I know a lot of people who are currently working in a field that has nothing or almost nothing to do with their original field of study. I'm sure some of you fall in that category as well.
A recent related study that caught my attention is called
Job Mismatch and Early Career Success. It attempts to answer the question:
How does being over- or underqualified at the beginning of a worker's career affect skill acquisition, retention, and promotion?
In this instance, the study is related to workers in the US Air Force, so you might take the results with a grain of salt knowing that this type of work attracts a specific type of person.
Nonetheless, here is a summary of their results:
"We find that being overqualified for a job causes higher attrition, both during technical training and afterward when individuals are working in their assigned jobs. It also results in more behavioral problems, worse performance evaluations, and lower scores on general knowledge tests... These patterns suggest that overqualified individuals are less motivated, but still outperform others in their same job."
And with regards to underqualified workers:
"Underqualification results in a polar opposite set of findings, suggesting these individuals are motivated to put forth more effort, but still struggle to compete when judged relative to others."
Would the results be similar in other industries? I asked ChatGPT and there only seem to be general studies done, but not necessarily ones on the same topic that are specific to an industry.
Now on to this week's hand-picked productivity links!
