THE FUTURE OF WORK

WHY TOP TECH CEOS WANTEMPLOYEES WITH LIBERAL ARTSDEGREESAS COLLEGES ACROSS THE COUNTRY BEGIN REVVING

BACK UP, YOU MIGHT WANT TO RECONSIDER YOUR

MAJOR.

BY ELIZABETH SEGRAN

Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen once said that the

average English degree holder is fated to become a

shoe salesman, hawking wares to former classmates

who were lucky enough to have majored in math.

Meanwhile, PayPal cofounder Peter Thiel, who studied

philosophy at Stanford, refers to degrees like his as

"antiquated debt-fueled luxury goods." Faced with such

attacks on the liberal arts, it’s no wonder that interest in

the humanities is waning. As the college year begins,

many students are likely to take President Obama’s

advice and forgo an art history degree for a certificate in

skilled manufacturing or some other trade.

Not to be outdone, defenders of the liberal arts are

jumping into the fray. Among them are New York Times

columnist Nicholas Kristof, liberal arts consortiums and

even a pair of cartoon crusaders called Libby and Art

(get it?) who are quick to respond to people

besmirching the humanities on Twitter. But joining this

chorus are some unexpected voices: CEOs of

technology companies.

While the tech boom is partly

responsible for the spike in students

majoring in science, technology,

engineering and math, many tech

CEOs still believe employees trained

“IT’S AHORRIBLEIRONY THATAT THE VERYMOMENTTHE WORLD

in the liberal arts add value to their

companies. In 2010, Steve Jobs

famously mused that for technology

to be truly brilliant, it must be

coupled with artistry. "It’s in Apple’s

DNA that technology alone is not

enough," he said. "It’s technology

married with liberal arts, married with

the humanities, that yields the results

that make our hearts sing." Other

tech CEOs across the country agree that liberal arts

training—with its emphasis on creativity and critical

thinking—is vital to the success of their business.

So how exactly do the humanities translate into positive

results for tech companies? Steve Yi, CEO of web

advertising platform MediaAlpha, says that the liberal

arts train students to thrive in subjectivity and ambiguity,

a necessary skill in the tech world where few things are

black and white. "In the dynamic environment of the

technology sector, there is not typically one right

answer when you make decisions," he says. "There are

just different shades of how correct you might be," he

says.

Yi says his interdisciplinary degree in East Asian Studies

at Harvard taught him to see every issue from multiple

perspectives: in college, he studied Asian literature in

one class, then Asian politics or economics in the next.

"It’s awfully similar to viewing our organization and our

marketplace from different points of view, quickly

shifting gears from sales to technology to marketing," he

says. "I need to synthesize these perspectives to decide

where we need to go as a company."

Danielle Sheer, a vice president at Carbonite, a cloud

backup service, feels similarly. She studied existential

philosophy at George Washington University, which sets

her apart from her technically trained colleagues. She

tells me that her academic background gives her an

edge at a company where employees are trained to

assume there is always a correct solution. "I don’t

believe there is one answer for anything," she tells me.

HAS BECOMEMORECOMPLEX,WE’REENCOURAGINGOUR YOUNGPEOPLE TOBE HIGHLYSPECIALIZEDIN ONETASK.”

"That makes me a very unusual member of the team. I

always consider a plethora of different options and

outcomes in every situation."

Both Yi and Sheer recognize that the scientific method

is valuable, with its emphasis on logic and reason,

especially when dealing with data or engineering

problems. But they believe this approach can sometimes

be limiting. "When I collaborate with people who have a

strictly technical background," says Yi, "the perspective I

find most lacking is an understanding of what motivates

people and how to balance multiple factors that are at

work outside the realm of technology."

