Can your level of education hurt your chances at a job?

As a recruiter, Ive seen instances where:

1. A person is considered to be under educated: Ive dealt with several companies who wont consider a candidate unless they have a certain level of education ie. a university or college degree. In some cases a certain level of education might be absolutely necessary (ie. if youre an accountant, the company might require you to be certified) but in other cases it might simply be company policy that every employee needs a minimum level of education.

2. A person is considered to be over educated: I can recall several instances when a hiring manager declined to interview a candidate because they felt that the candidate was too educated or looking at it another way, too theoretical and not hands-on enough.

To be honest, it really depends on your specific situation and the job you are pursuing.

While you dont want to leave out your educational achievements, the truth is that how you present your scholastic achievements can effect your ability to get interviews and get jobs.

Ive spoken with hiring managers who Ive had to convince to interview excellent job candidates because at a first glance, the persons resume appeared to the hiring manager to be too school-centric with not enough real life work experience on it.

When youre putting your resume together, you really need to tailor it to the specific job you are applying for. Obviously if you are applying for a job in the education industry, listing all of your publications, papers and other similar items makes sense.

If you are applying for a job where your education is a nice to have or just a simple requirement, you need to focus on highlighting your real life work experience and use your educational achievements as something that might help to distinguish you from other candidates, not as the main selling feature.

In other words, you need to ensure you focus your resume to highlight what the employer needs based on what they are asking for.

Carl Mueller

My name is Carl Mueller and I'd like to thank you for learning a bit more about me!

I feel that I have numerous relevant experiences during my career that come in useful when helping people with their careers:

I know what it?s like to work internationally, having worked overseas (in New Zealand, from 1994-1998).

I've survived several corporate downsizings while many of my colleagues were being laid off.

I have also experienced being laid off twice myself during corporate downsizings.

I know what it?s like to be self-employed.

I've helped many people find better jobs. I started to work as a professional recruiter in 2000 first as an Information Technology (IT) recruiter and then in general recruitment across many industries including IT, manufacturing and marketing. Since this time, I have helped many people find their dream career and it?s a great feeling.

I experienced one of the slowest hiring periods in recent memory especially during the general hiring slowdown that followed the Y2K frenzy in 1999, the bursting of the dot com bubble in early 2000, and then the employment market bottoming out following September 11, 2001.

These were certainly not great times to be a job searcher in most industries nor was it a particularly good time to be a recruiter.

Following this, I began running the day to day operations of an Internet-based company in early 2003 that focused on developing online software and subscription-based websites for consumers. It was then that I fully realized the power, usefulness and potential of the Internet which really spurred me to set up my own website which you can view in my Personal URL section below this bio.

I?m also a Platinum Ezine Articles Expert as recognized by EzineArticles.com, one of the most visited websites on the Internet. This special designation is earned by having consistently high-quality articles published and viewed on their website. All of my submissions are related to helping you find your dream career and many of my articles get reproduced on other websites by their webmasters.

Good luck with your career and I hope I have been of assistance to you!