Good point!

Can’t agree more that this is a complex analysis. That’s why very good companies will go beyond the school – and the GPA. However, most firms are in the business of minimizing risk with a selection, especially for those roles that will require a significant amount of training. Under those situations, a solid selection process will look at some (and many of the following):

GPA
SAT/ACT
School attended
Academic load (4 year or 5-6 year plan)
Extracurricular activities
Outside Employment (filters slackers)
Community/Charity activities (filters slackers)
Results from robust behavioral interview
Results from selection batteries
Quality of interview

robert edward cenek
http://www.cenekreport.com

Maybe the success-in-school/success-in-life rule of thumb works for 90% of the population. If it can’t be reliably applied to individuals at either end of that bell curve, what’s the value in applying an minimum GPA absolute requirement? Applying the rule of thumb, you’re guaranteed that a certain percentage of the very best candidates will never get a job with your firm.

There are many reasons why someone might fail to do well in school. Sometimes the reason is related to a lack of intelligence or drive. However… perhaps what drives the individual occurs outside the academics continuum. Perhaps a psychological condition or events of great importance have affected their priorities, and they have a set of values that varies from the culturally-expected “norm”. Perhaps they are haunted by memories of abuse and feelings of self-loathing. Maybe they just don’t take tests well.

A GPA score clues you in on none of this – it’s like trying to judge the speed of a car from a photograph. Certain professions will always require certified skills, but don’t look at “general performance” scores as an indicator of whether a person will “be successful”.

http://www.elsblog.org/the_empirical_legal_studi/2007/06/new_evidence_on.html

Again….at the end of the day…. overall smarts are important. Not perfectly predictive – but important. Exceptions abound.

robert edward cenek
http://www.cenekreport.com
Uncommon Commentary on the World of Work

Know your culture – is it a smart “kids are cool”? Is it smart kids are cool if they are in the basement of the science building? Most places that is not the culture – its “relationship people run!” or “working like a dog rules” or “numbers people are the new black”. Hire for your culture not for management theories.

When I graduated from law school (I don’t actually recall my GPA) I recall a very bright partner at a big law firm telling me it didn’t matter because no one graduating from law school knew anything about the world anyway. It was all preamble.

Old joke: People who get “A”s in law school become law professors; people who get “B”s in law school become law professors; people who get “C”s in law school become millionaires. Bada BING – No YOU try the veal.

- In some situations GPA actually does predict job performance, albeit not particularly strongly. See http://www.ipmaac.org/acn/aug98/techaff.html

- Several years ago I did a study looking at how well quality of law school and years of experience predicting performance ratings among attorneys. The only significant relationships were between experience and job knowledge, and between law school and getting along with others–but in the opposite direction (i.e., the better the law school, the worse they got along with others)

Politics would be another good example. Ronnie Reagan was a strong president, but he was hardly the sharpest tack in the drawer.

IQ is still a very strong predictor of job success, especially in higher level positions requiring critical thinking abilities. Other things are critical – e.g., creativity, EQ, etc.

robert edward cenek
Cenek Report