Employees trained in the liberal arts bring an alternative

point of view in day-to-day decision-making in the tech

workplace, but Vince Broady, CEO of content marketing

platform Thismoment, argues that they also think

differently about bigger questions, such as the impact a

company should have on an industry. As a student at

Brown, Broady studied religion, a field that emphasizes

long-term goals, rather than quick gains. "You study

people who dedicate their lifetime to their faith," he

says. "Their impact is measured across hundreds and

thousands of years." His academic background shapes

how he thinks about his work: he wants to stay

committed to building a company of lasting value, even

during difficult times. This goes against the grain of tech

culture, where entrepreneurs are encouraged to take

risks but quickly move to new ideas when things don’t

pan out. Broady questions whether "failing fast" is really

the best way to do business.

Broady’s study of religion has also convinced him that

leaps of faith are important in one’s career. If students

are inclined towards the humanities, he encourages

them to pursue what they love, even when others claim

these fields are worthless. "There is always a story about

a wasted education, about someone who paid so much

for a degree and is now driving a taxi," he says. "But you

have to have some faith that your education will not be

wasted on you. This is about you and your specific

situation; you need to make sure that what you learn

serves you."

Ultimately, Broady believes that people who are

passionate about their work are better poised to

succeed. "If you don’t personally care about what you

are doing, you are not going to be competitive at it," he

says.

For women in tech, a humanities background can be an

added liability, since there is already a perception that

they are less competent at science and math. Danielle

Sheer says that when she joined Carbonite, her first

impulse was to hide her lack of knowledge and retreat

at meetings. However, she quickly changed strategy,

deciding it was more important for her to ask questions

to fully grasp the technology. She’s spent hours

tinkering with the software and working with

engineering teams to learn about it. She says her

colleagues are supportive, even if she sometimes slows

them down. "By articulating complicated technical or

strategic ideas in plain English, you’d be amazed at how

much progress we’ve made solving problems," she says.

"We’ve become very good at assuming that we don’t

have the same definition."

While women have more biases to overcome, all the

humanities-trained tech leaders I spoke with

emphasized the importance of understanding their

company’s technology inside and out. Once they have

this knowledge under their belt, they have the unique

ability to translate complex technical processes into

clear, simple language—an important skill when dealing

with investors and buyers. "The ability to quickly

synthesize information and structure it in a way that is

comprehensible to non-technical people is powerful,"

says MediaAlpha’s Steve Yi.

But perhaps most importantly, liberal arts training allows

people to think about technology itself in fundamentally

different ways. David Rose, CEO of photo analytics

company Ditto, is pushing for companies to reimagine

the role that technology plays in our lives. His recently

published book, Enchanted Objects, is peppered with

ideas from literature, fine arts and philosophy to prompt

the reader to think about technology as the kind of

magic that humans have always been longing after. "I’m

so glad that no one asked me to pick my career as an

undergrad," he tells me, remembering his years at St.

Olaf, a liberal arts college. "It allowed me to take a broad

range of courses and do things like study in Scandinavia.

For a young mind, that is the very best thing you can do,

because it allows you to come at questions about the

world and new technologies from radically different

perspectives."

Tech CEOs are generally keen to hire people trained in

the humanities, partly because a large proportion of

them have similar backgrounds themselves. (A third of

all Fortune 500 CEOs have liberal arts degrees.) But for

students coming out of liberal arts colleges, it can still

be difficult to find work in the tech sector. Georgia

Nugent, the former president of Kenyon College who is

currently a senior fellow at the Council of Independent

Colleges, says that top executives are not responsible

for hiring entry level staff. Instead, recruiters and HR

managers on the hiring front lines often use systems

that pick candidates for tech jobs based on key terms

like "coding" and "programming," which many liberal arts

graduates will not have on their resumes.

Nugent is concerned about this trend because she

thinks that training students for very specific tasks seems

shortsighted when technology and business is evolving

at such a fast rate. "It’s a horrible irony that at the very

moment the world has become more complex, we’re

encouraging our young people to be highly specialized

in one task," she says. "We are doing a disservice to

young people by telling them that life is a straight path.

The liberal arts are still relevant because they prepare

students to be flexible and adaptable to changing

circumstances."

[Photo: Flickr user Shilad Sen]

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N

Elizabeth Segran, Ph.D., is a staff writer at FastCompany. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.CONTINUE

August 28, 2014 | 6:06

AM S I G N I NA D D N E W C O M M E N T

Type your comment here.

