Recently a friend of mine, Eric Wadsworth, remarked in a Facebook post:

My perspective, in my field (admittedly limited to the tech industry) has shifted. I regularly interview candidates who are applying for engineering positions at my company. Some of them have advanced degrees, and to some of those I give favorable marks. But the degree is not really a big deal, doesn't make much difference. The real question is, "Can this person do the work?" Having more years of training doesn't really seem to help. Tech moves so fast, maybe it is already stale when they graduate. Time would be better spent getting actual experience building real software systems.

I read this, and the comments that followed, with a degree of interest because most of them reflect a gross misunderstanding of what an advanced degree indicates. The assumption appears to be that people who get a BS in Computer Science are learning to program and therefore getting a MS means you're learning more about how to program. I understand why this can be confusing. We don't often hire a plumber when we need a mechanical engineer, but Computer Science and programming are still relatively young and we're still working out exactly what the differences are.

The truth is that CS programs are not really designed to teach people to code, except as a necessary means to learning computer science, which is not merely programming. That's doubly true of a masters degree. There are no courses in a master's program that are specifically designed to teach anyone to program anything. You can learn to code at a 1000 web sites. A CS degree includes topics like computational theory and practices, algorithms, database design, operating system design, networking, security, and many others. All presented in a way designed to create well-rounded professionals. The ACM Curriculum Guidelines (PDF) are a good place to see some of the detail in a program independent way.

Most of what one learns in a Computer Science program has a long shelf life—by design. For example, I design the modules in my Large Scale Distributed Programming class to teach principles that have been important for 30 years and are likely to be important for 30 more. Preventing Byzantine failure, for example, has recently become the latest fad with the emergence of distrubted ledgers. I learned about it in 1988. If your interview questions are asking people what they know about the latest JavaScript framework, you're unlikely to distinguish the person with a CS degree from someone who just completed a coding bootcamp.

What does one learn getting an advanced degree in Computer Science? People who've completed a masters degree have proven their ability to find the answers to large, complex, open-ended problems. This effort usually lasts at least six months and is largely self-directed. They have shown that they can explore scientific literature to find answers and synthesize that information into a unique solution. This is very different than, say, looking at Stack Overflow to find the right configuration parameters for a new framework. Often, their work is only part of some larger problem being explored by a team of fellow students under the direction of someone recognized as an expert in a specific field in Computer Science.

If these kinds of skills aren't important to your project, then you're wasting your time and money hiring someone with an advanced degree. As Eric points out, the holder of an MS won't necessarily be a better programmer, especially as measured by your interview questions and tests. And if they are important, you're unlikely to uncover a candidate's abilities in an interview. Luckily, someone else has spent a lot of time and money certifying that the person sitting in front of you has them. All free to you. That's what the letters MSCS on their resume mean.

Obviously, every position comes with an immediate need. Sometimes that can be filled by a candidate with good programming skills and a narrow education. Sometimes you want something more. But don't hire poorly because you misunderstand the credentials you're evaluating.