Ideal Millenial Entrepreneur Podcast

132: The Great Shift: Why College Degrees Are No Longer Enough

• Amir Estimo • Season 6 • Episode 132

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Feeling stuck in a career that doesn't reward your expensive college degree? You're not alone. The rules of success have fundamentally changed, and it's time we talk about it.

The traditional path we were all promised – study hard, get a degree, land a good job, climb the corporate ladder – has quietly transformed beneath our feet. Since the pandemic, major companies across industries have been quietly dropping degree requirements from job postings. Why? Because they've realized what truly matters: your ability to deliver tangible value through practical skills.

This episode dives into this profound shift and what it means for millennial entrepreneurs and professionals. I share personal insights about my own daughter's college journey and our family's decision to avoid student loans while focusing on skill-based education that leads directly to employment. The painful truth is that many degree programs emphasize theory over practice, leaving graduates with debt but without the hands-on capabilities employers desperately need.

The new employment equation is brutally simple: if everyone on your team can do what you do, you're easily replaceable. But when you develop unique skill sets that make you invaluable, you gain leverage, security, and earning power. This applies whether you're an employee or entrepreneur – the market rewards those who can consistently deliver results through applied capabilities, not those with the most impressive credentials.

This doesn't mean college is worthless – certain professions still require formal education. But it does mean we need to be strategic about education investments and focus relentlessly on skill development throughout our careers. Subscribe to the podcast for more insights on building financial success as a millennial entrepreneur, and share this episode with someone who needs to hear this message about the changing landscape of work and achievement.

This podcast is sponsored by Starvelle Talent Group. Our goal is to help the culture build Wealth Assets Prosperity. We appreciate you taking the time to listen to this episode and share the content if you find value.

Speaker 1:

Bienvenidos a Ideal Millennial Entrepreneur Podcast, the podcast for millennial entrepreneurs, where each week, I share financial tips on how to improve your finance, increase your income and your mindset as a millennial entrepreneur. Thanks for joining me in today's episode, empecemos. Welcome to the Ideal Millennial Entrepreneur Podcast. I am your host, amir Estimo. Thank you for tuning in today's podcast episode, because you could be doing anything in this world, but the fact that you are listening to this podcast it is much appreciated. Second, if you get a chance, please subscribe to the podcast if you enjoy this content. Also, share this podcast with someone if you find this podcast to be helpful with anyone. So it is much appreciated. Folks, leave a rating and review if you enjoy this podcast. It's only going to help this podcast grow, as we are looking to grow on this podcast. But anyway, today's episode we're going to talk about skills and why skills pays the bills.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you are someone like me and or even now, and you've been always understood that growing up, working hard is what is going to advance you and what you're starting to notice, if you notice now on the is work hard, go to college, get a degree and then get a good job, get married and so on. But what we're starting to see in the last, probably since COVID, that's not almost a thing anymore. That's really not a thing anymore. That's not almost a thing anymore. That's really not a thing anymore. And I think I happen to see a. I was reading a topic recently and how now companies are not even requiring people to have college degrees, like they're not enforcing it as much as they used to. And why is that? Well, what you start to realize going to college, what it does when you go to college and someone like me who went to college is you go to college but there is not really so much, there's not really so much hands on actually doing. It's a lot of theory and you take a test, you are studying, take a test and so on. Now, if you move on to what they call postgraduate maybe master's you go write a thesis and then you go for your doctorate. The thing is is that the aspect of doing things doesn't really happen. Now, let's say you go to be an engineer, you go to pre-med, now you got to go into medical school to actually do a lot of the hands-on stuff. And then, if you're an engineer, you got to go into medical school to actually do a lot of the hands on stuff and then, if you're an engineer, you got to go and do an internship and then to actually do a lot of the hands on stuff. And on top of that, college is expensive. It's very expensive. So now you have the cost of college, the cost of college. Then you have the lack of actually hands-on doing stuff, more so on the theory side and not so much really the doing side.

Speaker 1:

Now I remember when I took classes and this is years ago and I'm talking years ago and A lot of the stuff that you study the one thing I would say about college it really helped was your critical thinking. You had to be a really good critical thinker and it really opened you because you be put into a scenario and you had to understand how to put two and two together and how to make that work two and two together and how to make that work. But what you don't realize now is if you get into a job and you don't have the skills, you become now unemployable. And that's what has happened now in college and in the workforce is now you go and grab somebody that's goals come from college and they really haven't done a lot of the the actual doing stuff. So it's taking longer for them to get acclimated to the position. So and companies are getting frustrated. So where else? Now, if you have someone that understands, that does a lot of the doing and and then some, and then they actually, you know, they learn, they grow, it becomes, they're easier to stay, that person is easier to stay employed.