20 COMMENTS

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N 4 MONTHS

AGO

It's deeply ironic that 'coding' and 'programming'

(which are by and large the same thing) are being

labeled along with all other technical skills as

'specific and shortsighted'. Programming, regardless

of language, teaches applied mathematics, logical

reasoning, and gives practitioners access to a wealth

of creative opportunities . Software development is

in near constant demand across virtually every

industry, both technical and creative. Only someone

with no programming experience (i.e. from a liberal

arts background) would call learning these kinds of

technical skills shortsighted.

J O N A T H A N P R I T C H A R D

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E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N 7 MONTHS AGO

The combination is the key...broad liberal arts

training AND technical skills...entry level jobs are

usually based on "what can you do for the company

today" (typically the technical skills), while

promotions, entrepreneurial opportunities, and

leadership positions come from your creative

problem solving abilities and your communication

skills, a combination which typically comes from

your mix of liberal arts training and technology skills.

If you are not familiar with Fast Company, it is an

excellent magazine covering current topics in

business and technology.

M I C H A E L E A S O N

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E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N 10 MONTHS AGO

Georgia O'Keefe said it best "To create one's world

in any of the arts takes courage.” Innovation requires

courage, persistence, and an ability to deconstruct

things to create something new. Jeannine

J E A N N I N E

Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N 10 MONTHS AGO

This is a very good article, but entirely unnecessary.

I find these articles that try and defend liberal arts

almost as tedious as the articles that tout STEM as

the only path to a good life.

It seems painfully obvious to me that a well rounded,

high quality liberal arts education is the essence of

what it means to be highly educated. When an

educated person with drive, discipline, intelligence

and curiosity applies themselves to something the

sky is the limit. Period. If you actually listen to the

people that tell you you can't do something, you'll

never realize your potential.

It doesn't matter is the answer. If you are a lover of

science go for it. If you like to explore the world

more broadly study something like literature and

learn cognitive empathy. Treating higher education

as a trade school is a mistake of immense

proportions.

People often criticize both my degrees: English and

an MBA. And I don't care - it worked well for me.

Don't let the trons tell you what to do.

P A T S T R O T H E R

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E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

After every paragraph in this article that ends with a

quote, I thought "for example". And in the

subsequent paragraph: nothing. That's my problem

when liberal artists talk about engineers. There's so

much cliché about diversity of perspectives and

points of view. But there are few solutions, which

are what engineers, investors, and consumers want.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying I disagree. I've

seen many examples of how considering a particular

demographic perspective has affected a tech

product. But I can think of little to no examples of

how generalizations like "creativity and critical

thinking", "shades of correctness", "synthesizing

perspectives", "considering a plethora", or "balancing

multiple factors" have made a difference, especially

a difference attributable to a liberal arts degree.

After all, science is a creative endeavor. All those

hypotheses have to come from somewhere. Are

liberal arts hypotheses better? Prove it. Show some

examples.

E D T O R O

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Comment removed.

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

This is a great point but as much as it supports the

liberal arts, the language in this article still only

frames the liberal arts educated as being in need of a

STEM educated person for translating tech.

Sometimes the tech world needs the liberal arts

minded to translate the tech world to them. This is

exactly what everyone doesn't see, and I'm not sure

why this is a such a problem. We ALL study

algorithms. Math and logical reasoning is inherent in

everything. A code change can be initiated by

someone with no "coding" background who can

W I S D O M . H E A T H E R

describe a desired machine behavior in simplistic

language that sets off lightbulbs for an engineer.

This defines the clinical perspective, based on

external observation of behavior whether it be a

machine or a human being, that is missing from

tech. Stop talking about and do something about

then.

With kind regards, A female non-engineer who

worked in an engineering lab for the automotive

industry

Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Competency is "Competency"......nothing

more....nothing less.

http://ah2andbeyond.com/sales-marketing-

performance-competencies-must-haves/

http://www.slideshare.net/aharrell2000/field-

conference-report-workshop-presentation4

A N D R E ' D . H A R R E L L

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E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

I have an advanced degree in Comparative

Literature. I quit the Ph.D program in comp.lit at U.C.

