College grads: How many of you were/are still working in a job that's closely related to your major 10 years after graduation?

I majored in history and have always worked in technology, I started in Product Management at Amazon and later switched to marketing and later operations. Unless you have a highly specialized major i.e. some engineering and stem fields it is usually common that one doesn't work in their field of study, especially if you had more of a liberal arts focus.

I've hired 50+ people in the past 6 years and it is rare that I put much focus on a candidate or employees college major and I think that is very common after one's first job after university.

The CEO of LinkedIn never graduated from college, nor did Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg and while that may be an except or the fact that each was exceptional the fact is even for comp science very little of what you learn in terms of hard skills at college will be relevant more than a few years after graduation.

I learned how to code in high school and didn't take any courses in college. I taught myself some additional skills after college but today I rarely use anything more than a few SQL queries. Most developers are using coding skills they either taught themself or learned on the job. When I graduated 20 years ago HTML was just starting to get taught in undergrad, JAVA was usually not offered and companies like Amazon would have a 3 month boot camp for all new engineers for them to learn Amazon's proprietary code base.

I had a friend who majored in geography and he actually worked for Mapquest verifying roads and in some cases manually drawing maps to help improve their software but that stopped after a couple of years and he's in management now.

Graduated with an engineering degree and 10 years later I'm an engineer but not in that I specifically majored in. I don't do calculus or anything like that on a daily basis. I kind of feel more like a data analyst/process engineer lately. Works for me, good pay and life balance.

Kinda feels like the degree just proves you're not retarded.

Let's break it down:

Grad 1: Majored in mechanical engineering but is currently a UPS driver. Something is definitely out of sorts here.

Grad 2: Majored in accounting but is currently a human resources analyst. Counting people, not too far off the mark.

Grad 3: Majored in aerospace but is currently a construction inspector. What are they inspecting? Someone needs to inspect the construction of air and space ports, and other complex facilities.

Grad 4: Majored in chemistry but is currently a Walgreens store manager. Chemistry major works at a pharmacy where they sell chemicals known as drugs. Not too far off the mark.

My undergraduate degree is an engineering degree, and I work for an engineering company, but I don't work as an engineer. Am I in my field or not?

CrispyChicken wrote:

Grad 1: Majored in mechanical engineering but is currently a UPS driver. Something is definitely out of sorts here.

Grad 3: Majored in aerospace but is currently a construction inspector. What are they inspecting? Someone needs to inspect the construction of air and space ports, and other complex facilities.

Grad 1 had an iffy GPA (2.7?) from a mediocre state school and graduated during the worst of the recession (2009). He drifted around for a bit before working his way up to becoming a UPS driver in 2018, where he still works at today.

Grad 3 inspects stuff that vehicles drive on. This includes airport runways, but most of his inspections involve streets and highways.

CrispyChicken wrote:

My undergraduate degree is an engineering degree, and I work for an engineering company, but I don't work as an engineer. Am I in my field or not?

You're not.

BS in Exercise Science.

Worked in Corporate Wellness and as a Personal Trainer for 6 years then joined the Army.

Alan

Majored in linguistics as undergrad. Do some law gigs as a temp and review foreign-language documents in some of those.

Mostly a coach now, though.

Majored in economics. I'm a cardiologist.

Going to med school was always the plan, so it isn't like I took a left turn from my intended career path, but I guess I am working in a field that isn't related to my major.

I was an education degree. Now I’m a project manager for software automation.

Econ major, currently working in IT pretty lucratively.

Graduated in 2001 with a degree in Art/Graphic Design. Took a few coding classes as hardly anyone in my Graphic Design courses were learning HTML/CSS. Those people were f*cked and working retail after graduation because they could not code.

Became instantly employable because companies were looking for people who were good designers who could also build websites. I also knew Flash which was big back then.

Worked an insane amount of hours like most “dot commers” did and got burned out. Had some bad bosses, worked in some toxic places, had some great and bad performance reviews.

Got “let go” from one job because a wacko project manager didn’t like me. It worked out because my next job paid me $50k more per year. Peace out.

Switched to UX for 5 years which was far more lucrative, than that evolved into Product Design.

Without the Graphic Design skills, I would be nowhere. Currently working a great senior-level job with great pay and great co-workers.

Got a Master's in Sports Admin, been a coach for over 10 years.

Undergrad in History, never worked worked in that field. But, if I got out of coaching I would consider teaching high school lit or history.

such an American mindset....college must be to get jerbs!!!

If I just wanted a job I would have went to a 2-year technical school.

My degree was in EE and I worked as an EE, some eng management, for almost 40 years. Retired.

Soccer T's wrote:

If I just wanted a job I would have went to a 2-year technical school.

I do trust that you didn't get a four-year degree, dear.

Miss Fidditch wrote:

Soccer T's wrote:

If I just wanted a job I would have went to a 2-year technical school.

I do trust that you didn't get a four-year degree, dear.

did it for the alliteration, biiitch!

I am.

Graduated in 2003 with a Bachelors in Information Systems. I'm a CIO now.

Was an English edu action major but dropped the education part after student teaching. So I have an English degree. I’m an insurance agent now. From a pure education to career perspective I should’ve done community college and transferred to a state school and studied something more business related. But I had 3 older siblings who went to good schools and got the impression that not going to a private college meant you’d be living under a bridge for your whole life

Graduated with a small business management degree in 1999. Today I own a small business.