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53% of Recent College Grads Are Jobless or Underemployed reports the Atlantic.

FIFTY-THREE PERCENT!?

I genuinely wish I could say I was surprised. But it’s about as surprising as the promiscuous girl’s relapse less than a month after she returns from church camp.

… “college for all” is the wrong mantra. We need to be talking about “skills for all” instead.

The article is primarily talking about more tangible skills like writing code or administering an IV, but being successful goes beyond those things as well. A programmer who can’t communicate with his team and a nurse with no empathy for her patients won’t get hired.

Which begs the question…

What are some other skills young professionals should’ve learned in school?

I asked seven wicked-smart under 30 professionals. What follows are their responses:

1.) What it Means to Work
Diana Antholis discusses the fact that we are taught the skills necessary for certain jobs in college, but we are not prepared for what happens when we actually enter into those jobs.

2.) Life Skills 101
Jake Cripe explains that we need to learn life skills like networking, public speaking, how to change a tire and how to do our taxes. He also explains why teachers are soldiers going to war without weapons.

3.) Entrepreneurship
Sam Davidson insists it’s time to make the connection between education and entrepreneurship. “Perhaps the reason we don’t have more people starting more companies that could jump start our economy is because our country spent the last 20 years educating them to do anything but,” he laments.

4.) Emotional Intelligence
Tom O’Keefe urges students (and educators) to stop playing the memorization/regurgitation game and to focus on increasing emotional intelligence by enhancing the soft skills such as effective communication via body language.

5.) Personal Finance
Rich Pulvino understands that debt and unemployment are two things that have a stranglehold on recent graduates. Teaching students how to find the right credit card deals, manage debt, save money, and invest properly will help combat the confusion they often encounter upon graduation.

6.) It’s Okay to Fail
Patrick Johnson would’ve tried a lot more things, both academically and with respect to his future, had he known it was okay to take risks and to fail.

7.) Leadership
Michelle Bizon starts by admitting that leading isn’t easy. She goes on to explain why neither authority nor expertise make you a good leader, and that we don’t learn leadership in school despite the fact that it’s imperative to establishing a bridge between theory and performance.

What are we missing? What do you wish you would’ve learned in school?

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We all know the type. Most of you have worked with and/or for at least a couple in your career.

Most of them excel at fooling the boss into thinking they’re working hard and some even have the audacity to explain to you that “they know how to play the game.”

Your first inclination is to call them out or tattle. Most of you will refrain from this approach knowing full well it won’t do you any good and in most instances make you seem like a whiny baby. (Note: You *are* a whiny baby!)

Here’s the dirty little secret about these “game players.” They’re not stupid. Not by a long shot. And they do some things well that can be perceived by bad management (or perhaps busy management) as valuable.

• They know how to network and increase visibility with leadership.
• They know how to appear active and busy. (see: e-mails at all hours, lots of meetings, exasperated sighs)
• They know how to manage you in pursuit of their own goals and log your successes as their own (or the teams’ with emphasis on their leadership).

Here’s the rub: Life is not fair. Get over it.

Find the silver lining.

Here’s the best advice I can possibly give you:
Stop giving a damn about what other people think and worry about yourself.

Rather than worry about co-workers intent on “playing the game” I encourage you to do the following instead:

• Maintain your integrity at all costs, even if it costs you and/or your organization business.
• Take responsibility for your mistakes AND those of your team.
• Give vigorous attention to each task-at-hand and work your ass off regardless who’s watching — even if your achievements go unnoticed.

If these don’t work, then go to an organization or a company where they will. Find a company full of smart people and great leadership that is making a positive impact on society. Work there!

The truth is that “game players” sometimes win the game they’re playing.

Don’t play their game.

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Rarely is the most important metric the one on the surface.

Your Facebook likes don’t mean much. Neither do your Twitter followers.

You already know how I feel about impressions. They’re an incomplete business metric, at best.

Views are NOT your most important YouTube Metric. One million views don’t mean anything if those people are clicking to start watching your video and closing the window after 20 seconds of boredom and/or frustration.

But if views are not the most important metric, what is? Let’s take that journey.