Berkeley and went to work at the dawn of the tech

sector in the 1980s (I write the first corporate

backgrounder for a little startup called Oracle

Corporation). I went from that into technology

journalism and blossomed. Learning to 'speak tech'

was crucial: i treated it like another language i

needed to learn. Once i learned that language, the

world opened to me. I ended up having a great

career, going on to the Harvard Business Review and

ghostwriting books. Moral of the story: if you have a

liberal arts degree, do what you can to learn the

skills you will need to succeed in business (tech,

B R O N W Y N F R Y E R

economics, etc.) and then watch your career take

off. You will be in a scarce and much valued

minority of people.

Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

It's great to hear some powerful cheerleaders for

liberal arts. They need to speak out more to educate

all the naysayers on professional platforms like

LinkedIn, who are still quoting Dale Carnegie as if he

was the voice of God. Despite not having benefited

from the "money side" of a humanities education, I

still use the critical thinking skills they taught me

every day (both on and off work). I'd choose an

Oscar Wilde quote over a million of Dale Carnegie's

any day.

E L L E N G . K E M P L E R

1 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

It's interesting that these Liberal Arts CEOs went to

some of the top schools in the country. Brown,

Stanford, George Washington University and

Harvard; I wonder how the kids with a liberal arts

degree from a state school or local community

college are doing?

G E O F F R E Y C L E M E N T S

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G E O F F R E Y C L E M E N T S 11

MONTHS AGO

I graduated from San Diego State University

(not a top school) with a BA in American

Literature, then went on to a 20+ year career

in Information Technology. It's BECAUSE I

majored in English that I was able to do the

work in IT.

S U S A N D E L A V E R G N E

Some things my degree prepared me for:

communicating, understanding human

behavior (which literature reveals), detecting

BS, managing qualitative information (like

requirements, design specs, test materials),

analyzing process.

The difficulty is making that connection--

between the education and the job skills--for

HR people. CEO's get it, but they don't screen

applicants.

1 Link Reply

G E O F F R E Y C L E M E N T S A YEAR

AGO

I have two Liberal Arts degrees from a state

school, and I'm leading a Marketing

Strategy/Consulting team for Forbes' "most

innovative company in the world". About half

or more of my colleagues are Liberal Arts

graduates as well.

T O D D W I L S O N

1 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

What can I say? That is what I and we used to say

when I was a Chief People officer at Microsoft.

Halleluiah!

B I L L H O C K I N G

1 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

I just read an entire book about this phenomenon

called "A Whole New Mind" written by Daniel Pink.

What makes this point even more true is the fact

that things like engineering and programming can

J O R D A N M O N R O E

be either automated or outsourced. Very interesting

writeup, I had no idea that so many CEOs had liberal

arts degrees.

2 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Hurrah! As a journalist and marketing consultant -

and liberal arts grad - it is reaffirming that we get the

big picture and can translate the tech world to

others.

S H E L L E Y G I L L E S P I E

1 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Really insightful!

P H I L S C R I M E N T I

2 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Yes, it's great that some tech CEO's can see that

people with non-tech backgrounds might be good

employees. Unfortunately, they don't seem to be

passing their views on to their HR departments.

Good luck getting through their hiring bots with

only a degree in philosophy and a keen interest in

working in tech.

C J S T E P H E N S

3 Link Reply

E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Ludicrous.

E M A H R A Y T R O L L E

Link Reply

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E L I Z A B E T H S E G R A N A YEAR AGO

Absolutely second Dr. Nugent's comments about

higher education's role in preparing students to be

systems thinkers, allowing them to bring multiple

perspectives to problem solving. At Columbia

College, an all-women's liberal arts college in

Columbia SC, our Applied Computing Minor is doing

just that...adding technical and applied analysis skills

to every major. Exposure is everything.

C H R I S L A C O L A

1 Link Reply