No degree, no problem: US employers look beyond college credentials

Companies such as IBM, General Motors and Walmart are focusing on applicants' skills rather than education.

- Claire Bushey

Ms. Chanelle Washington-Bacon reproached herself for years because she had not finished college. Long after she entered corporate life, she was haunted by her lack of a four-year degree.

But her feeling of inadequacy began to shift after the Atlanta project manager connected with OneTen, a coalition of top employers focused on developing the careers of black professionals and others without a college education.

Ms. Washington-Bacon moved to Cisco Systems, a Silicon Valley maker of routers and networking equipment, where she is now a business analyst enabling the US commercial sales team.

"Tech is not easy to get into, and usually you need to have the degree," she says.

But, she added, "it's time for a change. Just because you don't have that four-year degree doesn't mean you don't have the skills to do the job."

Ms. Washington-Bacon belongs to the "new-collar" workforce - people hired and promoted for their skill set, regardless of whether they graduated from college. Also known as skills-based hiring, the practice has gained momentum as a tighter labor market has pressured employers to put less emphasis on degrees.

New-collar jobs can range from construction management to website development, from sales to event planning - the term is less about the role than how an employer fills it.

Proponents say skills-based hiring has the potential to increase employment opportunities and raise wages for the nearly two-thirds of the US workforce who lack a degree - a percentage that is higher among Black, Latino, and Indigenous workers. It can also reward employers with a wider talent pool and higher retention rates.

Companies adopting this approach include IBM, Aon, General Motors, Walmart, and ExxonMobil. But critics warn that efforts to steer away from traditional degree-based hiring can be superficial - and that a greater effort is needed to make sure this shift does not become a fad.