First find the “show video statistics” button on the bottom right next to your views:

That button brings up additional metrics including demographic and location information. Pay attention to these, but we’re still not there. Click the “view more statistics button.”

Now we’re getting pretty close. On the left-hand column under “view reports” you’ll find, “audience retention.” Click that.

That delivers this valuable little diddy:

You see, it doesn’t matter if you have 12,000 Twitter followers if none of them read your tweets, and it doesn’t matter if you have 100,000 YouTube views if all those views aren’t leading to sales, more subscribers, more affinity for your brand, et al. That’s why it’s crucial to know how many people are watching ALL of your video.

The chart above tells me that 82% of viewers were still watching after 45 seconds, 69% after 1:30, and about 60% made it through the duration of the video. It’s not great, but it’s better than most of the videos I’ve done thus far. Video isn’t my expertise, and I’m still learning. Watch Ze Frank’s return to see a master at work.

What could I have done differently to retain more viewers throughout the entire video?

Here’s some things to keep in mind:

• Err on the shorter side with videos. I’d aim for 2:00 minutes, 3:00 maximum (unless it’s a more informative how-to tutorial).
• Get to the main point of your video as quickly as possible.
• Consider using calls-to-action before the end of the video.

What else should we be considering? Here’s your chance to teach me in the comments!

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In short, yes.

But I’m not that Ryan Stephens.

Judging by my recent traffic, someone with my namesake is pedaling some “work from home and make millions of dollars” nonsense.

Stop wasting your time. I assure you that it’s a scam.

Here’s the rub. If you’re one of those people looking to get rich quick exerting minimal effort and working in your pajamas then you landed on the wrong blog. I’m not rich and neither is the clown trying to convince to throw away $97 dollars.

I have news for you. If it sounds too good to be true… IT IS!

Look I get it. I really do.

You would love to pay off your debt. You hate your job and fantasize about being your own boss. You want spend more time with your family. Maybe you just want to supplement your income.

Most people have been there at some point in their lives. I assure you that the Adam Baker’s, and the Ashley Ambirge’s of the world exist. They did it.

But guess what!?

They worked their asses off.

I know a lot of people that make a full time living online. And I’d be happy to link you to their blog(s) or even introduce you to one of them if you’re serious about learning.

But if not — if you’re just trying to get rich quick with some online home career bullshit, then kindly hit back and don’t come back to this blog.

I have a full-time job that I love for an organization I believe in.

I make a little beer money on the side helping people with the following:

• Creating integrated digital strategies that drive revenue.
• Establishing a relationship between social media metrics and business metrics
• Facilitating intelligent growth for online communities
• Leveraging social technologies to scale external marketing efforts and an internal culture of sharing

Beyond that I’m particularly interested in extending the internet/web/mobile disruption we’ve seen in media to other industries like education and healthcare in order to address the challenging economic and social issues of our time.

I also read a lot of business books and bitch about education in America.

If any of those things tickle your fancy then by all means, let’s connect. Or if I can help you achieve your goals (or connect you with someone else who can help you), I’d love to hear from you.

But to reiterate, if you stumbled across this blog because you were looking to get rich quick and start a career working online from home you’re shit out of luck.

Stop waiting for hand outs and start grinding.

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In order to efficiently jam as much testable data into a generation of kids, we push to make those children compliant, competitive zombies.

Every teacher, every student, every administrator, and every parent should read this manifesto. Seth Godin’s Stop Stealing Dreams is free and quick to consume. You really have no excuse.

I’m tired of seeing smart talented people thousands of dollars in debt while they mindlessly drone around in a cubicle doing a job they’re not passionate about.

Seth’s manifesto gets at the heart of the problem. The industrial revolution is long gone. The economy has changed and yet school’s haven’t. They still insist on rote memorization, crushing dreams, amplifying fear and churning out obedient factory workers that adhere to the status quo and fit into “the system.”

The good jobs of the future aren’t going to involve working for giant companies on an assembly line. They all require individuals willing to chart their own path, whether or not they work for someone else.

Here’s some quotes that hit home:

On shitty teachers:
If all the teacher is going to do is read her pre-written notes from a PowerPoint slide to a lecture hall of thirty or three hundred, perhaps she should stay at home. Not only is this a horrible disrespect to the student, it’s a complete waste of the heart and soul of the talented teacher. Teaching is no longer about delivering facts that are unavailable in any other format.

