"Quo vadis" matters, but what are you carrying?
It's actually 15 years, since I am in the work force, or its 15 years since I got my first job and have started to experience all ups-and-downs of the grown-up professional life, something I haven’t prepared myself when I was 15.
#WhenIWas15 I wanted to do something I'd be really good at. I didn’t have a clue what would it be and how shall I get there, but the intention of being a real professional was something that was guiding me back them. And little then I know, that I was a pure generalist.
I believe that was it, this intention that made my career choices non-straightforward and unorthodox.
Versatility curse
I was curious and versatile, I loved foreign languages, history, literature, geometry, geography, and much later I realized I also really enjoyed math and physics. Being so good in so many and having been raised in a country, which economy was tuned for preferring specialists to generalists, offered a scarce selection of career choices and has been undergoing a very sluggish transition, hasn’t left much choice and at 16 yo I chose to be a lawyer. Back then seemed like, if not the only, viable option for someone with all the preferences and qualities above and with the economy structure we had.
Generalist vs. Specialist
What in the economy contributes to the diversity of jobs and activities? The development level, the homogeneity of the industries in regards to the advancement of the development, FDIs, diverse supply of the specialists?
Is it better to acquire a broad range of skills and experience across a range of disciplines, or to become an expert in one field? It’s a question that many of us ask ourselves. Not only as students weighing up college options, but also throughout our careers. #WEF
The conclusion #WEF comes to in one of its articles «Generalists or specialists: who do employers value more?» is that while generalists vs. specialists is an age-old debate, it turns out that one type is more attractive to employers. Someone who can ‘wear many hats’ is more likely to be offered a job than someone who is highly skilled in one area.
I would still say, based on my own experience, whether a labour market favours generalists or specialists, largely depends on the stage of country's economy development, amount of services offered, commodities produced, demand and supply structure, FDIs.
I think today it doesn’t really matter if a child knows exactly, who he wants to be professionally. Even more, its better if he doesn’t constrain himself.
Today, what matters is the amount of skills and knowledge he gets, being as diverse and as abundant as possible. Because, today, we don’t know how the labour market and professional environment will look like in 5 years time.
Since my first job, I got many more qualifications, skills and knowledge and counting. I am a specialized generalist and still believe there is much more to learn and my perfect job is the one to come.
Re. European for-profit jobs I would argue empirically two things. 1. The first one is that you are more likely to get a job if you are a specialist as most recruiters hire you if your CV ticks all criteria which often means you must do the same work in the same sector so you "hit the ground running" as performance is only assessed via a short term prism 2. The second is that, once hired you are more likely to overperform in the LONG RUN if you are a generalist. Short term being the path of least resistance, it sadly beats long term any day of the week in the tranchees.