10 questions every college student must ask before choosing their major

In Part 2 of our series on the crisis and opportunity facing college students, we'll talk about 10 questions every college student must ask before choosing their major.  The McKinsey & Company Voice of the Graduate report shows that the major and college that university students choose can have a significant impact on their happiness, financial situation, and health.  

For instance, the McKinsey report shows that graduates who majored in liberal, visual and performing arts at four-year colleges fare the worst among all majors: they tend to be lower paid, deeper in debt, less prepared for the workforce, and less happily employed than the average college graduate.  In addition, many of them regret the major they chose - 41% of visual and performing arts majors and 39% of language, literature and social science majors wish they had chosen a different major.  But having regrets about your major or college doesn't just apply to liberal, visual and performing arts majors - in fact, McKinsey reports that 38% of all college students at the Top 100 4-year colleges say if they could do it over again, they would choose either a different major.

One of the biggest drivers behind this regret is the difficulty students in certain majors have getting full-time jobs in their desired fields.  According to McKinsey, only 37% of language, literature and social science majors and 42% of visual and performing arts majors reported having full-time jobs in a field related to their major.  In contrast, 78% of health majors and 62% of accounting, economics and finance majors were fully employed in those fields upon graduating.

Where are these college graduates that can't land jobs in their desired field working?  Increasingly, they are working in the retail and hospitality fields - McKinsey estimates that of the 1.7 million students who graduated from college this year, about 120,000 of them are working as waiters, cashiers and salespeople, because that's the only work they could find.  This trend is consistent with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics finding that 10 percent of cashiers, 15 percent of waiters and waitresses, and 25 percent of retail salespeople have a college degree.

To help address this problem for current and incoming college students, every student (with the help of their parents and/or a career consultant) must ask, research and answer these 10 questions before choosing a major:

1. Does my university offer a strong, renowned academic program and career services for this major?
2. What industries hire my major, and what percentage of grads in my major get hired in these industries?
3. What percentage of recent grads from my university and major have full-time jobs in these industries?
4. What is the outlook for jobs in these industries?  Are the industries growing, shrinking or stable? 
5. Who are the companies or organizations in my industry that hire college graduates?  
6. What are the most common entry-level positions that these companies hire?  
7. What are the required skills, experiences and qualifications to get these entry-level positions?  
8. How many college graduates do these companies typically hire each year?  
9. What is the average starting salary for this position, and what should I expect to be earning in 5 years?
10. Is this salary sufficient to support myself and pay off my student debt?

If students do their homework on the majors they are interested in, they will be more prepared for the job market after college, more confident in their choice of major, and happier with their major and college degree upon graduation.  We'd love to hear your thoughts - what else can college students do to make better informed decisions about their major?

The crisis and opportunity facing college students - Part 1

In May 2013, McKinsey & Company and Chegg Inc. released a stunning report on the state of recent college graduates, called Voice of the Graduate.  This report has a number of compelling findings, which we feel compelled to explore and start a dialogue about.  This is the first of our 3-part series, focused on the crisis and opportunity facing college students.  In today's post, we'll focus on the underemployment crisis facing recent U.S. college graduates.

Perhaps the most surprising finding from McKinsey's report is that 45% of recent college graduates they surveyed are currently employed in jobs that do not require a college degree. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (UBLS) recently also published a similar statistic that reports that 48% of college graduates are in jobs that don't require a 4-year college degree.  And the Federal Reserve Bank of New York recently hosted a press briefing that reports 46% of college graduates between the ages of 22-27 are underemployed.  Whatever the actual number is, it's really high.  

This is a complicated issue, and there's no single solution.  Rather than seeing this as a problem though, we see it as an opportunity - how can we help that 45-48% of college graduates who are underemployed get jobs in the fields they want to get into?  And how can we help the percentage of future grads who are underemployed go down, eventually to 0%? Here are three solutions that will help us realize this opportunity:

1. Make career preparation mandatory at all colleges: currently career counseling is treated as an option at most universities.  This results in many college students not taking advantage of their career centers.  In fact, out of the 4,900 college graduates surveyed by McKinsey, only 37% of students at the Top 100 universities used their career center, and the number is even worse at other colleges, where only 25% of students used their career centers.  Making a career preparation course or program mandatory would require all college students to have at least some exposure to their career center.

