast. That is what our society has developed into, and something we have to deal with. We can all tell personal anecdotes about degreed/no experience vs no degree/experienced people. Bottom line is, you have to have a baseline somewhere when it comes to hiring and like Creeker pointed out, its far easier to make it degree based than to try to figure out each and every little experience piece someone brings to the table. Hence the equivalencies. Of course some degreed people that aren't up to the task are going to get through, and that may not seem fair, but be happy in the knowledge that they likely won't get very far. I would wager that the less than adequate degreed person is in the minority though, which is why companies still put a lot of weight on the side of a degree.