The Expert Generalist

Episode notes

The Expert Generalist: AI’s Most Valuable (and Long-Overlooked) Player Field Notes by Brand Shepherd Every major technology shift creates new roles. Think back through the last few decades: the desktop computer, the internet, mobile, and social media. Each one reshuffled the deck. Some existing roles evolved. Entirely new ones appeared out of nowhere. AI is doing the same thing right now. And we’re still in the very early stages of it. But here’s what I find strange: I haven’t heard anyone put a name to the new type of person that this era is calling forward. So I’m going to do that. Why not me? The role is the Expert Generalist. What Is an Expert Generalist? An expert generalist is someone with working knowledge and above-average depth across a wide variety of topics. Not a specialist. Not someone who went deep on one thing and stopped there. You might actually know expert generalists as specialists, because they’ve typically chosen to lean into one area of expertise in order to get leverage in their career. But alongside that, they’ve got side hustles, hobbies, and interests that quietly demonstrate mastery in a whole range of other fields.

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