2. Parents, high schools and colleges must educate students on related careers when selecting a school and major: while liberal arts degrees have a lot of merit, students should go into these majors with eyes wide open, and right now they aren't.  The underemployment problem is even more dramatic with liberal arts degrees. According to the McKinsey study, liberal arts and performing arts graduates tend to be lower paid, deeper in debt, less happily employed, when compared to the average college graduate.  And 41% of visual and performing arts grads and 39% of liberal arts grads report (after they've already graduated) they wish they had chosen different majors.  

3. Students should not use a "DIY" approach in their job search: just as students seek help from expert college admissions counselors and SAT/ACT courses to get into a great college, they should seek help from professionals in their job search who have expertise and experience in career planning.  Most students don't do that - according to McKinsey, 61% of students rely exclusively on themselves, family, friends and internet advice in their job search.  While we encourage students to talk to friends and family in their job search, it's important that they also work with professionals, like university career centers and private career consultants, who can help with navigating the job market and build the career preparation skills to land their dream jobs. 

What are your thoughts on the underemployment crisis, and what can be done about it?  

Why we started Go Getter

The #1 question people ask us is why we started Go Getter?  There are three reasons:

1) We like helping college students, and we're good at it - Valerie and I have been helping college students and recent grads discover their calling and land great jobs for over 10 years.  

2) There's a huge need in the market - countless studies show that the majority of college students graduate unprepared for the workforce, and nearly half of recent college grads are underemployed in jobs that don't require a college degree.  Clearly the existing system is broken.  

3) The other options that college students have aren't sufficient - while each have their merits, university career centers and the "do it yourself" approach also have issues, which we have solved for.

Now to dive into these reasons a bit more:

Reason #1: We've been in the same position as all college students out there - when Valerie and I graduated from Cal and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo respectively, neither one of us really knew what we wanted to do with our careers.  Through trial and error, and going back to school for our MBAs, we eventually figured out "the system" - but it took years to do so.  And since that point, we've mentored and helped numerous undergrad and grad students from universities including Cal, UCLA, Stanford, Princeton & Rutgers discover their ideal career path and land a great job.  Not only are we really good at helping students, but we enjoy it!  It feels great to help a student figure out what to do with their career - and to help them do so quickly, saving them years of lost income and opportunity they would incur by trying to figure it out themselves.

Reason #2: Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you know that we are facing an epidemic with college students going into the workforce.  The statistics are sobering - according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 48% of employed college graduates are in jobs that don't require a 4-year college degree.  McKinsey & Company reported in May 2013 that almost 1/3 of college graduates feel that college did not prepare them well for employment, while other studies have reported that more than 80% of employers feel that recent college grads are unprepared for their first job.  And last but not least, Accenture published a study this year showing that only 68% of 2011/2012 college grads have full-time employment.  

These findings are only the tip of the iceberg - it's clear that there's a huge problem with college students getting great jobs out of college.  We intend to help solve that problem - one student at a time.

Reason #3: College students and recent grads typically turn to friends, family and themselves to figure out their career path and find their first job.  The primary issues with this approach is that students don't know what they don't know.  They rely on advice from people who have good intentions but aren't up to speed on the realities of today's market, or they search online for advice, which is all over the place and is often grossly inaccurate and insufficient.  They often don't know how to network, how to brand themselves and speak with confidence, and how to interview effectively.  They don't know that there is a hidden job market or how to access it.  

The other alternative is university career centers.  Some career centers are better than others, and some have great career resources for undergrads.  But even career centers have issues - one is time and resources.  How can a career center with 5-10 employees sufficiently serve the needs of a university with 10-15,000 sophomores, juniors and seniors looking for jobs, internships or career advice?  They can't.  Career centers can often be a great starting point for students, but many students need more help than they can provide.  Along these lines, career centers can't guide students though the entire career search process - all the way until the student lands a job or internship.  We can - we help students complete the last mile of their journey by actually guaranteeing them a great job in their desired profession.  In this economy, actually getting students great jobs is the only benchmark that matters - and only Go Getter does that.  

We're excited to launch our company this fall!  What do you think of Go Getter?  We'd love to hear your comments and questions!

Cheers,

Daniel Meyer

Co-Founder of Go Getter