The Modern Observer Group

An article ran recently in a national business magazine asking which degree will make you a better leader. The question illustrated one of the biggest problems we face, the idea that a degree fixes everything. There is so much talk about making college more affordable and getting more people to have degrees that people have lost sight of two salient facts:

1. The greatest companies of the 20th and 21st century were built by dropouts.
2. The biggest failures have been caused by MBAs.

The most successful people have always been people who continue to learn. There is a big difference between learning and getting a degree. A degree is a piece of paper that says you passed tests. It is not an indication that you understand or that you actually learned anything. An MBA once told me that the greatest value an MBA degree has is the network of people you build while in school. The value has nothing to do with actually learning anything. Higher education is not the answer to anything. Learning is.