I don’t have any degree and in another life I worked in restaurants and at CVS. Customers would grill me about my career aspirations and straight up beg me to go to college. I got sick of it pretty quickly and sat down and asked myself what I would want in a workplace and what skills I had that I could use to do something else.
I had some freelance experience and used that to enter my current field and continued pursuing organic opportunities for growth and learning. About a year ago I started working at a company that prioritizes employee development and internal promotion and I’m in the process of gaining enough experience and connections to be able to do something new again! I definitely think it’s possible for people who don’t have a bachelor’s degree to find these opportunities; you just have to be strategic about it and get your foot in the door at the right places.
There are so many transferable skills you gain in retail and food service that are beneficial in other professional fields like communication, multi-tasking, attention to detail, etc. So you can take those and add them to whatever skills you may have gained at your current job.
Ask yourself what it is that you’re better at than anybody else, the things you would want and definitely not want in a workplace, the kind of tasks you like doing, and kind of guide your search from there. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking you’re lesser than others just because you have less formalized education than they do and remember that people hire likable people they want to be around—even that will take you far! best of luck! 🍀