The “T-shaped professional” describes the perfect balance between the generalist and the specialist. This type of worker boasts broad skills within their discipline and deep skills in a specific area. It’s also a great way to assess your current skill set and identify potential gaps in your skill set. Psychology Today details multiple examples of T-shaped skill sets, including technical managers with high emotional intelligence, foreign language majors with skills in writing or accounting, and even T-shaped teams, which bring together people from different disciplines to solve complex problems. The author shares practical steps for mapping out your current skill set:
Identify your core skills. Where do you have a depth of knowledge or expertise? How do you apply your skills and in what settings? What skills/knowledge do you need to develop?
What discipline did you major in or concentrate on in college? How does that discipline apply to the job you’re seeking? Why would a person in that job need or value those skills and knowledge?
What courses did you take that were more interdisciplinary in nature? Where did you learn to apply your knowledge and skills to other fields?
Have you developed your oral and written communication skills? Can you discuss your area of expertise with individuals who don’t know as much about your field? How do you communicate the key elements of knowledge in your field? Have you studied the vocabulary of other fields to learn how your field interacts?
Have you developed your emotional intelligence for succeeding in the workplace?
Is not about doing 3 people jobs!
PAY ATTENTION
Technology has been displacing or evolving skill sets for centuries. (Printing press, anyone?) The invention of the internet ushered in a new era in the news and media space, with digital publishers eclipsing printed publications. Automation and robotics changed jobs in the manufacturing and construction industries — or made them obsolete altogether. The advent of IoT (internet of things) and smart devices shifted the skills required to monitor and maintain everything from water wells in Africa, to oxygen tanks in hospitals, and thermostats in houses.
At the macro level for all knowledge work, the World Economic Forum released their Future of Jobs Report, which includes a section detailing which skills are rising and declining over the next four years.
CLOSE THE GAPS
Once you understand the macro trends in your discipline and the gaps in your individual skill set, it’s time to work on closing those gaps. Continuous learning is the key to any career development plan, but you have to create space for it in your day.
Grab a piece of paper and make three columns: Start, Stop, and Continue. Write 3-5 bullets in each column that represent regular activities in your schedule. This isn’t about setting specific goals at the moment, but understanding what currently takes up your time, and what you want to take up your time in the future. For example, you might have many standing weekly meetings but you don’t find them valuable. Maybe you can use the 6 types of meetings that are actually worthwhile article to determine what should go into the Stop column. Let’s say you want to stay more up-to-date on developments in your field but you don’t have time to read articles. Maybe you add “read more articles” to the Start column.
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