Humanities graduates: The world needs you!

Shose Kessi - Associate Professor, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Cape Town.

In a seminal column in the Washington Post in 2017, Valerie Strauss published remarkable findings from a study undertaken by tech giant Google.

The Silicon Valley behemoth had asked itself: what kind of skills should they look for in new recruits? The answer, catching even Google itself off guard, was not to be found in the STEM fields. They needed humanities graduates. This went against the company’s founding principles. The original hiring algorithms had filtered through top computer science graduates from elite science universities. And while these graduates served the company so well that its name became a verb, they had hit a wall.

The seven top characteristics of success at Google turned out to be soft skills:

- being a good coach;

- communicating and listening well;

- possessing insights into others (including others different values and points of view)

- having empathy toward and being supportive of one’s colleagues;

- being a good critical thinker and problem solver

- being able to make connections across complex ideas.

Sound familiar?

The Silicon Valley behemoth had asked itself: what kind of skills should they look for in new recruits? The answer, catching even Google itself off guard, was not to be found in the STEM fields. They needed humanities graduates.

This revival of the humanities in the job market has scaled alongside the increased permeation of artificial intelligence into nearly all aspects of our lives. In the age of the algorithm, data scientists are limited by the assumptions about society built into the questions they ask. Machine learning is limited by the accuracy of the algorithm, which in turn is only as effective as the degree of nuance in the assumptions about human behaviour that underpin it.

Humanities graduates are well placed to think about AI’s impact on the world. The technology might be advanced but it needs to become more human-centred, with the aim to improve our lives, reduce inequalities and promote social justice. According to World Economic Forum, tech is not everything. It is ‘tacit knowledge’ or the four C’s – creativity, collaboration, communication and critical thinking – that are most valuable in the new world of work.

According to the World Economic Forum, tech is not everything. It is ‘tacit knowledge’ or the four Cs – creativity, collaboration, communication, and critical thinking – that are most valuable in the new world of work.

Shaping the future

Even before the 4IR, studies have shown that humanities graduates were highly active in the economy. Whilst many end up in educational fields, a significant proportion land positions in various other industries, such as legal services, civil service, and medical fields for example.

But perhaps the most important contribution of the humanities is to challenge the notion that we should educate our students to be exclusively economically productive. What the world needs is a generation of graduates who think critically and become knowledgeable, productive, and empathetic individuals. For our societies to evolve, we need to challenge systems that exclude and marginalise, we need graduates who can navigate cultural differences and deal with complex global problems.

These transferable skills are increasingly being identified as critical to the knowledge economy. A study by Deloitte Access Economics in 2017 anticipates that by 2030, 63% of the labour force will be made up of individuals with transferable skills.

In the face of global crises, like the COVID-19 pandemic, what humanities graduates bring to the table are analytical, decision-making, language, and communication skills that are essential to better plan responses that take into account different worldviews. Ethical responses to environmental destruction, economic collapse, and institutional discrimination require interdisciplinary skills that foreground participation, networking, building trust and partnerships so that industries can become more relevant and responsive to the people they serve. Innovative and creative thinking is necessary to drive sustainability and success.

With your humanities education, you can make a positive impact in the world. These qualities are transferable to any vocation or industry. What’s more, the leaders in these sectors now know your value. Wherever you end up, your colleagues will be counting on you to leave the space better than you found it, because you will be best equipped to do so.