Credentialism isn’t just inequitable, it is an opportunity

TLDR: Learning is not a smooth curve; we frequently grow in spurts and jumps. But those rarely align with external validation like graduation or licensing. Credentialism isn’t just inequitable, it is a business and cultural liability. And there is a market opportunity in refusing to accept the bias.

Recently, there has been a trend in mental health to switch to associates: psychologists who have not yet been fully licensed and cannot practice on their own, without supervision. This is driven largely by cost, as associates are 20-40% cheaper than their fully licensed peers, largely because they cannot create their own practices and must sacrifice some money to a mediating entity.

The requirements for an associate to become fully licensed vary by state but generally include an exam, some number of supervised hours practiced across various populations, and an annoying amount of paperwork that gets returned to you if you misspell something. Bureaucracy gonna bureauc.

Obviously, experience matters. In study after study, we can prove that people do actually get better at things over time; some version of “practice makes perfect” arose in pretty much every language for a reason. 

But that improvement is lumpy. When we look at learning, people tend to proceed in epochs, with long periods of level performance between jumps in ability. And those jumps are hard to pin down; if you do a cohort analysis, when people make a leap up is largely unpredictable. People who are learning and working together don’t necessarily hit milestones at the same time.

And so it isn’t necessarily true that you’re a better therapist today than you were yesterday and it certainly isn’t true that you’re a better therapist the day after the state declares you fully licensed than you were the day before. No one magically produces better work simply because they walked across a stage and got handed a degree.

And yet the day after graduation, your chances of getting a job go up dramatically. Credentialism, or the tendency to rely on formal qualifications over demonstrated ability, is rampant in hiring simply because across a large number of applicants, it is very difficult to find a better proxy.

The problem, of course, is that not everyone has equal access to credentials. Licensing fees can run into the thousands of dollars in some professions, let alone the time investment of a bewildering number of forms. Credentialism tends to amplify sexism, racism, and classism, because the systems that bestow credentials are themselves sexist, racist, and classist.

It is easy to look at associates as inferior and lambast the companies that are increasingly relying on them. Because hiring isn’t the only place credentialism occurs; consumers can just as easily interpret a credential as a valid signal of quality, without actually determining whether there is a real difference.

But ultimately, that drives up market pricing. Consumers who put false faith in credentials end up spending more, without any additional return. And because consumers are buying based on the credential, people are forced to get credentials to increase their wages; the tail is wagging the dog.

As employers, we have structural tools at our disposal: temp-to-hire as a method of determining actual ability, removing degree requirements, etc. And as consumers, we can use reviews as an alternative to credentials. But all of these are choices: ultimately, it is on us to give people the chance to demonstrate their ability to perform beyond their credentials.

And there is plenty to be gained. Besides combating inequity, in a market economy that overvalues credentials, there is a price opportunity in not making the same mistake: you can get more and better, for cheaper, if you’re willing to fight the bias that others are falling victim to. Fighting credentialism is a moral imperative but if you need an economic justification, it is certainly there.