Education and Experience: Unreachable Apex
Critical thinking isn't the be-all, end-all of education but it is the most sorely lacking component in today's curriculum in BC - and in many other places. Then again, school has never been about creating powerful thinkers; school was about giving those with access the basic skills to be functional within their own middle-worlds; literacy, arithmetic, and basic socialization. I'll get into this later.
Suffice it to say, also, that the ability to think critically isn't required for many jobs and in some cases it's counterproductive. This seems counter-intuitive to me though I understand the merit. In some jobs, such as pouring tens of thousands of tons of molten steel into a mould, there is only one correct and safe way of doing something and to do it any other way or hesitate when doing it can be lethal. I get that. The guy flipping the lever doesn't need to know why it's done that way, only that if he does it wrong he and his coworkers are proper fucked.
After the birth of my daughter I worked for a few months at a concrete prefabrication site. They made sewer pipes, drainage pipes, and culverts. Some of these, such as primary lines, weigh three tons or more. The core of these pipes is a mesh wire cage which is cut off of rolls and clipped together by hand using short twists of heavy bailing wire. This cage is put on a metal base plate which is lubricated with the foulest smelling liquid (rendered farm leavings) so that the concrete doesn't stick. This whole mess is lowered into a big mould and what I can only describe as the world's largest vibrator gets lowered into the cavity like some bad euphemism. The gap in between is filled with concrete and it vibrates until it congeals. They stand these in rows in the yard, like a forest of the city's bones.
The air temperature matters, the time given to the concrete monoliths to set matters, and the precise admixture of cement to gravel and the size of the gravel matters. At some point while the concrete is curing, but before it has completely hardened, someone has to walk through them and mark them with basic marks which denote who the order is for, when it was poured, and what size the pipe is. Did I say that the time given to the concrete matters? Did I mention that a slightly cooler than expected day can slow the curing? Or a windy day? Or that the concrete can dry faster in some places than others? I was lucky enough not to see the guy who had one fall on him.
This is just one kind of experience. I won't inflate the glories of spraying reduced animal on metal to make pipes that will carry the leavings of other animals. I won't speak poorly of the hot conditions, long hours, or hard work - that at twenty-two my hands ached as I imagine my grandfather's used to. It's good, honest work and it pays well. Just like the work of many of the world's people do every day. But this kind of experience is invaluable in teaching someone the purpose of safety regulations, safe procedures, and the full value of human life. You can't learn that in school.
At the time when there was a council concerning the promotion of a certain man, the council members were at the point of deciding that promotion was useless because of the fact that the man had previously been involved in a drunken brawl.
But someone said, “If we were to cast aside every man who had made a mistake once, useful men could probably not be come by. A man who makes a mistake once will be considerably more prudent and useful because of his repentance. I feel that he should be promoted.”
Someone else then asked, “Will you guarantee him?”
The man replied, “Of course I will.”
The others asked, “By what will you guarantee him?” And he replied, “I can guarentee him by the fact that he is a man who has erred once. A man who bas never once erred is dangerous.”
This said, the man was promoted. - Yamamoto Tsunetomo
Many employers know that ompetency isn't as simple as book learning and institutional study.
They know that there are intrinsically valuable lessons that come only from having done, and having failed while doing something. This is why many jobs require that candidates have a prerequisite amount of experience in completing a certain kind of job related to the position they are applying for. If you can hire someone who has done the job before - or something like it - you minimize the chance that they will make a mistake that will potentially cost you something.
By the same stroke employers want education. They want to know that the person they are hiring has been instilled with the basic skill set to do the job. Skills which they hope education has conferred on their ripely developing minds. Skills which include the ability to notice potential errors, identify deficiencies, and develop effective means of going about their work in a personalized way which meets the business needs. So employers want smart, critical people... people with the experience to add purposeful consideration to their decisions.
This is where we run into an effect I call the Infinite Lazy Suzan (ILS).
I need experience to get the job; I need a job to get experience
The ILS is the manifestation of employers pursuing candidates too selectively because they believe that having the right candidate will help drive sales and build their business. It's a vicious cycle that Will not answer the problem of a weak economy, and does nothing to help add motivated, critical, intelligent people to your company.
