Scott Adams: Knowledge that Matters

http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/knowledge_that_matters/

by cwan • 16 years ago

44 7 16 years ago

the thing you are best at isn't really relevant if there is little demand for that skill. being good at something also doesn't necessarily mean enjoying it. the world's best accountant probably dreams of being a pro baseball player.

it's easy to think like this when you have an awesome job like drawing comics. i've encountered similar sentiments from other people who have awesome jobs.

JoachimSchipper• 16 years ago

I think the world's best accountant would enjoy accounting. I don't see why it would necessarily be more boring than many other jobs, and by and large only people who love their job invest enough time to be the best. (We're not talking "pretty good" here, after all.)

roc• 16 years ago

The world's best accountant probably hasn't seen an actual balance sheet in ages.

He's probably struggling to be an effective manager somewhere.

rodyancy• 16 years ago

What matters:

If you aspire to do something great, you need knowledge of what you are good at, a love for what you are good at, and you need to be good at something many people care about, but few people are good at.

10ren• 16 years ago

The parachute books suggests that a good proxy for the skills you are good at is the skills you enjoy using. The argument is that you usually don't enjoy something for which you have little ability.

But another argument for this is that you only become successful by sticking at something - you know, it's mostly "turning up", overnight success takes a long time.

And there's the Dweck/Gladstone observation that it takes 10,000 hours to become good at something. So if you enjoy it (not necessarily find it pleasurable, but meaningful and worthwhile), you can do that.

I don't know if you can become world-class with 10,000 hours alone, or if you need a special potential. But one thing seems clear to me: if you have some aptitude, and you practice 10,000 hours, you'll be damn good. And if you enjoy it, find it meaningful and worthwhile, it's probably pretty close to maximum fulfillment.

philk• 16 years ago

But imagine if you were born knowing you had the natural aptitude to be the world's best brain surgeon, or guitar player, or graphic designer.

I see several problems with his argument here:

1) Talent is not that important. Geniuses in any field are made, not born, through long hours of focused practice. Granted, some fields (such as sport) have minimum physical standards to be competitive but for the most part it's due to effort.

(Focused practice refers to practice that's actively aimed towards identifying weak points and improving them. If, to take a simple example, you spend several years writing similar "hello world" programs in C you aren't going to get very far.)

More information on this can be had in the work of Anders Ericcson (a leader in the field of expertise research).

A profile can be found here: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/health-science/success-...

2) Even if you accept that there's some sort of talent-based destiny, people are still likely to have characteristics that could make them great in a wide array of fields. For example, if you're strongly analytical you could be a programmer, or a quant, or a research scientist, etc.

3) What if the field you're great in isn't valued by society? You might know that you could be a great artist, but there are great artists who are starving and miserable. On the other hand you could be a mediocre accountant (or whatever) and have fun outside your career while not living hand to mouth.

4) Finally, he seems to suggest that what he had was the aptitude to be a great cartoonist. However, looking at Dilbert, Scott Adam's main strengths seem to be excellent persistence and good salesmanship. These qualities (and I'd say they're far more useful qualities than artistic ability and a brilliant sense of humor) could have carried Scott to success in many other fields. The reason he's a great cartoonist is because it interested him, not because of some innate talent.

Scott Adams: Knowledge that Matters

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