Compare-and-Contrast Essay on Work Experience and Education Degree

Education and experience are two important aspects that determine whether a person will get a job. However, the question of what matters most when it comes to getting a job remains a debate. Does a degree get you a job or does your experience count? Besides, even after employment, will education or experienced serve you best in retaining your employment, advancing your career or making a decent wage? However, there are some instances where employers look for advanced degrees, and in this cases, the degrees earns a worker more money. For example, an advanced degree in engineering or even in the field of computing provides an employee an opportunity to earn more money that the average salary offered in other areas, such as in accounting or teaching which may have many years of experience but have just a university degree. However, there is also evidence that supports that if a worker remains in the same field, the experience will get him or her an upper hand over postgraduate education. Even so, in all the fields, employees who have stayed in jobs longer are most probably to earn bigger salaries than their counterparts who are recent graduates with higher education do. As a matter of fact, the only area where a higher education will outdo on-the-job experience when it comes to remuneration is teaching. Even so, according to Oak (n.p), the importance of education cannot be stated enough because it is for this reason that we receive formal education is school. Through school, we can acquire education and knowledge that is paramount for getting a job. Essentially, education provides us with knowledge about the world, and this subsequently paves the way for a good career while also enabling the development of character. While also it helps in the enlightenment process and can be considered as an investment in human capital. For this reason, it can have a great impact on the development and growth of a nation. However, in many instances, the experience is more superior to a degree primarily because it provides one with a good reputation, most jobs demand someone with experience, and people who have worked for longer get better wages and have higher chances of promotion.

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Experience provides one with a good reputation. In essence, a person that has experience has a better reputation for performing job tasks compared to a person with just a university degree. In essence, employees who have a reputation of adding to the firms bottom line have better chances of landing lucrative jobs than their counterparts with fancy degrees. In essence, employers usually prefer what the employee can do compared to having a degree. For this reason, a worker who can perform tasks is more preferred, and whether they have a degree or postgraduate degree is little of concern. For instance, in some fields like marketing simply relies on reputation. In sales, for example, having a reputation for sealing in deals worth millions of dollars tops over a degree. In this cases, the marketing skills will matter more compared to the university degree. According to Bradley (n.p), a degree from a top university opens doors due to its reputation, but a college degree has a lesser reputation as a university degree bears more weight. Even so, as Bradley points out, this reputation does not help a job seeker when they sit for a job interview. In contrast, this is not the case when it comes to experiences. As Bradley (n.p) articulates, experience matters because it determines what a person adds to the companys bottom line. Since experience is crucial for innovation, bringing new business, winning awards and promotion, it is more important than a college or university degree. Besides, according to Glassdoor Team (n.p), 7 in 10 employees value skills training more than degrees.

Also, most jobs demand someone with experience. Essentially, in the current world, most company policies indicate that their companies should recruit employees with work experience. In essence, most of the jobs advertised will demand experience. According to Beard (n.p), almost all jobs require some experience, and in especially in the professional level. As the writer stresses, potential employees who have years of experience will always outshine those with an education. Even so, the experience is also paramount in advancing ones career. For instance, as Beard (n.p) articulates, in many of the jobs that start paying very little, experience plays a critical role in advancing your career, The more you gain experience, the more you can do for a company, and thus, there is a high possibility that you will be promoted or receive an increase in pay. In fact, a person who has been delivering for a couple of years will usually be paid more that a person who is just starting out, and also they have a better chance of getting promotions. In this case, the employee with experience will win out over workers with an education. As Beard (n.p) argues, in some cases education is not necessary in performing job duties, and thus, from this, it can be derived that experience is more important. Besides, a degree does not prepare a person for all the challenges he or she may face while working. Some challenges are unique and will require someone who has faced the same challenge in the past. Therefore, in this instance, it is paramount that the person has prior experience so that they can deal with the challenges effectively (Beard n.p). Considering that the individual is an employee, they may not have any experience but have the education. For this reason, education will not be important in solving the challenges, rather, the experience will be more valuable in solving the challenges. In essence, according to Life (n.p), working can teach an employee valuable lessons, which will be essential in dealing with the job challenges, and education, in this case, might not be necessary. Besides, as the adage goes, the experience is the best teacher, and thus, education might be inferior to experience when dealing with some job challenges.

