Depth and Breadth

In order to stand out against the noise, it’s important to have both breadth and depth.
It is your specific combination of attributes which sets you apart.

McKinsey has this cool visualization which they call a T-profile. It consists of personal, functional, and industry specific skills.

Standing out is important right now, as generative AI is rapidly gaining on every white collar job out there. Robots will probably come for blue collar ones soon after that.

So humans need to understand where we fit in. It is a question of “how do you add value in ways that no one or nothing else can?” What lasts in a rapidly changing environment like this one?

My chosen area of depth is violence - its properties, its early warning signs, methods of deterrence, its tools, the shape of institutions which practice them. I don’t think conflict is going away anytime soon, no matter how many gains AI, drones, and robots alike make on the human job market.

However, the addition of this radically new tech to the scene adds strange new dimensions to modern conflict. There is a lot of uncertainty here. Without going deep, they may remain uncertain. We need to give clarity to the chaos.

As for breadth - thinking constantly about the many aspects of violence will make you sad and tired. So I’ve found it helpful to balance it out with things that are as far removed from violence as possible. Tanning. Meditating, reading, writing, playing music, going on a hike.

The right breadth and depth combination should net out to sustainable momentum. Something you can really build steam in, never get tired, and then win over and over as a result.

Organizations do this too.

LH

PS First voice hangout on our Discord is tonight at 1700 EST. See you there.