Symbiosis of Poor Education and Credentialism in Nepal's Bureaucracy

Nepal’s bureaucratic machinery - spanning both government and private sectors - suffers from chronic inefficiency and systemic dysfunction. A significant driver of this is the toxic combination of a weak education system and an over-reliance on academic degrees as gatekeepers for white collar employment. Together, these factors create a cycle that promotes incompetence, stifles innovation, and undermines service delivery and governance. They foster a workforce that is under-skilled, uninspired and incentivised to cut corners. This combination erodes productivity and entrenches systemic dysfunction. 

Detached from Skill Development 

Nepal’s university system emphasises rote learning and memorisation over analysis, practical skills or critical thinking. Graduates often emerge with degrees that have little relevance to real world challenges and the demands of modern jobs. Yet, in both public and private sectors, these degrees remain the primary, often sole, criterion for hiring. The result is a workforce that may hold formal qualifications but lacks the competence, creativity or problem-solving skills required for effective administration and management. Majority of management jobs in Nepal require the incumbent to hold a master’s degree but too many university gold medalists get hired quickly only to see them fail as competent managers as they lack real world intelligence and common sense.  

The rigidity of this model becomes even more problematic in a world where knowledge and skills are increasingly acquired outside formal classrooms. Students today gain a tremendous amount of learning through online tools and platforms enabling them to access global knowledge bases, interactive simulations, and real-time feedback loops. From coding to understanding complex policy frameworks, much of what once required a formal degree can now be self-taught through digital ecosystems. In such a context, is a college degree really the best, or even necessary indicator of ability? Nepal’s reliance on paper credentials looks increasingly outdated in a world where learning is personalised, accessible and constantly evolving. 

Misaligned Incentives 

This overemphasis on academic qualifications has bred a bureaucratic culture where paper credentials are valued more than actual performance. In government, this manifests in the form of rigid Lok Sewa Aayog exams that test academic recall rather than the ability to solve problems, think critically or communicate effectively. Once inside the system, advancement often depends on tenure and further academic credentials, not on delivering results or solutions. They are promoted over more competent colleagues because of exam performance or seniority. 

In private bureaucracies like banks, insurance companies, and even large firms, the same credentialist bias persists to a large extent. HR departments filter applications primarily based on university prestige and GPA, which often excludes talented, self-taught or vocationally skilled individuals who could inject dynamism into the system.  

The Shortcut Culture 

When degrees become essential for employment or promotion but lack meaningful content, they become ends in themselves. As degrees are made prerequisites for jobs and promotions, yet hold diminishing real-world value, the system creates counter-productive incentives. Instead of pursuing knowledge or skills, individuals are often motivated to acquire degrees by any means necessary, sometimes bypassing genuine academic effort altogether. 

It is not uncommon for master’s theses to be plagiarised or purchased. We have heard about availability of multiple thesis-writing services operating around university campuses in Kathmandu, offering pre-written research papers for a fee. 
Public servants often enrol in distance education programmes from little known institutions, not necessarily to gain knowledge, but to meet degree criteria for promotion.  

Talent Drain and the Depletion of Institutional Capacity  

As the system prioritises credentialism over capability, many of Nepal’s most talented youth seek opportunities abroad where performance determines success. Thousands of skilled Nepali professionals migrate annually to countries like Australia, UK, or USA. Many do so also because they face professional stagnation in Nepal due to bureaucratic barriers, degree inflation, etc – despite their proven abilities. 

On the other hand, institutions, staffed by often under-skilled personnel, become resistant to change. They lack the capacity for digital transformation, evidence-based policymaking, or user-oriented service design that are critical for modernisation and development. Government departments often rely on external consultants to draft policies or manage many aspects of their systems, especially computer-related, as in-house teams lack the required expertise. This leads to dependency and loss of institutional knowledge. 

Vicious Cycle of Mediocrity 

As the system continues to reward credentials over competence, it disincentivises reform in education, perpetuating a status quo where universities churn out more graduates who are not job ready. These graduates enter bureaucratic systems and perpetuate the very inefficiencies they were born into. 

This creates a self-reinforcing cycle of poor educational quality leading to a low-quality workforce resulting in dysfunctional institutions that create no pressure for education reform. The system remains unchanged and the cycle continues. 
Of course, it is important to avoid sweeping generalisations. Within the government machinery, there are indeed individuals of high caliber - officers who are competent, committed and driven by a sense of public duty. These individuals often work diligently, despite systemic inefficiencies. 

However, they are exceptions rather than the rule. Their presence remains scattered and insufficient in scale. They do not form a critical mass capable of pushing against the entrenched status quo or catalysing widespread reform. As a result, their impact is often localised or short lived, diluted by the prevailing culture of mediocrity, red tape and misaligned incentives that dominate the bureaucracy. 

Towards a Performance Based Culture 

Nepal’s bureaucratic inefficiency is not just a failure of policy but a failure of priorities. By clinging to a culture that equates degrees with capability, the country risks stagnation at a time when it needs to leap-frog. 

We must move beyond academic credentialism and adopt a skills-first/experience-first approach to workforce development. Obsession for academic degrees must be replaced with a culture of competence, integrity and results. Only through realignment of the education system with labour market realities and overhauling recruitment practices in both the public and private sectors can we unleash a more capable, citizen-serving and future-ready bureaucracy.  
Many of us wish to see this happen in our lifetime.