On the irrelevance of facts in today’s world:
In the connected world, reputation is worth more than test scores. Access to data means that data isn’t the valuable part; the processing is what matters. Most of all, the connected world rewards those with an uncontrollable itch to make and lead and matter.

On linchpins:
Scarce skills combined with even scarcer attitudes almost always lead to low unemployment and high wages.

The future of our economy lies with the impatient. The linchpins and the artists and the scientists who will refuse to wait to be hired and will take things into their own hands, building their own value, producing outputs others will gladly pay for.

On being a dreamer:
Dreamers aren’t busy applying for jobs at minimum wage, they don’t eagerly buy the latest fashions, and they’re a pain in the ass to keep happy.

On memorizing facts:
If I can find the answer in three seconds online, skill of memorizing a fact for twelve hours (and then forgetting it) is not only useless, it is insane!

When access to information was limited we needed to load students with facts. Now, when we have no scarcity of facts, or the access to them, we need to load them up with understanding.

On what schools should be teaching:
The two pillars of a future-proof education: # 1 Teach kids how to lead. # 2 Help them learn to solve interesting problems.

• When we teach a child to make good decisions, we benefit from a lifetime of good decisions.
• When we teach a child to love to learn, the amount of learning will become limitless.
• When we teach a child to deal with a changing world, she will never become obsolete.
• When we are brave enough to teach a child to question authority, even ours, we insulate ourselves from those who would use their authority to work against each of us.
• When we give students the desire to make things, even choices, we create a world filled with makers.

On the cult of ignorance in the U.S.:
The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

This is something I’m very passionate about.

Here’s my rant on the fact that American education deserves better.

Here’s some great articles/videos on education reform. (Feel free to send me more to add to the list.)

And finally, here’s some wicked smart young professionals discussing what they wish they would’ve learned in school.

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“One option is to struggle to be heard whenever you’re in the room… Another is to be the sort of person who is missed when you’re not. The first involves making noise. The second involves making a difference.” — Seth Godin

Growing up playing multiple sports I was always the kid that had to be first. You may say, “That’s great. You should be pushing yourself. You should be challenging your teammates,” and you’re probably right.

But… what I slowly began to learn was that there was a time and a place for being first, and there was another time. A time when being a teammate and not showing others up mattered more (i.e. warm-up laps and long, slow days for those of you who ran long distance).

Running full speed during warm laps is a great way for your teammates to start resenting you and the same thing holds true when you’re the person who ALWAYS has to talk during team meetings at your office.

Whether you’re an employee who thinks you’re getting ahead by standing out or an employer who encourages and reinforces this behavior I hope you’ll watch this quick video and reconsider.

Are you making noise or making a difference?

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[Video]: Stop Running to the Front of the Pack –> http://ow.ly/9HDzO

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I’ve been waxing poetic on all the ways American education fails for over a year now. Not only do I find it disheartening that we still insist on the status quo of churning out compliant factory workers, but I’m empathetic to the plight of my peers who fell for the promise of higher education’s return on investment.

But what’s the answer if a college education is no longer worth it for most people? (We’re excluding physicians, lawyers, engineers, etc.)

Self learning.

“The magic of teaching is vastly overstated, mostly by teachers, and by those who staff programs that have economic interest in teaching prospective teachers how to teach.” — In the Basement of the Ivory Tower

After interviewing a wide range of millionaires for his book, “The Education of Millionaires: It’s Not What You Think and It’s Not Too Late” Michael Ellsberg contends that most successful people learn their most critical skills outside of school.

Ellsberg argues that education is not the same thing as academic excellence and highlights 7 success skills that people can leverage to become financially successful in their own careers. Leveraging these 7 skills you should be able to create a career for yourself that can’t be outsourced, offshored or automated.

I won’t discuss all 7 here (you’ll have to read the book), but the skill that resonated most for me was having an entrepreneurial mindset. He explains that people with the entrepreneurial mindset relentlessly focus on the outcome they want to produce in the world and in their lives. Alternatively, people with an employee mindset feel satisfied working harder and harder without paying attention to whether their efforts are producing the outcomes they want.

