<p>No, cobrat. People who are smart know that being a good salesperson is a skill, and an important one at that. The only people who “look down” on salespeople are, frankly, the types of nerds with no social graces and little inability to interact with others, who secretly envy those with social graces that they do not have and therefore feel the need to disparage them as being less intelligent. Normal people don’t “look down” on people who are good salespeople. it’s a skill I don’t have, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a skill.</p>
<p>Goldman Sachs kids are overworked and overstressed. I feel sorry for them.</p>
<p>cobrat, it’s interesting that in your paragraph above, you seem to make the assumption that “what other people think” is something that people should take into account when making their career or schooling choices. </p>
<p>What kind of loser thinks - gosh, I’d love to be in sales, I think I’d be good at it - but, oh dear, there are engineers and academicians who will think ill of me, so I’d better not do it? You’re always presupposing that other people’s opinions are important and that there’s nothing worse in life than being “looked down upon” by other people.</p>
<p>Cobrat, sales is not what you think it is. Yes, there are still people who sell insurance and cars-- and I assume those are the careers you are thinking about. But more often, someone in “sales” is responsible for managing a range of client relationships, and these clients purchase hundreds of millions of dollars of goods and services (and often both) from their “salesperson”. It can take years of working your way up through finance or product development or production to get one of these coveted sales positions. The person who sells Boeing airplanes to a global airline is NOT a social butterfly who is hobnobbing and playing golf and shmoozing their client. It’s someone who most likely has a degree in engineering, or a degree in something else but deep experience in aerospace and is probably more of an intellectual snob than the folks you listen to.</p>
<p>No need to bash people who follow any path, my example of sales was to say that even among graduates at the LAC I attended in the 80s, there were diverse aptitudes and the false perception that “X career is the best career for everyone.” No need to “look down” on sales, nor is there anything but rudeness in “only nerds with no social skills dislike sales.” My point is that there are lots of good careers out there in almost every field. The constant media tempest about “ROI for certain majors” and “Humanities are dead” and “degrees are worthless, go into a trade” vs. “go to college, entry level wages were never meant to be living wages” almost never consider the actual reality of the fundamentals of career success – aptitude, passion, and discipline. </p>
<p>And, really, Hunt makes the best point of all. This jerk is working at Goldman Sachs. He went to college. He got a degree. If he thinks trades are the best thing, he can quit and go learn one. I didn’t read too closely, but I see some of you referring to him as a “kid.” Is this a young person, or possibly someone old enough to be the parent of a HS student and either 1) doesn’t want to pay for college or 2) doesn’t like all this competition for his little snowflake since the Great Unwashed started competing for admissions?</p>
<p>Bossy, agree 100% that aptitude, passion and discipline are important ingredients. And the idea that a plumber or an electrician can’t appreciate the liberal arts or benefit from a college education is obnoxious in the extreme.</p>
<p>I regularly interview folks in their late 30’s who are trying to switch careers after years of being miserable in a career that someone else shoved them into. Unhappy physicians. Unhappy electrical engineers. Unhappy elementary school teachers. All the vaunted golden tickets of CC. Your kid should get a teaching degree instead of studying ethnomusicology. Your kid should become an engineer instead of majoring in history. How can I talk MY kid into dumping his comparative literature major and transferring to the business school where he can major in accounting.</p>
<p>OK. If you are lucky enough to have a kid who is compliant enough to do what you tell them to… then what? Are you going to hold his or her hand every day walking into work? The physician I recently interviewed told me about rates of drug addiction among medical personnel which are significantly higher than the general public realizes. Part of it is opportunity-- a doctor sees more opiates during the day than I do, working in a corporate environment. But he believes that part of it is self-medication- doctors can’t admit that they hate their work in the same way that other people can, because it’s time consuming, expensive, and socially redeeming to study medicine.</p>
