THE LEARNING CURVE
WHY BE A JACK OF ALL TRADES
Ruwandi Perera invites readers to become learners of just about everything
We often hear and use the phrase ‘a jack of all trades, master of none’ but tend to skip the rest of the sentence that says: ‘But oftentimes better than a master of one.’ So what does it mean to be a jack of all trades or a master of one in today’s world?
Becoming a specialist in one area would have been a common mission for many of us a few decades ago and may still be for others, for better or for worse.
In school, we were required to pick a stream for our GCE A-Level examinations but this trend is hopefully on the way out. Picking a focus area in your younger days might make you a master at it and probably ensure a dedicated career path right from the beginning. However, it may not be the need of the hour.
On the contrary, it can be a recipe for redundancy if you’re in an area of work that’s no longer needed or will disappear in a few years.
Mastering one subject when it was the order of the day meant having specialisation and expertise in a particular area – be it architecture, investment appraisals, product development, creative writing or anything else – and being sought for it.
It also meant being able to offer a unique service at a price you could command to those who didn’t have other means of obtaining it.
Being a specialist meant acquiring knowledge and proficiency in a focussed area, and pursuing a qualification and certification in it. It meant dedicating your learning endeavours to keep progressing vertically in terms of your subject area since the more you learnt about it, the more specialised you became.
Indeed, mastery was the sweet spot to hit.
Yet, the allure of being a master of one died a painful death with the democratisation of knowledge and spread of inclusive empowerment thanks to the internet and AI. Today, information can be acquired with a simple prompt.
So today, anyone can be an expert in anything he or she likes – at least in terms of work that can be done on a computer. What we should really master is knowing how and where to find what we’re looking for.
We’ve been pushed to replace vertical mastery of one subject with horizontal understanding of many. Being a jack of all trades used to refer to those who didn’t have the focus or discipline to learn one thing and excel in it. But today, it’s what we have been called to be.
Having a working knowledge of multiple things will make you a better addition to any team. You will bring more to any table you sit at and fit in well in any room you enter.
And you will also have better choices in terms of what you want to do. Instead of having all your eggs in one job basket, you can spread them across several functions. Even if one container breaks, you will have others to fall back on.
It’s not necessarily easier to be a jack of all trades compared to being a master of one.
Learning multiple things at the same time requires agility of the brain, flexibility of the mind and malleability of will. It also requires holistic thinking since you are compelled to avoid viewing issues from only one lens.
You may learn computer engineering while also studying interior design or pursuing a psychology programme and completing a degree in financial management. Parallels between your learning areas may not always be apparent while contradictions in perspectives might be a constant. This calls for adaptation.
It will also need a humbler mindset.
You’ll have to accept that although you know a little bit about everything, you don’t know everything about anything. While this can be a scary place to be, it can work in your favour since it’ll propel you to keep learning, to keep updating yourself and to keep wanting to know more.
Being a jack of all trades means that you have to come to terms with the realisation that you’ll never truly master something but have a general knowledge about many things.
