It's Time to Torch the Paper Ceiling

How Might We Start to Torch the Paper Ceiling

Over the past few decades, employers have made post secondary education a requirement for professional job positions. While this doesn’t affect those fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to obtain a Bachelor’s or Master’s degree, it has greatly limited those who have gained education and experience outside of the standard classroom.?

For some professions like Medicine, Law, and Engineering post-secondary is a necessary and safe place to gain the knowledge required to fulfill the responsibilities and duties of the job. But for occupations like software development, sales, customer service, administration, and project or program management people can easily learn the skills through work experience, alternative programs, or even through self teaching. However, these nontraditional channels as well as transferable and soft skills are often overlooked by hiring managers.

This has created the Paper Ceiling, an invisible barrier for those in the workforce without a college or university degree. It is an educational bias that has been adopted by organizations and utilized as a hiring shortcut to seemingly determine whether a candidate is qualified enough to be considered for the position. The consequence is a tight job market that has created a false talent shortage when there is actually a high percentage of the working population known as STARs (Skilled Through Alternative Routes) that are being disregarded and underutilized.

Reasons to Look Beyond a Degree:

1. Widen Your Talent Pool

In 2021, it was reported by Statistics Canada that the share of working-age people (ages 25 to 64) with a college or university degree made up 57.5% of the workforce. This leaves 42.5% without a degree. During 2021 this group of the population made up just approximately 20.6 million people in Canada. Therefore, around 8.7 million people in this group have not obtained a post secondary certification or degree. This is a significant number and while not all of these 8.7 million people may have the skills to take on certain roles, there is still a significant number of people within this population that are most likely being disregarded due to institutionalized educational bias.

1. Increases Diversity in Your Organization

Diversity, Equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives have become a core facet in organization frameworks over the last decade. An overlooked way that a company can increase diversity is by accepting those with varied and nontraditional educational backgrounds. In Canada and the United States, when hiring managers screen for university or college degrees they are typically excluding minority groups such as Indigenous, Black, Veteran, Hispanic, or rural workers as well anyone who may have come from an underprivileged background that did not have the resources to pursue further education.???

1. Strengthens Your Company’s Perspective and Skill Base

Skills based hiring puts an emphasis on hiring individuals that have the right skill set and experience for your team. They have either used the skillset hiring managers are looking for in another role(s) or have transferable skills that meet the requirements of the job posting. This often brings individuals to organizations that are versatile, resourceful, and innovative allowing the company to be adaptable in an ever changing economy and job market.?

1. Increasing University Costs

In both Canada and the United States university and college has become increasingly more expensive. In the 2021 and 2022 academic year, Statistics Canada reported that the tuition of Canadian students enrolled in full-time undergraduate programs increased by 1.7% to $6,693. This does not include the price of housing and textbooks required to attend. As prices continue to climb, university becomes more unattainable for the groups within our population that do not have the means to choose this educational path for themselves.

The job market gap has encouraged some organizations, like IBM, to consider how the paper ceiling has affected their ability to scale and hire. Shifting to skills based hiring has allowed these companies to have a competitive advantage when it comes to having the best talent on their team. It instead focuses on the core competencies and relevant skills that are needed for the role and the company.

How to Adapt a Skills Based Hiring Approach

1. Question Current Requirements: What is actually necessary for someone to be successful in this role? Does the knowledge and skill set required only come from a university degree, or can it be learned through other channels?
2. Look Beyond the Job Title: Job title names can vary between organizations and industries making it easy to disregard those that don’t fall under the job titles used by your company. As well, a lot of skills learned or developed in past roles can be transferable, regardless of job title. Consider skills and projects over the job title when screening candidates.
3. Implement Skill Testing and Assessments: There are a wide variety of assessments and testing that can be utilized in the interview process to determine whether an individual is the right fit for the role. They are typically used in technical interviews but other evaluation methods such as practical simulations, case interviews, role-play exercises, and portfolio or project reviews are also helpful ways to evaluate a candidate.
4. Be Curious: A common thread throughout this recruitment strategy is to steer away from bias and assumptions. Recruitment will always be a dynamic and complex process due to it being a highly people centric profession. Leaning into curiosity and championing a spirit of learning will always result in the best fit for both a company and a candidate.

The Paper Ceiling may have an invisible barrier but its education bias is noticeable. Choosing to reconsider the way we look at work experience and implementing alternative ways to assess compatibility and competency is a necessary step to change. However, it is not until individuals that are a part of the hiring process take accountability for the preconceived notions they may have about those skilled through alternative routes and start to consider whether these prejudices are impeding progress, innovation, and efficiency of the workplace.

Written by; Katy Hayduk