An Idea
Tennis star Roger Federer dabbled with basketball, handball, skiing, wrestling, swimming, table tennis and stakeboarding as a kid. When he began to gravitate towards tennis, his parents cautioned him against taking the sport too seriously. Essentially when they discovered his love for sports, they encouraged him to have what author Dave Epstein calls sampling period – low risk experiments meant to organically discover what one loves doing and most want to succeed in.
Golf legend Tiger Woods, on the other hand, specialized under his father’s tutelage before he turned three. Wood’s learning path of early specialization has become the default template for schools and colleges who want to prime students for excellence. Even in most modern workplaces, a disproportionate emphasis is paid on having narrow skills that are marketable. While there is nothing wrong having an area of focus, one should be mindful of the perils of early specialization. There are three key reason for that.
First, we tend to specialize without knowing why. More than 80% of people work in areas that have nothing to do with their field of study. In India, for example, most students first graduate from courses like engineering and then figure out what they want to do with their lives. Spending 4 years of one’s life getting deep into a subject one doesn’t particularly care about is a colossal waste of time, energy and money.
Second, it hinders lateral thinking, a problem solving approach that draws upon seemingly disparate concepts and domains. Most innovators are lateral thinkers. Their lateral thinking is a direct result of combining different strands of thoughts and learning from different contexts. Leonardo Da Vinci combined art and engineering, Steve Jobs built upon the interconnectedness of design, fashion and technology, and Richard Feynman, a Nobel Laureate in Physics, is known to draw upon references from music.
Third, people with a narrow set of skills tend to approach every problem through the same lens. This not only ignores loopholes in one’s hypothesis but also amplifies biases. As investor Charlie Munger puts it, “To a man with a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”
So if early specialization can backfire, should we all snack on an array of ideas, insights and interests? The short answer is no. The future belongs to deep generalists, a term popularized by Jotform CEO Aytekin Tank. These are people who combine two or more diverse domains and integrate them into something defensible and unique.
An Insight
In the 21st century, with the mainstreaming of automation and AI, some jobs will be automated and some would become redundant. Even highly trained and accomplished professionals – radiologists, traders, programmers etc. – might lose their jobs to algorithms if they are over-reliant on their narrow set of specialized skills.
On the other hand, deep generalists will not only keep their jobs but also be able to demand a premium for what they bring to the table. These are the professionals who will push the boundaries for creativity and innovation in the AI era. Their competitive advantage – a unique combination of breadth and depth – will propel them to learn, unlearn and develop innovative solutions consistently.
In the age of widespread automation, learning and unlearning will be a lifelong pursuit. Tools and technologies will constantly change. While this might unsettle those with a narrow set of skills, it will empower deep generalists to create new opportunities they have nurtured over years of building lateral thinking and conducting repeated experiments to figure how they want to contribute to the ever changing world around.
A Book Recommendation
Iger is the CEO of The Walt Disney Company. In his book, he shares practical lessons in creative leadership. Network Capital Premium members will be discussing this book as part of the book club. You can participate by joining here
Iger is a great example of a deep-generalist with high AQ (Adaptability Quotient). If you want to read more about it, check out our article in Mint
A Podcast
Abhilasha is currently the VP of Strategy and Operations at Elucidata, a Delhi & Cambridge based startup, building an AI-enabled platform for the biopharma industry to enhance drug development.
She graduated with an MBA from Harvard Business School and holds a Bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Delhi.
In this podcast, she talks about the key inflection points in her career, journey to Harvard Business School and life after graduation. You will see the power of following your curiosity and being a deep-generalist in this podcast.
Check it out here. She also conducted a Network Capital Premium masterclass on career hacking. Watch it online using this link
A Masterclass
Wharton alumna Bhavika is an incoming Product Manager at Google. She will be conducting a masterclass today. Join us on Network Capital Premium at 10 pm IST.
Community Meetups
In the next two weeks, our community will be meeting in Seattle, Pune, Cairo, London, Delhi, San Francisco and Toronto. You can join the city specific groups within Network Capital Premium to keep updated.
The event calendar will also be updated on our website. Keep an eye out here
A Quote worth pondering
“Email is a wonderful thing for people whose role in life is to be on top of things. But not for me; my role is to be on the bottom of things. What I do takes long hours of studying and uninterruptible concentration.”
Donald Knuth, recipient of the Turing Award who retired from using email in 1990.
Have a mindful week!
Team Network Capital