Generalist or Specialist?

Earlier this year my Vistage groups were fortunate to have Carolyn Strauss speak. Carolyn did a fabulous job, but the one thing she mentioned that has stuck with me throughout the year is a book called Range, written by David Epstein. I have read many books and plan to read/listen to many more. Few books have so caught my attention as this one has. Why is that? Stay with me and I’ll tell you more.

Epstein does a great job of covering many of the most popular thoughts about how to become an expert in a field. He talks about the “10000 hour rule” so well communicated by Malcolm Gladwell. He also points out the poster child for specialization, Tiger Woods. I won’t go into all of the details here, but trust me when I tell you that most everyone knows that Tiger was practically raised with a golf club in his hands.

What Epstein does well is share other stories of extremely famous people who have a much more diverse background. One that always stays with me is Roger Federer. While Federer is best known for tennis, he participated in many other sports while growing up and I suspect that this contributed to his diverse skillset as a tennis player.

This book hit home for me because I too am a generalist. Let me explain. My undergraduate degree is in Engineering Physics. What that really means is that my undergraduate career focused on calculus and post-calculus mathematics in addition to about 40 hours of calculus-based physics. You might call me a nerd, but I was a pretty social nerd, and that helped lead to the diversification of my career.

After focusing on technical work and technical leadership for 13 years, I took a hard turn and moved into the Human Resources field. It makes me smile to remember what that transition was like and it also makes me feel good to know how many supporters and mentors I had during that period. I would have never made it without them.

The next pivot was into the entrepreneurial field where I focused on Executive Search and Leadership development. This pivot coincided with our sons heading to university and I learned so many things about work, clients, needs versus wants, and faith during this initial transition. What I really learned during this period is that people do work with people, not organizations and building relationships is critical in whatever you do.

My intent for the next few posts is to dive deeper into why Generalists may hold the keys to the future in comparison to specialists. I hope some of you out there disagree so that we can have a lively dialogue.

I see myself as a large, thin-crust pizza. The crust may not be thick or deep, but it covers a lot of ground. So too is my knowledge and experience. By having this broad knowledge and experience I can connect many dots that are not often connected by others.

More on this in a future post.