For many young people, landing a job at the tech giant Google is a dream career starter. Google is consistently ranked among the best companies to work for in national surveys. And with its stock price climbing ever higher, it makes those employee stock benefits look might sweet.
You might think that a pristine academic record from a prestigious school is the key to getting in the door. But in a recent interview, Google vice president, Laszlo Bock, called traditional hiring criteria such as GPA and test scores “worthless.” Even a college degree is not considered important for hiring purposes:
In a New York Times interview on “How to get a job at Google,” Bock said, shockingly, that “GPAs are worthless as a criteria for hiring, and test scores are worthless. … We found that they don’t predict anything.”
Even a college degree doesn’t make it, he said, noting that the “proportion of people without any college education at Google has increased over time.”
High tech companies are increasingly looking for demonstrated skills–especially computer programming skills–in new hires. It’s a potential game changer for young tech-savvy students, who increasingly have the option to skip college and dive straight into a lucrative career at a company like Google.
If I had a kid brother or sister who could write code like a champ, I’d advise them to skip the four-year college party/debt trap and put their skills and passions to work right away.
The days in which a four-year degree is the baseline entry point for a legitimate career are behind us–at least as far as Silicon Valley is concerned.
(Image: amysphere.flickr)
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