<p>So the people who loath med school often become the people who loath practicing medicine. And with access to drugs… volatile combination.</p>
<p>Very sad. And of course, upsetting if it’s YOUR doctor. But yes Bossy Mommy, I agree with you.</p>
<p>I think it is highly unfair to suggest anyone offering good advice needs to do that same thing for themselves. That is basically absurd. The President offers all sorts of advice to all sorts of people–is your response --then he should go do that himself?? Nonsense.</p>
<p>I agree, barrons, and this is what he said: “For many people (not all), the right advice should be to master a skill or trade, work hard, and one day own a fantastic business.” He didn’t say everyone should do it. Of course people would applaud his statement if the President had said it.</p>
<p>But it’s such stupid, obvious advice. It’s like saying that a good idea is to brush your teeth in the morning and in the evening. Of course people should master the skills and look towards jobs that they have natural aptitude in and interest towards - whether that’s becoming a PhD in physics, trading bonds, writing code, repairing plumbing or cutting hair. Duh. The bigger question is, what is so special about this “advice” that it needed to be called out? In other news, the sun sets in the west.</p>
<p>I actually agree with you, PG, that it is obvious advice…to us. I don’t think it is obvious to a lot of people. Even wrt The Dream Act, for example, you might get to be a citizen here if you…go to college. If you don’t, you are worthless to us, I guess.</p>
<p>I think there are some kids (boys, from my observation especially), who really and truly absolutely hate learning in a classroom and have no desire for a desk job. I don’t see a reason why they should put themselves through any college.</p>
<p>Otoh, I think so many kids don’t know what they want, or turn themselves around in college, and benefit from the education regardless, that unless they fall into the category of my previous paragraph, they should at least start out at community college for a year or two before making up their minds.</p>
<p>Read between the lines. In order for vampire squid to remain in his castle and keep it running efficiently, he needs minions to stay as minions. The more minions working for him the better.</p>
<p>But someone working as a plumber, electrician, hair dresser, whatever, isn’t “working for him as a minion.” They play a different role in the economy. All of these roles are needed.</p>
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<p>I don’t either. After living in the same (small-city) community for two decades, I see zero difference in respect except among people who are snobs to begin with. Some of those people are my friends or acquaintances. Unfortunately, in several cases, their kids are headed toward “college-optional” careers for various reasons. (And I say “unfortunately” not for their kids, who are fine with their life prospects, but for them having to deal with the fact that Joey and Susie aren’t going to be the Masters of the Universe they had been expecting them to be.)</p>
<p>The mechanics we went to for years both had MBAs and owned their own garage. One of H’s neighbors never went to college but runs a successful “landscaping” yard service business. He says he hires public HS, private HS, college grads and college dropouts. He only wants hard workers and has many more applicants than he can hire.</p>
<p>Setting aside any other considerations, the banker’s advice is only good if the person he is giving it to WANTS to be a carpenter or plumber - or, alternatively, if the only thing he considers in making life choices is future earning potential. Even if we’re not talking about someone passionate about a trade, if a person could be pretty content as either a plumber or a middle-management HR rep if it weren’t for white-collar bias against the former, then it might make sense to pursue the option that pays better and doesn’t require exorbitant educational expenses. But if someone really, really wants to be a teacher, it isn’t reasonable to tell him “well, you’ll make more as a carpenter,” particularly if he has no special aptitude for carpentry. </p>
<p>If you’re going to go the trade route, you’d also better hope that you actually wind up liking the chosen profession as much as you think you will. Even in these days of increasing specialization, a college degree opens up a number of possible career paths. If carpentry doesn’t work out, your training as a carpenter isn’t good for much of anything.</p>
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<p>Blossom,</p>
