Why T-shaped people? (2018)
jchyip.medium.com
Why T-shaped people? (2018)
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Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#2Everybody agrees high quality talent is great. Sick of articles lauding the obvious.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#3My first boss talked about "F shaped" people and encouraged me to try and develop in that way. I later discovered he was paraphrasing and extending this "T shaped" idea.
This was originally described by Tim Brown of IDEO [0] fame, but as the OP explains has been extended and adapted since.
I think it's a really good thing to consider earlier in your carrier, helping to enable you to be a better, rounder and more valuable contributor.
In many ways HN has helped me to develop as a "F" shaped person, the breadth of content on here is invaluable for developing a wide area of knowledge. But also the depth of insight available can pull you in and take you on a development journey where you become an expert in an area.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#4I expected this to be about 3D modeling and default pose.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#5I’m more like an H shaped human.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#6Everybody agrees high quality talent is great. Sick of articles lauding the obvious.
A thing have changed starting from few years ago: while before people prize specialization as the best route for anyone now some start prizing generic vast knowledge.
This shift is so far limited but important, it means some have realized too many have lost the big picture and we need it to keep anything working well...
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#7Everybody agrees high quality talent is great. Sick of articles lauding the obvious.
The elephant in the room for almost every management-type article you ever read is that they're all correct: you just don't have the space in your head or the minutes in your day to implement five hundred different good ways of doing things.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#8Everybody agrees high quality talent is great. Sick of articles lauding the obvious.
A thing have changed starting from few years ago: while before people prize specialization as the best route for anyone now some start prizing generic vast knowledge. This shift is so far limited but important, it means some have realized too many have lost the big picture and we need it to keep anything working well...
Any reasonably large organisation probably needs both types of person. There’ll be the deep problems that require a true specialist to deal with (Netflix blogs about optimising network transfer spring to mind here), and people with broad experience who can bring that to bear on new problems, put together prototypes, and understand which specialisms to involve as it develops.
There’s huge value in understanding the entire stack in the early stages of development so you’re not having to rope in five different departments just to get something live, but you also need to know when you’re out of your depth and it’s time to call in the people who do nothing but deal with a small subset every day.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#9Everybody agrees high quality talent is great. Sick of articles lauding the obvious.
The elephant in the room for almost every management-type article you ever read is that they're all correct: you just don't have the space in your head or the minutes in your day to implement five hundred different good ways of doing things.
IMO, It's less about time and more about will or political power from middle management to implement a change. Inertia is a terribly oppressive force.
Re: Why T-shaped people? (2018)
#10Maybe I didn't understand the article correctly, but are there any people, especially on HN, that identify as specialists? By that I mean, they only know one skill, and that's it, they don't consider themselves T shaped.