Revenge of Mediocre

Why Academic Qualification Is Not Enough?
Other day, I was talking with career counselor, Rima on depression at working place. During our discussion, she mentioned an interesting fact that several people feel frustrated during their mid-career because some of their school or college mates, who used to be back benchers, are professionally more successful than them today. 

Rima quoted this as the ‘revenge of mediocre.’

Here are her explanations-

1.    Good students have been taught to work hard to get excellent grades at exam. So, these toppers spent all the time in reading and remembering the content of the books.  And, obviously, they did well in our mechanized education system. 
2.    By virtue of high grades they got admission in top Engineering, Medical or Business Schools. In a way they give a dream start to their career. 

Problem starts here- 

Most of them are capable and skilled but they are not street smart.   These hard skills, along with academic qualifications, make them fit for the job but do not guarantee the success in job.

Whereas, the so called back benchers might not have a flying start in their career. This forced them to acquire some additional skills. Initial hardships helped them to learn various soft skills. Good soft skills are a key to success in this highly competitive corporate world.  

Moreover, large corporates employ people who have technical as well as business knowledge. The truth is that in majority cases these business people bring revenue and increase the profitability of a company. 
Generally, academically sound students join technical course to pursue a secure and bright prospects. But, others learn the ‘business’ game in a tougher way. This forces them to learn how to be diplomatic to tackle complex situation, how to negotiate for success and how to be proactive to solve the problem. 

Disadvantages of an elite education system

(1)    Students pursing education from elite colleges think that they are the best and brightest.  This arrogance sometimes becomes a disadvantage in professional world. 
(2)    To be successful you require social intelligence, emotional intelligence and creative ability, which either you have it on your own or you need to train yourself, as these are not distributed preferentially among the educational elite.
(3)    Actually, elite education inculcates a false sense of self-worth. The tests like SAT, GPA, GRE do measure your ability to take tests, but this is only a small slice of the real test.   


I would like to conclude this article with Stephen R. Covey’s quote ““Opposition is a natural part of life. Just as we develop our physical muscles through overcoming opposition – such as lifting weights – we develop our character muscles by overcoming challenges and adversity.” 

Success follows anyone who is keen to achieve it. You need hard skills as well as soft skills to be successful in life, in career or whatever you are doing. Do not just think that academic qualifications are enough to be a CEO. 

In the next article, I will discuss on how to develop soft skills to be successful.