Marc Andreessen's Career Opinions

Marc Andreessen the very famous co-founder of Netscape, has written a series of insightful blogs on career planning:

1. Part 0: Introduction
2. Part 1: Opportunities
3. Part 2: Skills and Education
4. Part 3: Where to Go and Why

I especially like how the disclaimer on the introduction blog states right off the bat, that "these posts are aimed at high-potential people who want to excel throughout their careers and make a significant impact on their fields and the world. These posts are not appropriate for people for whom work/life balance is a high priority or for whom lifestyle is particularly important". In other words, the advice is geared towards highly ambitious, work-a-holic types looking to not only make billions, but to change the world!

Given Marc's history and impact he has had on the world through founding one of the most important and used products of the century, the web browser, it lends a lot of legitimacy to what he advocates.

There are a multitude of career help books espousing the politically correct notion of how important it is to balance work and personal life, but the reality is that if you have high ambitions, forget about it, you will need to make considerable sacrifices. But I believe that if you have a genuine passion and desire to be the best at what you do, which is typically some kind of career, given that all of us need to earn a living to keep food on the table and a roof over our head unless what you have a passion for is purely a hobby, then it really shouldn't feel like sacrifices but simply things you have to do to achieve your goals.

But on this notion of following your passions, which Marc advocates throughout, he contradicts himself and it is a point I'm in complete disagreement with him about, and that is in Part 2 where he states:

Some people argue that college will be your one chance in life to pursue your passion -- to spend four years doing nothing but studying whatever you love the most, whether that's Renaissance literature or existential philosophy.

I disagree.

If you intend to have an impact on the world, the faster you start developing concrete skills that will be useful in the real world, the better -- and your undergrad degree is a great place to start. Once you get into the real world and you're primed for success, then you can pursue your passion.

A typical liberal arts degree will be almost useless on its own. So you usually won't have the option of immediately entering the workforce in a high-impact way when you graduate, and you'll have to go get a useful graduate degree.

First, if it is your burning desire to become a hot shot entrepreneur, then I think going to college will be a waste of time. The reality is that colleges and universities are really nothing but an extension of high school with more challenging (though this is subject to debate at a lot of colleges, even the elite ones) classes, where students who are considered too young to join the corporate world stew for a while and prove that they can slog it out 4 more years proving they have the necessary stamina to do pencil pushing (or keyboard typing) white collar work. In addition, there is still that prestige factor of getting a college degree felt by both parents and students.

It's no accident that some of the greatest entrepreneurs (Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Richard Brandson, etc.) were either college drop outs or did not bother to attend at all. You could argue that getting a college degree will give you an advantage when entering the work force, and while this is true on average, a true entrepreneur with a burning passion to make it big would not need such a temporary advantage (I say "temporary" because after a few years in the workforce, the college degree becomes moot, and one's real world experience is what counts). Furthermore, overcoming the advantage your peers have with a college degree is something a true, determined entrepreneur would welcome overcoming anyway.

Second, if your going to go to college, then in my opinion, getting the broadest education you can is best, because the reality of the new world is that a student will be changing their careers multiple times and being able to learn new skills quickly will be an important asset. Having a broad educational foundation is best, and it should be on the fundamentals: critical reading, thinking, writing, mathematics, and science. But the bottom line, is to completely disregard Marc's recommendation to pursue classes that "have a technical element of some form -- that teach you how to do something substantive", unless that is what you want to do, and pursue whatever you find interesting and make sure it and you employ the fundamentals to your full advantage.

You can pursue something as esoteric as art history, and so long as you are motivated to use your creativity, logic, and analysis and be able to articulate this well in writing and speaking, then this will help you in whatever career choice you pursue. Anyway, a popular notion and one in which I fully agree, is the notion that creative right brain functions are just as, if not possibly more important than the typical analytical left brain functions in the new world. This was well articulated in Daniel Pink's book "A Whole New Mind" and is a book I highly recommend.

Finally, in our highly competitive and fast paced world, you have to acquire the discipline to constantly learn new things. It will make you a more productive person, and in addition will make you a better human being all around. If you can learn to acquire a genuine passion for learning just to satisfy your curiosity and to explore your mind and intellect, then you will be able do this without it feeling like a chore. It is this acquired ability that has allowed some of the most influential people in our history, to change the world.