Here's an article I stumbled on.... Although it's quite sentimental to the Oil and gas field, it has applicable advice I remember the day I graduated from college as well as if it had happened yesterday: the weather was broiling, I was really sad to leave Rice and my friends, but I was proud of what I’d done. I also remember thinking (probably like most recent college graduates): “Well, this is it. I graduated from a great school with a great degree, so I must be awesomely smart. I know everything I need to know, and it’s only a matter of time before my future managers realize how awesome I am and promote me to partner.”
Riiigghhttt…
As you’ve probably guessed, some time out in the “Real World” changed my thinking, so much so that I’ve gone back to school not once, but twice!
As a result of my lengthy experiences with graduate education, a question I hear often from other Young Professionals is “do I really need to go back to school for a graduate degree?”
My short answer: “If you’re really serious about building a successful, interesting and dynamic career, yes!”
Following that, the next questions without fail are: “what degree(s) should I get?” and “how should I go about it?”
Given all the talk today regarding the many issues with higher education (cost, usefulness…), these are very relevant questions. Just as the issues aren’t straightforward, neither are the answers, so in the interest of clarity I’m making this a two part series: today I’ll give you my thoughts on why I believe strongly in earning a graduate degree as well as some recommendations on which ones to pursue, and next week I’ll share some insights I’ve gained regarding full time vs. part time, and distance vs. in-class.
When you join an operator or a service company, it’s likely that everyone in your start group has a college degree. At that point, you’re at the exact same level as the others: regardless of your GPA or where you went to school, you ended up in the same room as everyone else, and everyone else ended up in the same room as you. Also, if you’re like me, you’re already thinking about how to separate yourself from the pack…
Fast forward a few months, and after a short time working, you probably also realized that your undergraduate coursework only scratched the surface of what you’re exposed to professionally. The most direct way of addressing those knowledge gaps is to pursue further studies. If you bring this up, you may get some push back depending on who you talk to. Sadly, I’ve heard of many senior professionals counseling Young Professionals away from pursuing their education: “work experience will fix that, more school isn’t necessary, look at me I turned out fine!”
I respectfully (but strongly) disagree with that statement. I see education as a mental “filing cabinet”, a way of organizing all the new knowledge you gain; the more education you have that’s relevant to your field, the bigger your filing cabinet. If your classes represent the various folders, every time you’re exposed to something new at work, you can file it mentally in one of those files. I believe that having this strong foundation allows you not only to pick things up quickly, but also to see the “big picture” and see how things are related to each other.
If part of “the Great Crew Change” is getting up to speed rapidly in order to compensate for the many senior professionals leaving the industry, aren’t these desirable benefits of pursuing graduate education? Additionally, from a career development point of view, this makes you a higher performing employee, which brings me back to my first point, about setting yourself apart from your peers.
The fact is that every high performing Young Professional I know today has a graduate degree, or is in the process of pursuing one (or their second!). I remember clearly being told on my first day of business school that 27% of new students already had a graduate degree. That may seem like a small number of students in the grand scheme of things, but then again…how much space is there at the top of the pyramid?
If you think showing up and doing a good job alone will get you to the top, think again. Furthering your education proves that you have a desire to learn more, and that you can set long term goals and follow through on them. Those pursuing graduate degrees (especially those doing so while they work) work very hard, and everything else being equal, the extra qualification could mean the difference between promotion and stagnation.
Perhaps you’re saying: “but I don’t want to work for a big corporation, and real entrepreneurs don’t need school, they just get on with it and build their companies!” I have to disagree with the assumption held by many that going back to school either means you’re incapable of starting a business, or that it turns you into a “worker bee” capable of doing nothing more than working for someone else.
Personally, I’ve made some great friends/future business connections in school, and I do feel far better prepared to handle anything up to and including starting my own business eventually. To be fair, I do know several people roughly my age that have started companies with only Bachelor’s degrees. I’m really happy for them, but if entrepreneurship is your goal, I can still see value from going back to school, provided you pick the right course of study, which leads me to the next question most YPs in oil & gas have…
“MBA or technical Master’s?”
This is a tough question, and it really depends on your career goals, interests and expectations. An MBA is usually seen as necessary in order to access the highest levels of senior management, but don’t think that just because you’ve earned one you will immediately be promoted to CEO. Earning this degree (especially if you’ve previously only been exposed to engineering) teaches you to think in new ways which will in turn allow you to be more impactful at the office. This degree opens doors, but it’s still up to you to make things happen, and you may not see a full return on this degree until years after you graduate.
A technical Master’s is usually much more immediately applicable, and is appropriate if you would rather become a subject matter expert as opposed to managing business units. Usually, you can start benefiting from this degree as soon as you graduate, in terms of more interesting assignments and/or more visibility in the company. The subject you choose is entirely up to you: do you want to delve deeper into a subject you already know, or do you seek to broaden your skill set or acquire a more desirable qualification?
For me, the decision to earn a Master’s in petroleum engineering even though I already have a degree in mechanical engineering and a lot of field experience was in consideration of the former. I’ve found that even if two degreed engineers are equally capable, the one with the petroleum engineering degree will be paid more initially and will be more in demand on the open market. That “stamp” carries a lot of weight today!
As you can tell from the length of this post, the questions I posed aren’t easy to answer, and depend highly on the individual, so I’d love to hear your feedback! Do you see any need to go back to school? If you have already done so or are doing so, what benefits are you gaining? Do you think any of this advice changes if you’re going further than a Master’s, onto the PhD level? Source: fuelfix.com/blog/2013/06/05/an-undergraduate-degree-is-just-the-beginning-for-young-professionals-in-oil-gas/ 4 Likes 3 Shares |