<p>You’re assuming its my opinion when I was actually offering an observation of subcultural attitudes whether it’s engineering/CS techie oriented firms/folks, the snobby portions of academia, etc and how they may influence perception of sales careers among students identifying themselves as academically above average or above. </p>
<p>I actually don’t agree with them. </p>
<p>Whether we want to admit it or not, these perceptions do have some influences on how such students may perceive such careers even if they’re naturals for sales careers. </p>
<p>As for engineers being moved into sales, within the engineering/CS subcultures I’ve seen, the vast majority of them…especially those who are the most talented/hardcore in the STEM/techie aspects usually prefer being at the center of the techie aspects. Especially those involving the most challenging parts of the core technologies/products involved. </p>
<p>Most would regard being moved into sales as being moved out of the “center of the real action” or in the case of hardcore engineering/cs firms like the ones my uncles worked for, a definitive sign they weren’t regarded as having the techie bona-fides to continue working in the engineering/techie side of the company. </p>
<p>The latter was understandable as in the latter hardcore engineering/cs firms, sales positions were commonly assigned to those who didn’t meet the technical proficiency standards set by the engineering/cs supervisors or those who want to move away from the techie side for various reasons in which case, they tended to be regarded as not being as hardcore/committed to “the real action”. </p>
<p>This attitude isn’t nearly as much in existence in less hardcore/techie centered firms…especially ones where techie departments are supporting non-techie oriented firms such as finance, law, or other non-techie corporate businesses from my professional experiences. </p>
<p>On the flipside, the techie departments/personnel do sometimes tend to be snobbed on, in return, because they’re at the bottom of the totem pole in terms of institutional priorities and anti-Nerd attitudes among some in departments allowed higher institutional priorities as exemplified by PG’s comment here:</p>
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<p>Hmm…very amusing when read with a Victorian era British aristocratic accent. Same with the GS twitterer’s tweets. Wonder if they both sup on cucumber sandwiches at tea time… :D</p>
<p>Incidentally, it’s not envy or any feelings of inadequacy which drives that attitude. Frankly, it’s rank intellectual elitism where they feel their intellects obviates the necessity for such social graces or worse, feel demonstrating such graces is a form of “excessively pandering” to those they perceive as the LCD. </p>
<p>Ironic as such blanket snobby attitudes…whether against non-techies or nerds are themselves very anti-intellectual. </p>
<p>Also, such attitudes are a good way to ensure an exciting, but short painful career with much bridges being burned in the process…</p>
<p>"Incidentally, it’s not envy or any feelings of inadequacy which drives that attitude. Frankly, it’s rank intellectual elitism where they feel their intellects obviates the necessity for such social graces or worse, feel demonstrating such graces is a form of “excessively pandering” to those they perceive as the LCD. "</p>
<p>Except it’s NOT intellectual elitism worth caring about, because someone who thinks “we techies are the only ones who are smart in this world, no one else could possibly be” and “demonstrating social graces isn’t necessary since I’m so smart” are quite stupid. And the people who let themselves be influenced by such people are stupid, too. </p>
<p>Your techies-who-are-convinced-they-are-the-only-bright-ones are as obnoxious and not worth the time of the day as the stereotypical banker-who-is-convinced-his-profession-is-the-only-one-worth-having-everyone-else-is-little-people. Losers whose opinions are of no interest. </p>
<p>And maybe. Cobrat, you could state your OWN opinions instead of repeatedly rehashing what you perceive other people think.</p>
<p>My only point is, who cares about this person’s advice for people utterly unlike himself? He has no special perspective about this as somebody who works for Goldman Sachs. If a plumber posts a column about how people at Goldman Sachs shouldn’t be such greedheads, do you think this guy will listen?</p>
<p>Exactly. Why is “GS executive says …” of any more importance or interest than “Allstate executive says …” or “Proctor and Gamble executive says …” Or for that matter “Cheesecake Factory executive says …” Or “Guy who runs a bunch of car dealerships says …” </p>
<p>Working for GS doesn’t give anyone any special insight into anything. It’s just a job like any other. </p>
<p>I guess we should ask the OP why so breathless over the fact that it was a GS person?</p>
<p>It might be a good story if it was “head of nation’s largest plumbing contractor says…”</p>