Jack of All Trades or Master of One | How do you grow yourself and your team with the organization?

You’ve likely heard the often misquoted and unflattering cliche:

“A jack of all trades is a master of none...”

But there’s an additional clause:

“…but oftentimes better than a master of one.”

Every quarter, we brainstorm a hashtag that emphasizes one different core value that we want the team to emulate.

Given where we are part of a fast growing startup, we’ve had different tactical and personal focuses, including #safespace (to have a fearless voice to ask questions and challenge ideas) and #OneTeam (to encourage cross-functional collaboration).

This past quarter, we landed on #indispensability, which has a couple different connotations and interpretations:

• How can I add unique value to the (ever-growing) organization?
• How do I develop my skill sets to find my niche?
• How do we grow talent along with our business?

As an organization, we’ve been shifting our culture to be employee-first. We hypothesized that the concept of indispensability can balance both personal goals and company strategy for a common target.

At a personal level, I remember when I first kick started my career almost a decade ago. The big box retailer that employed me was going through a digital transformation, and graciously offered me an internship in product management. They had just introduced the product organization and agile teams, consisting of product managers, UX designers, and engineers.

Product was a relatively new (but hot) field back then in the industry. I remember being on a college panel at work with 30 visiting students. I asked how many of them wanted to be a product manager, and the vast majority of them raised their hands.

Today, Zippia (a career platform) reports that there are over 40,000 product managers in the United States alone. Even when I open my LinkedIn, my connection recommendations list product managers from every corner of the world.

It begs the question of how I can continue sharpening my product skills and stand out amongst the global pool of product managers.

There are all sorts of product managers. Many come from engineering or business analyst backgrounds. Others are niche subject matter experts within their fields — whether that is education, finance, advertising, or retail technology.

What was my unique value proposition? Was that the direction I wanted to drive my career? What did I want to do long-term? (If you’ve read my blog, you’re familiar with these existential crises and questions.)

I remember sharing these questions with one of my earlier managers. I marveled with him about my product role models. I told him about Colin, my mentor within the organization who had impeccable documentation and oral skills. He could have you questioning the user journey and KPIs that you thought were so obvious to the product.

But I remember my manager’s response which has stuck with me to this day, “I don’t want you to be the best product manager Colin can be. I want you to be the best product manager that Raakin can be.”

Of course, that only sent me down my existential spiral even further. It was much easier to analyze Colin’s product skills from the outside than introspect my own. But here we are anyway. What was the best product manager I could be?

Dare I ask, how do I make myself indispensable?

There’s a term in statistics known as the “interaction effect”. The textbook definition by Paul Lavrakas is “the simultaneous effect of two or more independent variables on at least one dependent variable in which their joint effect is significantly greater (or significantly less) than the sum of the parts.”

Here are some examples that can help exemplify this concept:

• An amazing marathon runner won’t just run to get better. He’ll also swim or pair it with weight lifting to improve stamina.
• A technologist can couple engineering chops with communication skills to grow his leadership abilities.
• A product manager will build subject matter expertise within their domain while also developing project management skills to lead a team.

In simpler terms, the interaction between the two or more skill sets create a unique (and therefore, greater) value-add than focusing on a single one.

So, how does someone become indispensable?

Well, for me, I learned that it’s not just about growing my product management skills by themselves. Rather, it’s about taking a blend of all my interests and experiences. Long gone are the days of traditional career paths of doubling down on one skill set.

In my own career, I’ve observed the unique value that was brought to the table by a technology director that used to be a musician on a cruise ship or a barista that eventually transitioned to UX design.

When I was interviewing for my current role at a cryptocurrency startup, I pitched to them why I would be a unique candidate. I spent my product career selling groceries, department store clothing, and artwork online. I can bring the simplicity of traditional retail to the “complex and intimidating” crypto space — building out a user journey that makes it as simple for users to buy Bitcoin as it would be to buy a banana from their grocery delivery app — a user experience that became increasingly familiar during COVID.

Indispensability is derived from the interaction of different and independent skill sets. These don’t need to be strategized. Better yet, I’d argue that it’s the unlikely pairings that would yield the most unique value. In the process, you might even land on a new niche (and passion).

In a nutshell, I’d say indispensability comes from two foundational pillars. The first is the ability to bring your entire authentic self to the table (authenticity). Second, it is unleashing your natural curiosity into different areas that will allow you to discover uncharted territories and intersections that you didn’t know existed (curiosity).