Speaker 1:

And what has happened again is now, if you don't have the skill sets of skills meaning you could be in IT, if you don't even know, because IT, the industry is always changing. But if you're not keeping up with the latest technology or you're not good at a tool, and then let's say you get better, you get better at that tool, then also you know you have to be able to go out there and get better at other things. You know, maybe leadership, you're leading a team, maybe being a very good asset to your team, but if you just go in there and all you just know how to do is one thing, you're really not going to be able to survive in this workforce anymore. A college degree is now just a paper in the workforce and it's not necessarily what is going to pay the bills anymore, it's your skills. That's going to pay the bills, because companies want to be able. You, you be able to come and be able to come and be able to be a value add.

Speaker 1:

Now, if I put you in this position, what can you do? If I put you here, what can you do If I put you there? What can you do? You get what I'm saying and I hope that makes sense to people because the more you are, you have the skill sets, the easier it becomes, because now you can become employable again. You could probably be a team lead or you can be. You know they can put you on different projects and they can entrust you. Because of the fact that You're a, you're so versatile because you have a lot of skill sets, that becomes employed, that becomes useful to the company.

Speaker 1:

Not necessarily how this theory and how that and how you try to figure out the Pythagorean theorem and the theory behind it and and all that stuff. So that's where. That's where it is now in society. Society has changed to now where you have to be able to be. You have to be able to be. You got to be open-minded and constantly improving your skills, constantly getting better with your skill sets, because of the fact that if you just focus on going to college, getting it and I'm not saying you should not go to college, I'm definitely not saying that but I think if you go to college, you have to have a certain.

Speaker 1:

You got to have a certain. And if it's like almost that, because the shift in the industry, the skill sets and, like I said, going to college, you should, you should go, like if you're going to be a doctor, an engineer, a lawyer, those type of things, you should definitely go to college. Seeing now is, depending on what industry you plan on going to is, you may have to focus more on skill sets than versus. Okay, going the college route, racking up so much debt, and then all suddenly it's hard for you to find a job to pay for that college debt that you just took out. And if I notice and the reason I'm sharing this too is because, about a couple of weeks ago, I took my daughter, my oldest, she turned 18 and she's going to college. She's about to graduate this month and she's going to college.

Speaker 1:

The thing, though, I noticed is, when we filed for financial aid, then what did the financial aid come? Well, you're getting a little bit of grant and then you get all the student loans and we as a family has made a decision we're not taking student loans, we are not taking out student loans at all. So for us it's going to be us working as a team, collectively, to ensure one she knows what she's going to do in college going because she wants to go into nursing, so what she wants to exactly do, because we can't be in the mindset of wasting time. And if she's going to go become a nurse, could it, could there be maybe other outside schools or education that she can do besides? And luckily she's going to go to a community college and the community college has the program, the nursing program, that she would like to do. And that's where I'm saying that, in the aspect of and I've had this discussion with her too I told her you're going to have to build skill sets Because even though you get the nursing degree, you're going to have to have different skill sets to where you can elevate your income.

Speaker 1:

A lot of people focus on getting a job, but then they stay at the job and then you're like okay, well, I'm happy, I'm good, this pays the bills, I'm great. But they don't necessarily focus on the skills that they would need to be able to continue to keep going. Because the more you keep going and the more you keep going, you know you learn different aspects and then a company may be, you may be, very useful to a company and therefore you may be able to do a job that nobody else on that team can do that you can make more money doing. So I just thought I would share this with you guys today, because I've seen the shift in the industry and the industry now has shifted, because now it's more about skill sets. It's not so much about college degree and all that stuff. It's now is okay.

Speaker 1:

If we put you on this team, what can you do? Because if you're like everybody else, you're easily replaceable. But if you have, if you can do, if you can do, if your job requires something, if your job requires other people can't do your job. You're not as easy replaceable job. You're not as easy replaceable, and that's where the shift in the industry is happening. So hopefully this is a, this is a you know, maybe something you guys get out of it. And it's today's episode, because right now it's more about your skills, more than ever, and it's not so much more about. You know you're going getting a college degree. I will link that um that, that article that I read and hope you guys can take a look at it in the show notes. Read it and you'll see that these companies are changing. It's not any more about, it's not even a requirement anymore to have a college degree, it's more so of skill sets. Okay, appreciate you guys. Much love.