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I agree with you that, logically, it should be the case that "many other EU countries are a lot more strict about letting you in without a degree then the UK, e

I agree with you that, logically, it should be the case that "many other EU countries are a lot more strict about letting you in without a degree then the UK, especially if higher education is 100% free". However, my experience as a British person (admittedly, sample size of N=1 participants) is the polar opposite. During the pandemic, I was offered (by a fellow contributor to an open source project) a pretty high-flying role in a large semiconductor company. It would be remote-working for a technical department which was based in Germany. Ultimately, though, I couldn't be employed because the British HR department of the company had a policy of 'no degree, no job'!

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
>a pretty high-flying role in a large semiconductor company Well there's your problem. Semiconductor companies, like all "real engineering" companies, mandate academic credentials for everyone on the technical side, especially for "high flying roles", nothing to do with the UK, in Germany it would have been the same or even more strict, it's how the industry operates. If your "high flying role" would have not worked out, then the HR lady would have been under fire for letting in someone without a degree and not following protocol. She was just covering her ass by doing things by the book of the industry/company. Try SW companies and you'll be fine without a degree. The more scientific and old-school engineering the company is, the more they fixate on your credentials. Here in Austria, some even want to see your university grades.
- seabass-labrax 3y ago
  The intriguing thing here was that I had warned the person offering me the job that I didn't have a degree. He said something like "don't worry, we just put the degree requirement in the job advertisement to appease HR" and seemed very confident that it wouldn't be an issue. Later, he said it wasn't possible specifically because of the British HR, whose hard requirements he didn't know of. Since I have no reason to think that he might have changed his mind on me or something like that, it really does sound like the UK department were stricter in this case. That said, I can understand how it probably looked from their perspective - they would have had no reason to trust the recommendation of a manager from another department (from another country no less!) without any paper qualifications to go on.

FirmwareBurner 3y ago

>a pretty high-flying role in a large semiconductor company Well there's your problem. Semiconductor companies, like all "real engineering" companies, mandate academic credentials for everyone on the technical side, especially for "high flying roles", nothing to do with the UK, in Germany it would have been the same or even more strict, it's how the industry operates. If your "high flying role" would have not worked out, then the HR lady would have been under fire for letting in someone without a degree and not following protocol. She was just covering her ass by doing things by the book of the industry/company. Try SW companies and you'll be fine without a degree. The more scientific and old-school engineering the company is, the more they fixate on your credentials. Here in Austria, some even want to see your university grades.

seabass-labrax 3y ago
The intriguing thing here was that I had warned the person offering me the job that I didn't have a degree. He said something like "don't worry, we just put the degree requirement in the job advertisement to appease HR" and seemed very confident that it wouldn't be an issue. Later, he said it wasn't possible specifically because of the British HR, whose hard requirements he didn't know of. Since I have no reason to think that he might have changed his mind on me or something like that, it really does sound like the UK department were stricter in this case. That said, I can understand how it probably looked from their perspective - they would have had no reason to trust the recommendation of a manager from another department (from another country no less!) without any paper qualifications to go on.