You can’t be the type of person who aimlessly follows ‘orders’ from your boss. Proactively go out and find problems within your organization, help solve them, AND THEN return to your boss to show them the results. That’s how you succeed; that’s how you get promoted.

On the employee mindset:

People with the employee mindset may work hard. Very, very hard. But they haul ass along a path others have created for them; they don’t create their own path. They are the passive recipients of instructions, orders and guidance, not the active creators of their own world. They do not have the answers; someone else does. They do what others around them tell them and expect them to do. They hope — indeed, expect and demand — that, if they please the people above them, a steady stream of benefits will flow their way. (“I did what you told me. Now give me my reward!”) If the reward is not forthcoming, they complain and get bogged down in bitterness and resentment, like a child who didn’t get a candy from Mommy.

To people with the employee mind-set, power resides elsewhere, not within themselves. There may be some safety and security in clinging to the employee mindset because those with employee mindset rely on someone more powerful and resourceful than themselves to save them and shield them from risk.

Here are two additional quotes I really appreciated:

On reciprocation:

“If you want to succeed, find leaders who are doing amazing things in the world, and push them up. Find powerful people and help them reach their goals. If you’re of service to them, they will be of service back.”

On entitlement:

“There are two decisions you need to come to in order to be free, and to be more effective. First is that you are not entitled to anything in the world, until you create value for another human being first. Second, you are 100 percent responsible for producing results. No one else. If you adopt those two views, you will go far.”

I’m not really the audience for Ellsberg’s book anymore, but I sure wish someone would’ve handed to me as an undergraduate. If you’re looking for direction and/or guidance in your education or career I encourage you to pick up the book. The people out there tinkering, starting businesses, failing, refining their ideas through exploration… Rest assured they’re getting ahead and acquiring valuable real world experience in an ever-changing world.

To be clear, I’m not telling you to forgo a college degree (maybe one in the arts), but I am pleading with you to take control of your life – before it’s too late.

Was your college education worth it? Was it applicable to the job you’re doing now? Do you catch yourself following orders and getting complacent rather than proactively searching for solutions? What is something you wished you learned in school? Here’s some topics other young professionals wished they would’ve learned in school.

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I’ve been fortunate in my career that I haven’t had to interview too much – though I enjoy the process and learning from those interactions as I hope this post will illustrate.

There was a handful of times I didn’t get the gig. Of those, I was usually in the final 2-3 candidates; however, there was one time in late 2009 when I flat out BOMBED an interview.

Let’s talk about that time.

The interview was with an up-and-coming social business firm based out of Austin and I fell in love with the work they were doing from the onset. The interviewer was a brilliant strategist who I admired a lot. For the first time in my life I was a little intimidated.

When I found out that I would have the opportunity to interview/have a conversation I started reading EVERYTHING I could about social business. I read everything the company had written, and I didn’t just read it, I thought about it.

I took an inordinate amount of notes and dove deep into the content. I thought about how it was applicable to marketing, the workplace, organization architecture and much more. I pored over it for hours and felt like I had something semi-insightful to offer from almost every vantage point.

On the day of the interview, I was nervous, but felt like I was more prepared than I’d ever been for anything in my life. I had notes scattered out (it was a phone interview) and though I was ready to answer ANY question.

I thought wrong.

We didn’t talk about social business. We barely talked about the organization at all. The interviewer asked me questions about myself.

“What did I want out of life?”

“Where did I see myself in five years?”

“Why did I want to leave sports marketing? Sports marketing is fun.”

Ummmmmmmmm… I wanted to talk about measuring a social brand and capturing value from today’s emerging technologies and evolving operating environments.

The funny thing is that I’d learned more about myself in 2009 than I ever had before, but I was completely unprepared to articulate most of that to someone else.

This company was full of brilliant people that could teach me social business. They were looking for someone who fit their culture, who wanted to learn, and consistently push him(her)self beyond their level of comfort. Hint: That’s what most companies want. They can teach you the rest.

In a world where most people are looking for a quick fix, (popping Adderral and anti-depressants like they’re candy) most of us are completely unwilling to turn the lens on ourselves. To think deeply about what we think, feel and believe. And how experiences, thoughts, and feelings impact our lives and they way we interact with others.

