Lazlo Bock, senior vice president of people operations at…
““Lazlo Bock, senior vice president of people operations at Google, made the following comments in an interview published by the New York Times in June 2013: “One of the things we’ve seen from all our data crunching is that G.P.A.’s (grade point averages) are worthless as a criteria for hiring, and test scores are worthless. Google famously used to ask everyone for a transcript and G.P.A.’s and test scores, but we don’t anymore…. We found that they don’t predict anything. What’s interesting is the proportion of people without any college education at Google has increased over time as well. So we have teams where you have 14 percent of the team made up of people who’ve never gone to college.” Doing well in college—earning high test scores and grades—has no measurable correlation with becoming an effective worker or manager. This is incontrovertible evidence that the entire Higher Education system is detached from the real economy: excelling in higher education has little discernible correlation to real-world skills or performance.””
About This Quote
This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation.
Grades and test scores poorly predict job performance; hiring should focus on skills and experience rather than formal education.
In simple terms: College grades don’t guarantee work success; look beyond transcripts.
Key Takeaway
Prioritize real‑world abilities over academic metrics in hiring.
Themes
employment
education
skills assessment
bias
Mood
critical
analytical
Type
pragmatic
thought‑provoking
When to use this quote
- recruitment processes
- career counseling
- HR policy development
Key Concepts
human capital
meritocracy
data‑driven hiring
Questions to Reflect On
- What alternative criteria can better predict employee success?
- How can bias be reduced in hiring?
A Different Perspective
Companies may lack tools to evaluate non‑academic talent fairly.