MBA craze has done fundamental damage to the job market
Ajanlekoko, an electrical engineer, is a Senior Manager in one of the telecommunication companies operating in Nigeria. He earlier made same post on Nairaland.com
It’s interesting that when we want to hire in Nigeria, we think certificates/paper qualifications first, before skills.
I didn’t really appreciate the impact, or how deep this was, until recently.
I am currently looking to hire someone for a particular project, and I noticed that all the CVs I got did not really reflect the skill set I was searching for. But I got a lot of CVs with serious qualifications, and even IT certifications. When I discussed with a colleague she was like ‘What level of qualification are you looking for? OND, HND, BSC or Masters Degree?’ To be candid, that had not even entered my mind.
I can understand the candidates accumulating qualifications in a bid to get noticed. But what I don’t get is the recruiters piling on the demand for more than the required qualifications, and not paying attention to the requisite skills a candidate has to offer. Personally, I think the MBA craze has done a fundamental damage to the job market, and turned it into a mere rat race. You have a lot of candidates, mostly with qualifications and no real skills, in a market that’s highly undeveloped. Should organizations and recruiters not be encouraging prospective candidates to focus less on paper qualifications, and more of skills?
Some years back, there was this Chevron recruitment for OND-qualified engineers. I know of at least five people who were actually university graduates, but because they had earlier acquired an OND, they were able to get in. Ironic, isn’t it?
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I beg to differ slightly from AJ here. There are some skills mere looking at CV will not show, yet the CV owner has such skills. Can you tell from a CV whether someone has integrity, loyalty? You may not even be able to tell from CV whether the candidate is a good writer (after all, you can hire someone to write error-free CV for you). While I agree that certificates may be over-emphasized, I still think certificates can say something about the candidate’s ability. More so, what we call paper qualification is not just that someone takes a piece of paper and write something on it, it is the accumulation of the paper holder’s efforts over 4-6 years (in the case of first degree) or 1-3 years (in the case of higher degrees). Also, don’t forget that since you don’t know the applicant from Adam, his certificates are what give you insight about him, ab initio.
Jarus
You are not far from the truth, I will advice you to read ” there is no elevator to the top” by Umesh Ramakrishnan.
My thought, the instances cited by the writers above are true, though their opinions may be confusing (for someone like me to start with). Both writers have minced the words: qualification,certificates,skills and CV together. First writer seemed particular about skills, insinuating that “bogus” educational qualification doesn’t often correspond with the requisite skills that employers demand. By this, I concur with him on the naked assertion that what employers need are basically two things: SKILLS, and KNOWLEDGE! Educational qualifications/certificates (BSc, MSc, MBA, etc) are indications of KNOWLEDGE only, and not SKILLS! So, in a CV of a purported Civil Engineer, employers would want to see, for instance, BSc in Civil…in order to meet the “KNOWLEDGE” criterion, and then “certificate/proficiency in the use of autocad, revit, BIM software” etc in order to meet the SKILL criterion.
Alas, what is most common in our society is “BSc in Civil..” (which is generic), followed by “proficiency in MS office tools or java or even Oracle”!. For God’s sake, how does proficiency in java or oracle software synchronize your “knowledge” of civil engineering? Well, if it does, there is little chance that your immediate potential employer needs it. Hence, unable to get a job nor meet a good adviser, this civil engineer directly goes for MSc in Civil Engineering. He forgets that that important concept is still lacking-that’s SKILLS, and he then complains of not getting job at all, or being under-employed. The same applies to “the accountant” with BSc Accounting, MSc Accounting (or even MBA), but can not simply save a file on Microsoft Excel! He doesn’t have any prof. certifications, he lacks skills! This is why a Master student of Elect. Engineering may not be able to change a bulb in his room!
In line with what Jarus said, CV gives the first impression of possessed SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE to the potential employer. However, I opine that integrity and loyalty may be reflected in a well compiled CV. For instance, having worked with “Amnesty International” is an indication of proven integrity, having served in a company for long years (10-20yrs, rising along the cadre line) is also an indication of loyalty to your previous employer since you would have been faced with several challenges-financial,moral,etc.and yet, rose with the company!
I think it’s really high time we had insight on these educational decadence in Naija. A year- MSc/MBA wont replace/provide the knowledge that was missed in the four-year BSc! Again, the MSc/MBA may not give the skills that potential employers require. Very soon, we may have graduates in this category becoming lecturers (since Phd is just the basic pre-requisite for lecturing), and hence a generation of worsened knowledge- capability. I came across a friend last time I was in Nigeria who was already writing his Phd. Being a little-below-average student in college days, he couldnt get a job, hence went for Masters. He also completed that, and now willing to lecture after his Phd, since he claimed he waited again for a year after MSc and couldnt find job.
I pity the future of the students that would be lectured by my friend, because as at the last time we met, my friend was still the UEFA- Club boys- YahooPlus type.
so painful
The future of Nigeria is undoubtedly in trouble.