Should your academic qualifications define your potential? It’s time to end minimum educational results for Early Careers roles.

Since the start of the year, I have been really happy to see more and more organisations rethinking the minimum requirements for Early Careers roles (whether graduate level or apprenticeship). It started with Santander following in the footsteps of pioneers like PwC,?by dropping the minimum degree requirements?for graduate jobs and during National Apprenticeship Week we have seen more and more companies talking about ‘potential’. The question for all them then, is how do you measure potential? And at scale, in an objective way, where there is no advantage for polish or privilege?

As anyone who knows me can vouch for, I’m incredibly passionate about uncovering for potential, and Anouska Ramsay’s (Santander HR Director) comment in the Guardian summed up so well why we need to look beyond academic qualifications as our minimum selection criteria:?

“Academic achievement is important, but it is only one of many factors we look at when searching for new talent. We believe potential can be found anywhere, and this move (dropping a minimum degree qualification) reinforces our commitment to finding the best candidates from a wide range of backgrounds.”

As Anouska references, academic achievement remains important but there are so many other factors behind an educational qualification that it is no longer a useful differentiator between individual candidates. Is 6 in Sociology the same as a 6 in Physics at GCSE? What about a 2:1 in Philosophy (my course!) compared to a 2:1 in Neuroscience (my son’s course!)? Then you have the whole issue about socio-economic status and those with support, and those without support, and how that affects educational results. Like the CV, educational results classification served us well for a time, but it’s time to move on to ensure greater equity.

The challenge is how do you measure potential? The definition of potential has to be a combination of soft skills (personality or attitude) and intellectual capability (general mental ability). Can you measure it and just as importantly, will any alternative to an application form and a qualification be better? The two key challenges employers face once you drop a minimum qulaification are: how do you differentiate applicants and consider both the minimum intellectual requirements as well as soft skills, like resilience; and secondly, how do you do this at scale and not introduce further bias or inequity?

The starting point is to take the time to really understand what you need. Setting a minimum educational result overlooks this important step. What type of general mental ability are you looking for? Learning agility or speed of thought? What about problem-solving? There are many different nuances to general mental ability (which we loosely refer to as intelligence), so understanding what you actually need and what the real minimum levels are, will pay dividends later on. This then drives how you measure the particular type of general mental ability you are looking for. One of my ‘bugbears’ in this area is that intelligence tests are ‘right or wrong’ focused and unlike the rest of a modern educational assessment approach, don’t give any credit for the way you get to the answer.

The other problem about setting a minimum educational qualification is that it fails to acknowledge the value of soft skills. A good lawyer or accountant must be as good at networking and building client relationships as they are at processing large quantities of information (in fact ChatGPT can do the processing so the need now is for interpreting results with insights). A good approach to assessing a candidate’s capabilities has to be holistic.

Now, back to my second question; how do you do this at scale and not introduce different barriers or bias? This means not only fitting an assessment seamlessly into your existing tech stack but also getting confirmation that the assessment works just as well on a mobile device as it does a computer. Adecco’s research showed that 28% of candidates complete assessments on a mobile device, often because that is the only device they have easy access to. They mustn't be disadvantaged simply because they only have access to a small screen - confirm this with validated data before you take on any new assessment approach or provider.?

It’s clear that dropping minimum requirements is a great step in the right direction when it comes to unleashing social mobility and promoting potential. However, dropping a hurdle is not the answer alone. Early Careers recruitment is not a competition for the highest number of applicants. There are real people with real differences and real aspirations who will go through your process. Thinking carefully about what you want to measure and how to measure it at scale without being disadvantageous to any groups. Putting something better in place is as important as dropping the hurdle in the first place. Otherwise, it's just a marketing 'value signalling' exercise.