Ren Akinci
Chief People Officer
Emerald
Episode 173
Degree-blind hiring: Unlocking 60% of America's untapped talent.
Current chapter: Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built By PeopleMay 27, 2025 · 7:52
Thesis
“Removing college degree requirements is a 'talent-first' business strategy, not just a diversity initiative, that unlocks a vast pool of skilled individuals, enhances talent pipelines, and ultimately leads to stronger organizational performance.”
Show notes
60% of the U.S. workforce doesn't have a college degree. If your job postings require one, you've just screened out the majority of the country's working-age talent — including people who may be better qualified for the role than anyone in your applicant pool.
Ren Akinci, Chief People Officer at Emerald, made that calculation and decided to act on it. In partnership with OneTen, she removed degree requirements from more than 75% of Emerald's job descriptions — and framed it deliberately not as a diversity initiative, but as a talent strategy. The distinction matters. Calling it a D&I play shifts focus to representation metrics. Calling it a talent-first initiative shifts focus to where it belongs: skills, potential, and whether the person can do the job. Her data supports the reframe — Emerald has consistently met business objectives and accessed talent pools they never would have reached through degree-filtered pipelines.
Her challenge to the common resistance is equally direct: when you look at actual performance failures in your organization, are they ever really attributable to a candidate's educational background? Almost never. They're tied to onboarding gaps, misaligned responsibilities, or managers who weren't equipped to set people up for success. The degree requirement was protecting the organization from a problem it never actually had.
- The 60% statistic — what the U.S. Census Bureau data means for your talent pipeline and why it's a business case, not a social one
- The OneTen partnership — how coalition-based efforts accelerate skills-based hiring and provide peer learning from CHROs in the same journey
- "Talent-first" vs. "D&I initiative" — why the framing of degree removal changes how hiring managers respond to it
- Service industry talent as an undervalued source — the soft skills retail, hospitality, and food service workers bring that formal education often doesn't build
- Where performance failures actually come from — and why education history is almost never the culprit
- How to start small — Ren's advice for organizations that want to pilot skills-based hiring across even 10-15 roles before going broader
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What you'll take away
- 160% of the US workforce lacks a college degree; requiring one significantly limits access to a broad and skilled talent pool.
- 2Skills acquired through community colleges, military service, boot camps, certifications, or work experience are often as valuable as a traditional degree.
- 3Removing degree requirements should be approached as a 'talent-first' initiative, focusing on spotting potential and skills rather than solely a diversity metric.
- 4Performance issues are typically linked to onboarding gaps, misaligned responsibilities, or unequipped managers, not a candidate's educational history.
- 5Hiring individuals with service industry backgrounds (retail, hospitality, food service) can bring employees with highly developed 'soft skills' crucial for collaboration, decision-making, and customer satisfaction.
What most organizations get wrong
- •Removing degree requirements is primarily a 'talent-first' initiative for business objectives, not merely a D&I initiative.
- •It's unnecessary and potentially counterproductive to track degree status for D&I metrics when the goal is to open access to all talent.
- •True performance failures are almost never due to a lack of a 4-year degree, but rather systemic issues within the organization.
In Ren's words
“For me, it was when I started reading statistics. For example, the US Census Bureau releases data that shows how many percentage of US workers don't have degrees, and that percentage is 60%. So that's a lot of people that you are not getting access to when you have college degree as a requirement.”
Highlights the significant portion of the workforce excluded by traditional degree requirements.
“I think it's actually a talent-first initiative. It's about training hiring managers and recruiters to spot potential and hire based on skills.”
Re-frames the motivation for removing degree requirements from D&I to a strategic talent advantage.
“I think in general, for most companies, when performance issues do occur, they're usually tied to onboarding gaps, misaligned responsibilities, or unfortunately unequipped managers, not someone's education history.”
Challenges the common misconception that education history is a primary cause of performance issues.
“Wholeheartedly believe in it, and I'm happy to help anybody who's listening that wants to start this at their organization, whether it's all of their jobs, some of their jobs, or even 10 or 15 jobs. Progress is progress, and I think going back to that statistic of 60% of people not having college degrees, if you have talent gaps, if you're looking for people and you can't find people to, to place in the roles that you're hiring for, you're missing out a huge market, and I'd love to help you tap into it.”
Serves as a call to action, offering practical advice and emphasizing the business opportunity of skills-based hiring.
The problems this episode addresses
- •Organizations struggle with talent gaps and limited candidate pools due to outdated college degree requirements.
- •Companies are overlooking a large segment (60%) of highly qualified individuals with valuable skills gained outside of traditional higher education.
- •Performance issues are misattributed to a lack of formal degrees instead of internal shortcomings like poor onboarding or ineffective management.
- •Recruiting processes fail to identify and leverage critical 'soft skills' like collaboration and adaptability, often abundant in service industry professionals.
In this episode
Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built by People
Red says college degree requirements are creating unnecessary barriers in HR
Red Carpet: College Degree Requirement
Ren: We remove degree requirements for 75% of our job descriptions
How OneTen Works for Hiring Students With Degrees
Oracle removed its degree requirements to boost diversity and inclusion
D&I Impact of Removing Degree Requirement
You hire for skills and potential first, not degree requirements
What is the Hiring Process for Service Industry Talent?
Wren recommends removing college degree requirements from jobs that deserve skills-based hiring
Wren Bowen on College-based Hiring
Topics covered
Organizations and entities mentioned
Full transcript
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