Is it time for more CHROs to rethink college-degree requirements?

BOSTON - Given the tight labor market, CEOs and Chief Human Resource Officers (CHROs) in business and government are increasingly dismantling or considering dismantling arbitrary college-degree requirements. They're motivated. After all, research increasingly shows that by doing so, they have a better chance at tapping highly qualified-yet-overlooked candidates, reducing costly turnover and offsetting social inequities.

To learn more about this growing movement, listen to the latest episode of 美国哈佛商学院 ’s Future of Work podcast: https://www.hbs.edu/managing-the-future-of-work/podcast/Pages/podcast-details.aspx?episode=27066606

In this podcast episode, HBS Professor William Kerr speaks with economist Byron Auguste about Auguste's efforts at his six-year-old non-profit, Opportunity@Work. Over the years, Auguste has been influencing U.S. employers to move toward skills-based inclusion vs. degree-based exclusion.

Underscoring the opportunity for employers, Auguste says his research shows that there is a hidden labor market of more than 70 million talented U.S. workers. The group refers to them as “Skilled Through Alternative Routes," or STARS. People in this category can make wonderful employees and the jobs they could get could change their lives - if only employers would change their arbitrary rules, he says.

Urgent example: SaaS administration roles

There’s currently high demand for software as a service (SaaS) administrators for companies such as Salesforce , Auguste tells Kerr. There are many qualified people who do not have college degrees, yet they're experts because they’re already doing the work for smaller firms that don’t require college credentials.

“They’re making on average half of what a Salesforce administrator makes and doing the same work with less tailor-made software - and yet they aren’t the people that companies are going to hire for Salesforce administrator roles or their equivalent roles,” Auguste says.

If larger companies drop their college-degree requirement and hire people from this population at the same pay rate, they’d see happy employees and ultimately “much higher retention,” he says. It’s one reason why large companies often work with his group, he says.

The movement has momentum with companies as well as governments.

On April 10, for instance, New Jersey became the latest state to dismantle college-degree requirements for thousands of state government jobs. You can read Gov. Phil Murphy's Executive Order No. 327 here: https://nj.gov/infobank/eo/056murphy/pdf/EO-327.pdf.

Readers: Is your company in the process of dismantling at least some college-degree requirements and are you open to discussing your successes and lessons learned so far? If so, please reach out to our team! We'd love to talk and learn more.

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