Academia vs Experience

It has been said that the early bird catches the worm, but in the real world this may not always be true.

Early birds or capitalists who have been actively engaged in playing the lead role in coming up with new products and services may have reaped manifold in comparison to late comers, but they are not always the winners of the race.

For example in the academic world, there are people who ace all their papers in exams and achieved the highest academic qualification within a short time, while there are also those who achieved their academic qualification late in life. Yet in the secular sense of the economic world, both may be great achievers in their own respect, and in some cases, the late academic achievers may be better off than the early. To understand what I mean by this, let me illustrate by telling you a story that happened in real life.

Hector is a software analyst who has not achieved a degree in Computer Science. While working in a technology firm, he learned hands-on how to implement networking for corporations. When he was required to get himself technically and academically certified for Internetworking, he was able to score high marks because of his experience, in comparison to the degree holder who lacks the practical hands-on.

From the factual story mentioned above, it is clear that people with skills and expertise in their field of work demonstrate better performance and possess perception that is quite different from the pure academic achievers. Unfortunately even though this is a fact, not all employers however recognize this truth, partially because certain governments, especially in Asia, strongly believe in academic achievements and have thus molded the society to think the same.

If you are among the people who are not the great academic achievers or who are latecomers, you must therefore be discerning and not be disheartened, because you can often be better secular or economic achievers than the academics.

Therefore, when writing becomes a pressure instead of pleasure, it is time to retreat and rediscover inspiration within nature.