Not an expert on the area at all but it seems perhaps the college you go to is more important for technical professions than business ones?
The big exception is in academia, where the college counts for a lot.
And for the really attractive jobs, do you even get a shot if straight out of college if you are not from a top one(often you don't either how because of no experience but when you do)?
Don't want to bash the point though. Effort > talent, I agree.
In computer science, if you're trying to go into a programming career, the difference between a prestigious college and a non-prestigious college is significantly less than the advantage you get from having proof of coding skill, such as significant open source work. Anyone serious about programming should definitely make sure to have something like this in hand before they leave, if they want the good opportunities.
Of course, side project + prestigious college is a winning combo... but even then, I'd say it's the side project dominating for most good employers.
I would imagine in fields where the means of production (whatever they may be) are not so much in the hands of the masses that the college distinction could be more important; how do you prove yourself a competent civil engineer with a side project? (I dunno, maybe there's a way, but it must be a lot harder.)
Every college freshman should be told this repeatedly. It is too easy to miss out on that bit of information and think that getting good grades and graduating is enough to land you a job out of college.
The article may've found that degrees rarely help CEOs because CEOs rarely make "cold" applications. Once you get that high, nearly everything is done via network and past record, so the degree doesn't confer much information that isn't already available.
Similarly, technical people may rely on degrees more because their networks are not as well-developed as business people. Though honestly, most of the successful programmers I know either have no degree or went to a state school, and it's never hurt them. They maintain good networks, though.
And it may matter in academia because a lot of the grad school application process is blind, with very little information available. It doesn't seem to matter once you start to publish and people can judge the quality of your work for themselves.
In The Bell Curve they mention SAT statistics for top verbal scores. Although their point was to show extreme concentration of talented people at the elite schools, it also shows how many are outside of them:
90% of the top scorers were not in Harvard/Yale
69% were outside of the top ten universities
40% were outside of the top fifty universitiesSo, I think the logical result of these ideas is that the way to success for those at Ivies (and schools like Stanford etc...) is that their social networks include many other highly motivated and successful people. However, anyone at any large university has a huge network to possibly tap, including thousands of talented students, alumni, and world class professors. Thus, I think the more logical result is that motivated students at any large school do well by building large and powerful social networks.
I am an undergraduate (senior) at one of the nation's top i-bank feeder schools.