Skill Up and Skill Wide
To All My Millennial Brethren
Note: Though I had been thinking about writing something like this for sometime, I was finally spurred on by this fantastic piece by Jeff Giesea. Give it a read, especially if you’re a millennial - he might be describing you!
Today, this rainy, dreary Saturday in Dunedin, New Zealand, I woke up with the plan of finishing my ‘Intentional Art Consumer’ article, which I’ll publish next week.
I got not one but two flat whites from my local café, opened Substack … and then a flurry of typing sounds later, I instead had written the following in a Note - realising, that, while short - I valued its message enough to send it out to all you lovely subscribers.
My entire life project, in a practical sense, is organised around the following strategy: To become skilled at many things so the turbulence of my environment - from future economic depressions, to heavy-handed censorship and cancellation on ideological grounds, to AI replicating my career - affects me less. I want to stay as resilient as possible to the increasing volatility around me, so whatever the outcome, I can still provide for my future family.
I am trying to Skill Up and Skill Wide.
Mastering one thing - Will it lead you to the desert?
Photo by Yusuf Onuk on Unsplash
As a millennial growing up, we were told, “Hey young chap, the key to success is to master one thing - become the best at that, and no matter the politics, you’ll earn a healthy salary to support your family. This jack of all trades thing? Yeah, that’s folly young chap - you’ll just fail at multiple things.”
The boomer parents had good intentions. They wanted us young chap and chapess millennials to succeed - they loved us. But this ‘master one thing’ philosophy was fostered in an era of great stability; of great wealth and productivity. Careers were clear; they took one to a predetermined location - just like a train on a railway track on a sunny day.
Today, the picture is much different. The career railway is only built a mile or so ahead, and it leads into darkness. In this world, of chaos and instability and reduced upward mobility - the ‘master of one thing’ is playing a risky game. Will the train he’s chosen lead him to his desired location? To provide enough wealth for his family? Or will the railway lead to a rocky, barren field; a desert?
For all those millennials and younger generations out there, I suggest a different strategy. In times of volatility, like today, the man who can do everything well, has a much better chance of survival than the man who is a master at one thing. Even if it is to learn far and wide in your teenage years and twenties, and then focus your ability later, one should be wary of going all in on one thing.
That’s why I am here on Substack, while I’m studying an intensive PhD in Clinical and Social Psychology; that’s why I produce electronic music, while being an experienced and certified ski instructor; that’s why I save money to invest, while regularly coming up with new entrepreneurial plans. I have laid down several carriages, on several tracks, maximising my chances of success.
Perhaps all of them will lead to the same barren desert, but I know the man who has one carriage on one track, is far more likely to end up in that desert.
The wisdom of ‘master one thing’ was formulated and devised in a different time, with different politics, different economies, and different societies. It may have been wise then - and in many regards it is still wise today - but with AI and robotics, Universal Basic Income, economic monopolization by the tech-companies, inflation, rising house prices, and the increasing stratification of society, the careers of today are quickly becoming the careers of yesteryear; relegated to an interesting factoid in a digital history textbook.
Skill Up and Skill Wide my millennial brethren - our families may depend on it.
Thank you all for reading.
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Chur, and have a good day and night,
The Delinquent Academic
I go back and forward on whether this is the right strategy. Sometimes I think you're right. I even shared your perspective with someone on a train in Europe in one of my "It's about the process, but even if it is also about the ends, it's about what you're trying to achieve and your internal metrics of success" moments.
But then I think, well what if you really do have a major talent for something. What if you could be 'that guy', but you never quite get there because you're dividing your zero sum eggs into too many different baskets. And because given the scope of humanity, talent in any area is actually relatively common. 'Hardwork beats talent when talent isn't working' as the adage goes.
But you would never know what heights you could truly be capable of if you didn't keep a focus.
My question is; how to skill up into the trades when boomers seem completely hostile towards the idea of hiring anyone new. I know of a few in the local area who will not teach youngsters outside their own sons.
I am asking as I really do want to learn a trade, but it's so far been barred.