{"id":3810,"date":"2015-03-17T09:24:00","date_gmt":"2015-03-17T16:24:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/?p=3810"},"modified":"2019-04-28T12:06:26","modified_gmt":"2019-04-28T20:06:26","slug":"what-should-you-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2015\/03\/17\/what-should-you-master\/","title":{"rendered":"Which Skills Should You Master?"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s enough time in life to become mediocre at a lot of things. But there isn\u2019t enough time to get really good at more than a couple. Most people don\u2019t even get really good at one.<\/p>\n

How do you figure out which skills are worth mastering?<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a difficult question, and one I\u2019ve often struggled with. But I\u2019ve found a handy rule of thumb which can help make the decision clearer: which skill, if you were truly exceptional only at that one, would still be enough to have an interesting and successful career?<\/p>\n

Say you wanted to be a writer. There\u2019s plenty of skills that could help you be successful: deep expertise in a subject, perfect grammar or marketing skills. But for writing, there\u2019s only one that could stand alone: writing compelling content. If you can do that well, you\u2019ll have a great career. The others, alone, won\u2019t be enough.<\/p>\n

Or consider being an entrepreneur. Again, there are many skills which could be useful. Understanding finance, networking and recruiting could all qualify. But without deeply understanding what people want, none of that matters.<\/p>\n

What is Your One Skill?<\/h2>\n

Actually, I lied earlier. You could have a very successful career, if your only exceptional skill was great marketing, recruiting or understanding finance. It just might not be the same career as one where you\u2019re focused on creating compelling content or understanding what people want.<\/p>\n

With economic specialization, nearly any useful skill will become the core skill of at least some jobs.<\/p>\n

The difficulty arises because although specialization exists, it\u2019s never perfect. We often have to perform many tasks that aren\u2019t the core skill of our job. Sometimes we\u2019re even misled, believing our core skill is one thing when it\u2019s actually another.<\/p>\n

Blogging is an excellent example. When you get started, it\u2019s easy to believe that the key to success is mastering a bewildering array of technologies, social media hacks and networking gimmicks. But the core skill of any successful blogger is the same as the writer: delivering compelling content.<\/p>\n

If the thing you\u2019re becoming exceptional at isn\u2019t the core skill for your job, you need to either switch jobs or switch skills.<\/p>\n

Hunt for Counterexamples<\/h2>\n

How do you figure out what is the core skill for your career? For that, I\u2019d test it. Look for examples of successful people who all have the same career and test them on various attributes. It\u2019s a core skill if almost every person who is successful is excellent at it. It\u2019s not a core skill if you can find plenty of successful people who are lousy at it.<\/p>\n

If you were investigating blogging, it\u2019s very hard to find successful blogs without compelling content. However there are plenty that have no social media or lousy designs.<\/p>\n

The core skill should be something all or almost all successful people in that role have. Auxiliary skills may be present more often in successful people (especially once they\u2019ve reached a level of success where delegating and outsourcing are possible), but finding counterexamples should be easy.<\/p>\n

Now Focus on that One Skill<\/h2>\n

Whenever I find myself learning something for my career, I ask myself: how is this helping me create more compelling content? If it\u2019s not, I try to find some way to avoid or outsource it. If I can\u2019t, I focus on getting minimal proficiency and then moving on.<\/p>\n

Admittedly, this is easier said than done. I\u2019ve done learning projects, picking up skills quite unrelated to writing that have helped me make more compelling content. So, in a sense, the MIT Challenge<\/a> and the Year Without English<\/a> have helped me improve that one skill. But they also created new distractions, so I\u2019m less confident that they would have been better than, say, focusing exclusively on writing for a year instead.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s your one skill? What one skill do all successful people in your career share? What are the distraction skills that feel important but aren\u2019t decisive? Special thanks to Cal Newport<\/a> for inspiring this post.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s enough time in life to become mediocre at a lot of things. But there isn\u2019t enough time to get really good at more than a couple. Most people don\u2019t even get really good at one. How do you figure out which skills are worth mastering? It\u2019s a difficult question, and one I\u2019ve often struggled […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[683],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3810","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-nc-career","7":"entry"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nWhich Skills Should You Master? - Scott H Young<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It\u2019s a difficult to decide on skills you want to master, especially when there are thousands to choose from. 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