There is value in education - please don't misunderstand what I am getting at here. I have a university degree. I also started with over forty thousand dollars in student loan debt. I think that it's worth every red penny, too. I really do. University taught me a lot of things which are inordinately useful, and built skills upon the talents which I already possessed. I can do quantitative analysis of data sets, review a philosophical argument for obvious contradictions, and write actionable reports.
None of these skills have been required for any job which I have worked in. It's not that I didn't use these skills to my benefit; I found a place to make them fit and to leverage them in my role at a few employers. But the skills themselves were not immediately required or relevant to the position. My degree is in Archaeology - I consult in IT and management practices. Seems quite the departure. What is valuable about a bachelor's is the same thing which is valuable about possessing a black belt: it only shows you are a determined and perceptive student.
However, employers have become increasingly attached to the credential of having this type of education, and in response the consumer masses have consumed. More and more are taking on student loans, and student loan debt, because they believe it will get them the job they need or at the very least they acknowledge it is the minimum requirement. This is at the very least an awful shame because the trade value of the bachelor's degree is decreasing daily, but the cost of achieving it is becoming unsustainable.
I will do without mentioning that the grades you get in school matter, or that competition and excellence in school are defining factors. They are; at first. If you have no experience to rely upon. In the absence of applicable experience or even meaningful life experiences your grades and non-academic achievements will come into focus during the review of your curriculum vitae.
Employers want people with education, and they want people with what they consider to be meaningful experience. This creates the problem I refer to as the Unreachable Apex (or just Apex for short). You see, Apex theory takes over after you've managed to get past the ILS.
Like a kid jumping onto a merry-go-round somehow you've managed to hold on. But now you have two problems: holding on as the thing accelerates and demands increase, and not tossing your cookies under the pressure. Also, there's a lineup of kids who'd gladly take your place. Employers are counting on this, and they use this anxious fear to drive down wages and secure working ethic - after all, nothing motivates like fear, and being afraid of becoming homeless is pretty genuine for a lot of people.
Not only to employers want people with education, and people with experience, they want both and they want it on the cheap. This is the focus of Apex theory: on one side you have a very steep but achievable incline (demand for education) and on the other you have a very steep but mostly achievable incline (demand for experience). When you combine the demand for these things you end up with a very narrow sampling of the market's free agents - or potential employees - who meet both criteria: education and experience in one package.
This is the Apex club; the Edmund Hillarys and Tenzing Norgays of the employment market. Those who understand and can do. The problem with these bold, these precious few is that they are the most highly sought after commodity on the market... but only if they are under 30 years of age.
The truth of Apex theory is that there are far more in the Apex club than anyone realizes, but they are all very likely close to thirty-five to forty years of age or older. They have the understanding and the education and the experience. They have the know-how and the been-there. They have the chutzpah to ask questions and the keen to know what to do with the answers. They are looking for jobs by the thousands.
The Apex is unreachable for all but the Hillarys and the Norgays of herculean effort and good fortune (or money and good connections) because at near-forty years of age and older most employers will acknowledge this: they have to pay you more, and you might take their job because you're likely smarter than they are.
Now, this is not to say that there aren't some very capable and very intelligent people out there running businesses, or occupying middle-management. What I will say is that in a lot of the most influential businesses in the market - those that employ many - your continued employment depends on being affordable and your ability to survive attrition. The latter is of these is often called "seniority", and it comes with special powers.
The Apex problem is compounded by unions, employers, and trade organizations which grant special powers to those with seniority. If you belong to a union and have even the remotest semblance of suitability for a position you will get the job over someone who comes in as an external applicant with droves of accords and a list of positive referrals longer than Chinese antiquity. (This is predominantly a North American problem, because in Europe they actually seem to want qualified people in their unions.)
Worse, running off to join a union won't help you to conquer the Apex, because you are inevitably coming in under an inflexible, top-heavy structure with a fixed position and little or no ability to advance without someone else leaving (one way or the other). There are a few rare examples of organizations reforming the rights of their unions such as Seaspan, which recently and openly began attempting to clear out some of the most senior workers and actively trying to recruit younger, more dynamic people - which in turn only creates more on the Apex list. Those who've been there, and who know, and who need work.
This is the Unreachable Apex and the Infinite Lazy Susan: it's hard to climb a pyramid with an unrealistically high peak which is simultaneously spinning at its base.