Pulitzer Prize winner talks about the importance of a liberal arts education at Franklin College

Anders has professional experience in both traditional journalism and the data-driven dynamic of today’s tech sector. He spent six years as a senior editor-at-large at LinkedIn, covering the future of work and writing the weekly Workforce Insights newsletter. He started his career at The Wall Street Journal as a national copy reader, where in 1997 he shared the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. 

Anders has written five business books on topics ranging from finance to healthcare. His most recent book is “You Can Do Anything: The Surprising Power of A ‘Useless’ Liberal Arts Education.”

Anders' speech on Mar. 14. included five sections:

His journey

We’re going to wind back to Anders' journey as an undergraduate. He got a degree in economics with a minor in communications, and those are liberal arts adjacent fields.

“That was enough to get me my first job but it was not really enough to propel me on to what became a pretty interesting career,” Anders said. “And specifically when I came out of college I joined the Wall Street Journal, what euphemistically would be called a ground floor entry job and honestly, it was in the second sub basement.”

Value of a liberal arts education 

Anders did four years of college and wasn’t pleased with the job that he had, and wanted to go farther. 

“So what helped me go farther, I want to highlight three college classes that you will never forget. And each of them is core liberal arts material.”

• Slavic languages and literature class

A class that taught him how to overcome his challenges, and introduced him to storytelling and writing profiles

• Seminar on the Bill of Rights 

“They're throwing you into large lecture classes, you’re gonna feel a little adrift. Let’s give you a chance to be in a seminar to exchange ideas,” he said. “And I think that sense of energetic exchange of ideas back and forth of a high powered seminar, you end up doing a lot of not just public speaking but debating and discussing in the adult world.”

• Civil War and reconstruction 

Anders said he believes “today that remains a very hotly contested, sensitive raw part of American history, but it’s also where some of the most profound truths about this country come from.”

“When I took that class we dug into the tensions between the Dunning School which was very much centered on a southern plantation view of history, and the revisionists, which was an entirely different look at reconstruction. And what I took away from that class, aside from a biding lifelong interest in that period, was the sense that you can do very powerful work, writing about great areas of conflict and tensions between different belief systems.”

Digital fluency and Artificial Intelligence 

Anders emphasized the importance of digital skills by showing data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. 

Jobs that require no digital skills pay $17.62 per hour. Jobs that require nine definite digital skills pay $43 per hour.

He also suggested jobs emerging from AI capabilities will focus on human interactions, rather than technical skills. 

“So there’s an interesting piece in the The New York Times, just a couple of weeks ago, looking at the opportunities for jobs in an AI world, and the core argument is jobs that emerge as a result of AI’s capabilities will probably be anchored increasingly around people skills,” Anders said. “It comes from the Center for the Future of Work and from a top LinkedIn vice president.  They’re the experts.”

What employers want

Anders referred to a list from LinkedIn of the top in demand skills these days, and these are skills you will get from a liberal arts education: communication, leadership, project management, analytics, teamwork, problem solving, and research. 

Graduates finding good jobs 

Anders emphasized graduates should be patient as they begin their careers.