#1 Why Grad School?
China 2.0 Web Review recently reported that QQ.com, the #1 Chinese social networking website, recorded a 200 million active users in the month of January, 2009. The comStore chart below tells that QQ.com almost doubles Myspace’s and Facebook’s clicks as off January 31. Techcrunch followed the news, so did VentureBeat; VentureBeat even used the eye-catching headline: Who can get the bigger social network: China, or everywhere else combined?
Although it is still debatable which is the largest (in fact, even the measurement standard itself could be a hotbed of debate), this is the most astounding piece of evidence to me that China will play a more and more vital role in the knowledge-based economy, and more importantly, the Chinese market is too huge to be ignored.
The world eventually has to deal with China. As a Chinese, I am no exception. In fact, if I don’t leverage my Chinese identity, I am not maximizing my potential as an invidual. This leads to the first reason I am reconsidering grad school.
Per my previous post, Chinese value credentials, highly. Even though in my opinion, credentials are significantly overvalued, a good degree can open many doors. Here is an anecdote: when CEO of a major Chinese bank was introduced in a conference last year, the public deemed him powerful because of his Harvard degree, rather than his position.
Arguing against Paul Graham’s After Credentials, Professor Tony Savor put this into effective words and gave a viable rationale in his email:
Regarding credentials, they are basically a brand. In our day and age consumers navigate the complexities of our world with brands (e.g. Toyota is better than GM, Coke is better than Pepsi). One can make these claims without any knowledge of GM’s cars, UofT’s programs or Coke’s ingredients.
As our world becomes more complex, brands become more important because nobody understands the underlying science anymore. Thus credentials will continue to prevail and serve to get you in the door. After you are in its up to you to win or loose but the power of brands is immense in our day and age and only seems to be getting stronger.
First reason for grad school: a degree from Harvard, MIT, or Stanford would get me into more doors.
Good argument for doing grad school.
But at the end of the day, are you really willing to forfeit your North American pay cheque?
Not that I am disagreeing with you, just a random thought.
Middle management or up… you probably earn more in Asia, especially China, than in North America.
Also it’s much less about the money, rather it’s about what you can accomplish.
well said. “credentials are basically a brand.”
btw, did you mislabel QQ and FB in the chart?
Hi Ray,
I totally agree that credentials are becoming like brand names. Hence, just like brands, they have a target market.
Banks and some consulting firms are major consumers of brand names such as Harvard, the same way that women prefer certain cosmetic brands over others. However, certain companies which are seeking champions of “think outside box” mantra are not as much concerned with the brand as they are with the quality and characteristic of the individuals. They know what they are looking for and they know better than anybody else that these brands bear little to do with creativity and consciousness, two main elements of a long-term success.