There's a guy on my Facebook friends list, a former minor hockey league teammate of mine, who recently finished getting his Master's Degree at the University of Victoria. Today, his status read:
Jonathan is job-hunting in Calgary. Anyone know who's hiring MBAs for project management/consulting?
Immediately, one thought struck me – that this is one of the douchiest status updates I've read in, well, maybe forever.
Let's deconstruct, shall we?
For starters, it is my opinion that Master's Degrees are overrated. In my line of work, for example, someone with a post-graduate degree is just as likely to enter the workforce in the exact same position (ie: the bottom) as someone with a two-year diploma in the same area of study. I have a bachelor's degree, which took four years to obtain, so I fall directly in the middle of the two extremes, but sometimes I still feel like it was a waste, except for the ego-boost that saying "I have a degree" gives me (Or could conceivably give me. I don't really get an ego boost from it, but that's just me). Strictly on a professional level, it does me limited good.
In most fields, I'd suggest, Master's Degrees are about as necessary as snow tires in July.
Which brings me to my next point. I think people get Master's degrees largely so they can say they have them. It makes them sound fancy, and hey, I guess it is pretty impressive that you spend an extra 2 years in school.
(Important note: I do have a couple friends currently obtaining master's degrees. I do not know your specific reasons for doing so, but I exclude you from my Master's Degree rant, if only because you are both far less douchy than my ex-hockey teammate, and do not post similar FB status updates.)
And case in point is this guy's status: He makes a point of announcing his MBA to a group of 200 people on Facebook. "Hey everybody, just in case you forgot, I have a Master's Degree!"
I mean, if Facebook was a corporate job board, or a business networking website, maybe I'd understand. But it's not. It's a place for posting pictures of your trip to Vegas, sending drunken messages and playing Farmville.
The only people who will read that message are people who already know him – friends, old school buddies, etc. Chances are that nobody – nobody – is going to respond to that status by saying, "Oh yeah, my Fortune 500 company is hiring people right now. Send in a resume!"
I'm sorry, but it's just not going to happen there, Champ.
Secondly, and this is just a personal thing, but "consulting" and "project management" are about the most vague, pretentious sounding jobs I can possible dream up. Which of course, plays right into Mr. MBA's hands – I mean, imagine the hard-on this guy would get if he was able to have MBA and "Business Consultant" on the same business card?
(And make no mistake about it, this guy would definitely be the type to add every possible "title" after his name on his business card, whether is was BSBA, MBA, JD, MD, whatever.)
So there you have it, the Douche of the Day.
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