Lastly, people who have worked for longer get better wages and have higher chances of promotion. Essentially, promotion in many fields is based on professional experience. For instance, most of the CEOs and Managing Directors of big firms must have prior working experiences before clinching the job. Moreover, experienced employees get better pay, for example, computer experts and engineers earn $78,000 and $79,000 respectively. This surpasses the average of a businessperson ($69,000) or a teacher a ($47,000) or who has many years of experience but has just a basic university degree. For this reason, it can be derived that experience is critical when it comes to securing better-paying jobs. As one works, the more they are capable of dealing with the challenges that the job offers. Also, as Life (n.p) purports, firms prefer to promote a person who worked for them rather than getting a fresh graduate for a managerial or supervisory position because the former has an extensive experience of the firms organizational culture. Therefore, people who hold a leadership position in most instances must have worked in the organization for years or must have served a similar position in another company for many years, thereby amassing the experience required to optimally perform the job tasks and responsibilities (Marks n.p). Moreover, promoting an experienced worker means that he or she will not take long to blend with other employees because he is already used to them. As such, as Marks (n.p) purports, it can be derived that indeed experience is more vital compared to education primarily because the person knows how well and more efficiently to perform the assigned job tasks that a newly hired worker with just a college or university degree.

As such, in many of the cases, experience stands out best in securing better jobs and advancing ones career. However, there are some instances that education, and in particular, a college or university degree, associate degree, or postgraduate degree, is more important compared to experience. As such, this leads to the derivation that even though experience is more vital, there are few exceptions that education might be more important in securing a better job or advancing the career (Beard n.p). Additionally, a person clinches a job and continues with education; they are in a good position to get promotions, or rather, get better jobs.

Therefore, work experience is only relevant in some fields while in others it is outdone by college degrees. Firstly, a college degree is a clear indication that an employee has undergone training under trained experts, have immersed himself or herself in a specific discipline, as well as have acquired a broad combination of interpersonal and educational experiences. As such, in this case, a degree provides proof that one has been trained to analyze problems, carry out studies, as well as yield solutions. In most of the occasions, especially in computing and in design, this is what employers need, and thus, a person with more education is preferred. Secondly, if a person has a degree or a couple of them, it indicates that one has a proven capability to grasp complex, hard subject matter.

Besides, it can also be noted that a degree or an advanced degree is particularly vital for people who envision rising to management-level positions in the course of the careers, specifically in professions instead of trades. In such positions, such as in managerial jobs, a degree offers enough evidence that one is motivated and has a drive, a fundamental ingredient for those seeking promotion. Also, a degree or an advanced degree is a proof of intelligence. Executive-level positions demand people with high intelligence as they are constantly faced with numerous challenges that require intelligence to be solved. Further, from the job market, employees with a degree have better interpersonal, communication, and coping skills among others that one cannot learn from work experience. In essence, other than training someone on the certain field, college education also offers training on skills that enable an employee to deal with his colleagues, employers, and customers among other stakeholders (Oak n.p). As such, education is paramount in developing certain skills that are important in the job market, including communication and interpersonal skills. These are very essential especially in teamwork and team building, as well as vital characteristics for effective leadership. Besides, in some cases, a degree has the edge over work experience because it is a more credible qualification. For example, a marketer with a university degree with an experience of a couple of years is more valuable to employers than that without a degree.

In conclusion, the experience is more superior to a degree. However, this only happens in some cases while in others education has the edge over work experience. For instance, employers will in most cases select a job interviewee with the most experience if the interviewees have the same education qualifications. Even so, this is not true in some occasions. For example, a high-tech company might go for a recent or college degree, which comprises of studying the current enhancements and leave out another person with vast experience in the same field. Simply put, the current debate indicates that there is a gray line between education and work experience. To this end, if one is hunting for a job it is important for him or her to identify the part he is missing and work on it. If one has a degree and lacks experience, he or she needs to get experience even if it means doing internships or voluntary jobs. Likewise, if one is experienced but lacks education, he or she requires getting a degree even if it means attending part-time or holiday classes, like in the case of teachers.

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