Specialist vs Generalist

#184

Specialist vs Generalist

Which is better?

Going to a good school, learning a valuable skill (accounting, coding, engineering), & becoming attractive to an employer, is the coveted track for most upper-middle-class kids in the US.

Liberal arts degrees are valuable, just not necessarily rewarded with the highest paying jobs at age 23.

In my thinking on this, you do need to develop a set of skills. But more importantly, you need to develop the skill of learning new skills.

Early in life, school is as good a place as any to develop those basic skills. Plus you get the added benefit of a credential (your degree) telling the world that you have completed the work.

Later in life, you need to adopt an ethos of lifelong learning.

Talent Stacking

I like Scott Adams idea of talent stacking. Over the course of your life you will build skills. It is unlikely you will be the world’s best at any one of those skills, but the combination you uniquely develop might catapult you to the top of your chosen profession. Some of those will be “hard skills” (reading a balance sheet, writing code, fixing the toilet, etc) … but as you gain experience, the more valuable skills are the “soft skills” that are not as easily credentialed. Leadership. Decision-making. Communicating.

Lifelong Learning

Developing an ethos of lifelong learning will propel you into all sorts of new endeavors and skill-building opportunities.

“The bigger the picture, the more unique the potential human contribution. Our greatest strength is the exact opposite of narrow specialization. It is the ability to integrate broadly. David Epstein