Specialist? Generalist? or Specialised Generalist?
Are you a specialist or a generalist? Simple enough question, yes? Also a common one posed to Tim Ferris, and today I share his five minute Youtube video where he talks about this. I love how he makes it simple:
- Unless you are truly brilliant at one thing, don’t be a specialist
- Instead, combine two or three skill areas
- When choosing those skill areas, focus on them being as rare and valuable as you can.
- Do this and you can be a “Specialised Generalist”
I love how this brings focus! Instead of being a generalist who is good at a lot of things but doesn’t stand out in any particular field, by combining a particular few rare and valuable sets of skills and experiences, one can create a space of value.
Now, in looking at this concept, Tim talks about adding a meta skills that can be applied across your “specialised generalist” focussed space.
In my writing and conversations of late I’ve been encouraging individuals and businesses to add new skills, new assets that they can invest in now and that will pay back later in the future. For example…
