Why are high school and university dropouts among the most successful founders of startups?
CNBC’s Courtney Connley reported not long ago that Google, Apple, and 13 other companies that no longer require employees to have a college degree, spurring some consideration of the implication on jobs and education.
The amateur economist in me read the headline on the surface of it and thought, “great! More affirmation that $100,000 in debt to get a piece of paper that says you’re academically capable of consuming and regurgitating information isn’t the right bar to set for tech jobs!”
And then I pondered…
- Will this domino other companies to do the same?
- Will this encourage Universities to be more flexible or affordable?
- Wait… college degrees aren’t really REQUIRED in any job, are they? They may have said it’s required but that’s never actually the case. Is this just a PR stunt to get more attention and candidates?
- For what jobs?
For what JOB?
Why are high school and university dropouts among the most successful founders of startups?
Founding a startup isn’t a job. We can’t teach people to BE entrepreneurial. We can teach how startups typically work, and we can teach best practices, but a “Startup” is NOT a “Business” (not yet) and so formal education has little to do with what it takes to be a startup founder.
We all know a few facts:
- The cost of education, particularly in the U.S., is spiraling out of control
- The culture-shifting our beliefs to “needing a college degree,” has pushed too many into a system from which we just don’t have jobs/demand. Trade schools died, and again are flourishing as we realize this
- Certain skills that are highly educated (such as coding) don’t require such formal education
I’ve touched on education a few times in my career; personally passionate about it though not working specifically therein (not entirely true, MediaTech Ventures runs incubators which teach how to build startups).
What bothers me is a notion pertaining to my primary work with startups and entrepreneurs; how we’re all born to be creative builders, entrepreneurial, and that institutionalized schooling seemingly beats that out of us. We grow up aspiring to be astronauts and artists but find our way into expensive 4 year plans that make us worker bees. Why do we perpetuate that??
College has been sold to us.
In 100 years, I hope college Marketing professors are teaching this era as the golden age of Selling University. It’s a brilliant case study really, not unlike how DeBeers made us all believe diamonds are invaluable…
- Create prestigious brands to which we aspire and from which people find themselves in lofty, celebrity, and valued positions
- Make that education more accessible to others
- Legislate how education is funded, public from private schools, and work with the government to help pay for the costs of those who struggle to afford it
- Offer courses and degrees that previously needed no extensive education, broadening the market further so that it serves everyone
- Ramp up the consumer appeal… “Party Schools,” Spring Break, free Macs (today, Free Alexa’s from Amazon), Back to School shopping season, Animal House movies… who doesn’t want to go to college???
- Develop the market, from/through elementary schools, such that it perceives that one must get the college diploma. Your future depends on it!
- Lastly, constrain supply even further. Tenured professors. Aggressively compete with online education (see ASU). Legislate away For-Profit secondary education.
Someone should write a book on the brilliance of how University went from Cambridge so that people could learn to be Academics, Doctors, and Lawyers, to a trillion-dollar industry so people can learn to be coffee baristas.
Perhaps this article is a start to that.
—
Startup founders are entrepreneurial, and you can’t teach someone to be entrepreneurial.
Why are high school and university dropouts among the most successful founders of startups?
Because successful startup founders are:
- Driven
- Passionate
- Tenacious
Followed by, since we’re asking:
- Older
- Experienced
- Affluent with resources
Now, granted, the second list doesn’t correlate with your question, I’m just giving you the facts of the matter (yes, the average age of a successful startup founder is 43, not 23, and it’s because, around that age, people have experience, wealth, and a network of people).
The first list though DOES answer your question and hopefully evident, it has nothing to do with education.
What creates entrepreneurial people is society and culture; the U.S. is a prime example of this. Places where the culture is:
- Competitive (i.e. sports)
- Creative (arts and entertainment)
- Capitalist (your risk is rewarded)
Tends to result in more people who take willingly take risks in order to make something better, while benefitting themselves. This is the entrepreneur; I can’t teach you how to be like that.
This is how younger people can drop out of High School or even just forego college and find success.
