College prepared Pinky Cole well to be the CEO of a $100 million company, she says — just not in the way you might think.
Cole, 35, runs Slutty Vegan, an Atlanta-based vegan burger chain with 11 locations across Georgia, New York and Texas. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in mass media arts from Clark Atlanta University, one of the city’s historically Black colleges and universities, in 2009 — and says the classes she took don’t really help her in her day job.
But that didn’t make college worthless, she says.
“I’m going to be totally transparent with you. When I went to college, all the stuff that I learned, I don’t remember [any] of it,” Cole tells CNBC Make It. “What I do remember is the relationships that I built along the way.”
Her sorority, Delta Sigma Theta, for example, taught her leadership skills and professionalism, and gave her relationships with people she “still connects with to this day,” she says. When she happens to see former classmates at conferences or business meetings, finding avenues for potential partnerships is easier because “we’ve already built a rapport.”
“The people who I went to school with are now executives and CEOs of some of the biggest companies in the country, but I’ve been able to build those relationships before they became these big-time executives,”     says Cole. “So the relationship is organic, it’s authentic.”
Indeed, Clark Atlanta’s alumni range from pop stars to politicians. Chance encounters at homecoming events can lead to business opportunities — which is likely the case for many schools, not just Cole’s alma mater.
That’s valuable: Networking can result in higher quality job offers and help you climb the corporate ladder faster, according to 2016 research from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. And while it’s certainly possible to connect with high-powered people without a shared academic experience, college graduates tend to have better career prospects and financial outcomes than high school-only graduates.
College graduates earned 75% more last year, on average, according to the San Francisco Fed, a research nonprofit. College graduates also reported a 2% unemployment rate last year, compared with 7% for their counterparts, the National Center for Education Statistics reported.
Cole’s own college experience was worth every penny, purely due to those connections she’s made, she says.
“If I could turn back the hands of time, I would do it all over again ... spend $200,000 to go to school, to make some relationships and network with those people,” she says. “Because guess what, your network is your net worth.”
Her advice to anyone on the fence, she adds: “By all means, I believe that you should go, because the relationships, if nothing else, will be the thing that will support and carry you [on your career journey].”