I know, it's been a long time since I have been on my blog. Been quite busy lately with my part time job as a Marketing Intern for Simon Property Group, finishing up my last course for school (long story), and applying for jobs in London. But I wanted to write a post today about something that has bugged me for sometime.
GPA. This one mark that is made permanent on a piece a paper most of the time determines whether you'll get that high paying, valuable job you've always dreamed of. It seems more and more companies are deeming it the most important aspect of hiring compared to the skills that a candidate has. I recently read an interesting LinkedIn post titled "When Your GPA Doesn't Matter" by Andy Yeo and it really impacted me. Although I will say he is right when he says don't knock yourself down and fail because you feel you're better than school, but don't think that your GPA and degree are the only things that will get you far in life.
"The truth is, your theoretical knowledge is not your most
valuable asset - your hunger to make a difference and bring a creative and innovative perspective to the table is."
Stole this quote from his article, but it is definitely well said. For me, I've had a lot of experience in the marketing world, ranging from sales jobs (which were my beginning positions) to marketing assistant to event planning. Although some jobs were short term because of location, I gained so much knowledge and experience from each position that will help me in my future positions. To be honest, these jobs gave me more knowledge of what the real world offers than my courses did. I will admit it, I wasn't the grandest in University. When I entered UTSA, I wanted to do Biology and follow in my brother's footsteps and do something incredible in science. But let's be real, Universities make it extremely difficult for students to even stay in the majors like biology or engineering. I completely understand though. In order to make it into a field like that you have to be tough and ready for challenges. Unfortunately, that was not the case for me. I struggled. I struggled A LOT. I ignored the advice from people to switch to business because I was hard headed and wanted to push myself into a career that wasn't for me. Don't get me wrong, I love science, but it wasn't a career path that I was meant to walk on. Although I went down a deep, dark path, I found light at the end of my tunnel. I pulled myself up, switched to the business school, and I will be getting my degree at the end of this month.
But what some businesses don't understand is that the reflection of grades may not be because of lack of interest or failure to study. I studied my tail off to get good grades when I was both a business major and biology major. Every semester that I did with my business major I was either taking 18+ credit hours and/or working. My Fall 2013 semester at UTSA consisted of me taking 18 credit hours and joining various organizations and Spring 2014 consisted of working a 12 hour week, founding an organization, and completing 19 credit hours of school. Trust me when I say I was not disappointed when I received all B's in my upper level division marketing courses. And yes, I did get a couple of C's while I was doing my business courses. I'm not the greatest test taker. I get confused and nervous about multiple choice exams because all the answer choices sound right. I give kudos to those who are great at taking those exams. But if you gave me a piece of paper and told me to write down what I learned from the course, I could probably write you an essay.
I've failed many times in my life. In high school, university, even personal events. But take this quote "Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing." With failure comes success. From failure, I was able to realize I have a passion for event planning. I've planned events ranging from resume workshops to my most recent event Vogue Fashion Week. From failure, I've become more experienced with graphic design and hope to one day start my own business in promotional design work and wedding invitations. From failure, I was able to start this blog and express my interests and opinions in the one way I truly love: writing.
Successful people like Mark Zuckerberg, David Ogilvy, Rachael Ray, Walt Disney, and many more either dropped out of college or never attended. They all knew that they had skills and knowledge in them that a 4.00 GPA couldn't match up to. I'm not saying don't attend University, it's an amazing experience where you'll meet great people and take interesting courses. But don't ever sell yourself short because you received a D or an F on an exam or your GPA is/was below a 3.00. You have it in yourself to do great things. As Andy Yeo put:
"At the end of the day, how well you do in school is only a black and white score on a piece of paper - what will count the most is the passion you have for what you do."
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