I encourage you to spend more time reading books that challenge you and retreating into your own mind more often.

Understanding who you are is crucial in understanding what you’re capable of and how you fit into our fancy little ecosystem.

Had I done that, I might not have gotten the job, but I wouldn’t be writing posts about that one time I bombed an interview.

What about you? Have you ever bombed an interview? What would you have done differently? What are your favorite interview tips?

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Are you like most people? Do you want to aimlessly float through life collecting your paycheck and living for the weekend? If you have no desire to become a linchpin, but you still want to fool your boss into thinking you’re working hard so you can obtain that elusive raise and/or promotion then these 10 tips will set you in the right direction.

1.) Send E-mails at Ridiculous Hours

Right before you go to bed send out one of those e-mails where all you did was casually look over a document and announce that “It’s good to go.” Make sure you CC someone else so they know how late you’re working too. If your office uses Outlook you can use the delay delivery feature to send stuff at 5:30am and on Sunday afternoons.

2.) Turn Your Desk into a War Zone

It is a clear indication that you’re working on multiple projects if you have stuff scattered all over your desk. Printouts, binders, folders, notebooks. Stack it all high. Put some excel spreadsheets on top. Everyone knows poring over excel is intense.

3.) Outsource Everything to Co-Workers

This is a key one because at some point something has to actually get done. Get a candy bowl, buy them lunch/drinks — basically do whatever you need to do to get them to like you and then persuade them to “help” (see: do) you with your work. Most of the time you should take all the credit, but throw them a bone sometimes and they’ll feel appreciated enough to help you next time you need it.

4.) Schedule Tons of Meetings

Most people think that if you’re in meetings you’re working and progress is being made. Most people haven’t read this book. Peter Drucker says meetings are a concession to deficient organization. We either meet or work. We can’t do both at the same time. Until your boss realizes that most meetings are worthless keep your calendar full of them.

5.) List Off All The Things You’re Working On

Most companies have status meetings where you alert everyone on the projects you’re working on. Don’t just announce the most impactful projects or the things that have changed since the last meeting. List every single thing you’re working on. Don’t just stop at tactics either. Let them know you e-mailed so-and-so and are awaiting a follow up. Really up the ante and make sure your to-do list spans multiple pages.

6.) Say “Uh huh” and “I Like That Idea” Loudly in Meetings

Visibility is key to proving you’re working hard. Don’t sit there quietly in meetings and not say anything. Processing all the information in order to fill a gap with a valuable contribution is a waste of valuable time. Make your voice heard. Nod a lot, and say “Uh huh” like you’re really engaged. Agreeing with someone else works well and stating the obvious, provided it won’t be contested by someone smarter than you is also a great strategy.

7.) Carry a Folder, Binder or Laptop Everywhere

Maybe you’re going to Target to get the latest Hunger Games book, but if you look like you’re going to a meeting or to someone else’s office they’ll never know. Bonus points for perusing the document as you walk down the hall towards your phony destination.

8.) Always Leave the Office Last

I know this is counter-intuitive to your desire to slack off, but this is the best way to guilt your boss into giving you a raise or a promotion. Play on Facebook, read a magazine or make personal phone calls when most people start leaving. Once everyone is gone, wait a few minutes and then leverage rule #1 by sending off a few obligatory e-mails. If your boss and/or co-workers follow you on Facebook go one step further and announce you’re finally leaving after an exciting day at the office.

9.) Learn Fancy Industry Jargon

You don’t have to actually know what you’re talking about, but if it sounds like you do everyone will be impressed. Get a few trade pubs, scour a couple of blogs and commit to learning a few nonsense words every week. Flowery language with no real substance makes you look super smart and we all know that smart people work hard.

10.) Act Really Stressed and Make Sure Everyone Knows

Audible sighs, massaging your own temples and announcing you have no more capacity to anyone who will listen are fool-proof tactics. Also, make sure you drink lots of caffeine, act frazzled and occasionally toss a few sheets of paper or yell at the printer. Work creates stress so the the more stressed you are, the harder you’re working. It’s a proven theorem.

