Photo by Oliver Roos on Unsplash
—
One of the enduring memories of the past twenty years and some of work is getting hauled into my Supervisor’s office for a career chat. At the time I was twenty three, fresh off a year of national service , quite literally in the middle of nowhere, and two weeks into my first proper job. The contrast with my Supervisor, a no-frills expat, fresh off an assignment in South East Asia, who fit the dour Scotsman stereotype to a tee, complete with a Protestant work ethic could not have been starker. The sum total of my big city life prior to that job was two weeks in Lagos, the intricacies of corporate life being as alien to me as it would be to a small town boy in a King’s court.
The job was as one of five new hires, four of us fresh graduates. It was at one of the oil & gas exploration companies in the country and paid more in that first year than what my father – a 30 year University Professor at the time – earned. It was, to put it mildly, the very definition of life changing money. Over time, it would come out that someone in the great corporate behemoth had the idea to recruit fresh grads for the first time in nearly a decade, the intent being to organically develop talent for a change rather than poach from elsewhere.
The chat boiled down to one question – what path I was interested in pursuing over my putative career with the company. As I recall it, he leaned back in his chair, hands on his head and proceeded to detail a parable of ladders, one technical and one managerial. The choice before me was between being a specialist or a generalist. My choice that day was to be a specialist, the allure of a niche specialty, being a purveyor of somewhat esoteric knowledge, and the one example I knew being some of the things which predisposed me to that choice. Implicit in that conversation was that there was a contract of sorts – have your preferences which we will try to support as long as it aligns with business interests. The path was fairly well defined – complete the Early Competency Milestones, become and Independent Contributor, Complete the Advanced Skills Milestones, get a few choice assignments and become an Advisor in some region/affiliate.
The generalist v. specialist debate is one which continues to simmer, presumably for the very reason that there are pros and cons to both. In perhaps the most popular book on the subject, Range, David Epstein weighs in on the side of the generalists, concluding that they have advantages in the long run over narrow specialists, have a more robust toolbox for problem solving among other advantages. AI, data and the “death” of expertise is relevant, given they perhaps erode the benefit of niche, specialist knowledge to some degree.
At first glance Cal Newport, of the Deep Work and So Good They Can’t Ignore You fame appears to fly the flag for specialists. A deeper look however suggests things might be a bit more nuanced than that, particularly when viewed through the lens of career capital and the five habits of a craftsman he espouses. This suggests that the right balance may be industry specific at least.
It seems to me therefore, that it is perhaps not an either or question, but a both and one, one which must necessarily take into account the intersection of the individual, their personality and the opportunities available at any given time. In my case, my Enneagram 5/ INTJ type lends itself to a motivation for knowledge, hence the joy I have derived from a deep, somewhat niche specialty. Being somewhat introverted has also been a consideration, as being a specialist has led me down the Independent Contributor route, rather than a supervisory/ managerial one.
Reflecting on that conversation from twenty years ago, I must admit that the Generalist route has in aggregate been the better choice, if the five person experiment can be given any credence – small sample size caveats notwithstanding. Wider trends in my industry only seem to buttress that, with the well trodden path to recognition as a technical specialist becoming increasingly swampy both from rejigs to job titles/ job descriptions, a shrinking of opportunities to develop in multiple geographies and the new wave of Global Capability Centres.
Five years into my journey at that company, I ditched the well worn path, opting for study abroad – a good decision based on the past twenty years. Three continents and counting, it does feel rewarding to be recognised for a niche specialty – the question of if I’ll be singing a different tune in the next twenty years remains to be seen.
Leave a Reply