I’ll be completely honest. In a lot of organizations shit like this probably does work, at least for awhile. (The skeptic in me says it works more often than it should, for longer than it should, in more organizations than you would suspect).

But I hope that it doesn’t work in your office. In good companies you’re not fooling anyone. Not your boss and certainly not your co-workers, who will typically keep quiet hoping leadership will notice until you step on their head in an attempt to ascend the corporate ladder.

So keep leveraging these tactics at your own discretion, but I hope you don’t find yourself in a high-profile position where you have to step up your game. Rest assured I’ll be rooting for you to fail.

Do you know anyone in your office that employs these tactics? Does leadership notice?

Photo Credit: Slyworking2

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Those of you that have been reading this blog for any length of time know my disdain for the current state of education in the U.S. I subscribe to Peter Thiel’s notion that hyper-inflated prices, investments by ignorant consumers funded largely by debt, and widespread faith in increasing returns will invariably ensure that higher education is the next bubble to burst.

Is a college education still worth it for most people?

“In the Basement of the Ivory Tower” Professor X, an instructor at a small private college and a local community college, sets out to answer that question and to share what he learned about his struggling students and the college system. These were some of my favorite takeaways from the book:

On our insistence that everyone needs a college degree:

“Our society, for all it’s blathering about embracing diversity and difference , really has no stomach for diversity and difference when it constitutes disparity.”

“Our American unwillingness to count even the most hopeless of us out of the educational marathon may be on of the most debilitating ideas in contemporary culture, a jagged gash through which vitality and truthfulness and quality slowly drain away.”

“Until the core job-training components are separated from the rest of the college curriculum, students less inclined toward an academic track will suffer.”

On how unprepared students are:

“The American zeitgeist of limitless possibility is a beautiful thing to behold. I, too, want desperately to believe in it. But some of the students I encounter in the community college world test my belief in the ultimate workability, the sustainability (to use the fashionable term) of what we have set up.”

On college as a business:

“Americans venerate education, perhaps unduly. With every increase in enrollments comes a positive tick on someone’s performance evaluation, another measurable achievement for someone’s curriculum vitae. And with every increase in tuition revenue comes more incentive to grow.”

On the ROI of a college degree:

“The collapse of our public education system and the skyrocketing cost of private education threaten to make college unaffordable for millions of young people.”

“It’s really about what it means to be 28 and try to make loan payments and health insurance premiums and still put something aside for a down payment on a house.”

On College vs. Home-Ownership

“The same societal urges that lowered the bar for home-ownership have lowered the bar for higher education, and the similarity haunts me.”

On self-learning:

“The magic of teaching is vastly overstated, mostly by teachers, and by those who staff programs that have economic interest in teaching prospective teachers how to teach.”

On female empathy & feelings of maternity for students (when passing those that shouldn’t):

“In 1971, 31% of college teachers were female; by 2009, the number had grown to 49.2%. There are more women teaching in college than ever, and it is quite possible that their presence, coupled with our discovery of postmodern narrative, has had a feminizing effect on the collective unconscious of faculty thought.”

On Writing:

“Writing is difficult because we don’t even call it what it is. The writing, the recording, the typing, whatever, is the least crucial part. Writing is thinking and crafting and editing; unfortunately, the writer always desires to make progress, and without constant vigilance may slip out of thinking and crafting mode and into mere progress, which can signal doom.”

“Is there any process that calls for more self discipline to get it right with less potential payoff?”

I learned a lot in college, very little of it that I’ve found applicable to my current job function. And I absolutely think college can be a great experience, but I also realize that I was born into a privileged situation where college was always a destination where I would likely graduate with little (or zero) debt.

What about all of the people that graduate with $25,000 of student loan debt (the national average), get out during an awful economic time, and compete with much more experienced workers coming back into the workforce? Do RNs, dental hygienists and computer programmers really need a four-year degree to signal to a potential employer that they have what it takes? Or do they need real, tangible experience?

I don’t have all the answers, but I hope that we’re at least starting to ask the right questions.

What do you think? How did your college degree prepare you for your job? If you’re someone who does have a lot of student loan debt, would you do it all over again? Because you think you have to in order to succeed or because your degree set you apart and gave you an advantage? I’d love to hear your stories and experiences. Please share in the comments.

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