My approach is to understand the topic one level deeper than is needed to satisfy my immediate needs. It’s not always enough but it usually exposes any obvious traps you’d run into with only a surface level understanding, or at least lets you know if the thing really is too complex to not understand deeply and still succeed.
Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
51–60 of 91 posts
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#52TBH it's very difficult to gauge when to stop pursuing something. Personally, I learn something up until it stops becoming useful and/or it starts becoming more of a burden on my mental overhead. Doesn't mean I'm never going to go back to it, it just means I accomplished what I needed to do with the minimum amount of knowledge. From there on out it is entirely dependent on how much the topic interested me. Most of the time I'll end up going back to a topic anyways since making things isn't just about designing and creating the thing, it's also maintaining it. At that point it's more about whether or not you can pursue a project due to it's knowledge requirements, but I believe that falls out of the bounds of your question.
This is my rule of thumb:
Learn what you need to know first for your task at hand. If your curiosity can't be contained, make a mental note. If that mental note doesn't go anywhere and you keep dwelling on the thought of it, pursue it until your curiosity is satisfied. If done successfully, repeat.
You COULD write it down, but if you're anything like me you'll just end up with a desk filled to the brim with post it notes and never actually going back to 90% of those topics. Which kills a lot of trees. If you're into that sorta thing, don't let me stop you. Making a mental note is much better since if the topic is of interest to you, then you will not forget about it. Therefore, you'll let your curiosity build up until you cannot contain yourself and have to learn more about the topic.
NOTE: Being a generalist usually comes because of a deep sense of curiosity in a wide range of topics. Take your time and enjoy the process of learning things since that will guarantee the longevity of your curiosity without burnout.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#53My approach is to understand the topic one level deeper than is needed to satisfy my immediate needs. It’s not always enough but it usually exposes any obvious traps you’d run into with only a surface level understanding, or at least lets you know if the thing really is too complex to not understand deeply and still succeed.
"one level deeper" is a great way to look at it!
You aren't really a generalist if all you do is solve the problem without understanding anything, and this approach will usually bite you or your replacement down the line. Just consider solving "I need a message queue", "I need to add Elasticsearch", or gods forbid, "We need a frontend JS framework". I've been at companies where this has happened, and it's a dumpster fire weeks afterward.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#54I don't understand the question. One does not simply decide to stop falling down the rabbit hole, you keep going until it stops or you get taken down a different path. Never in my life have I made an active decision to stop learning about any one thing. You learn whatever skill is required to deal with the problem at hand and go on keep learning until you need a new skill or just get distracted. But also you're makin…
Grounding with a real scenario: You're doing your taxes. At what point do you hand off to a tax expert? OP's asking a tough question. At some point, it's impractical to try to be great at everything.
I hand off to a tax expert when things are too complicated for a 1040EZ. Basically I hand off to an expert when the problem grows beyond my capabilities, same as any other kind of problem.
I'm not saying be great at everything, that's literally not possible. What I'm saying is that specialization is not antithetical to generalization. A good generalist should have areas of expertise because we can't cover everything. You don't need to be a world class expert, but you do need to find a niche for yourself and IMO the best way to do that is to simply follow what you find interesting.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I stop when I find a solution to the problem That. I’ve embraced that I cannot direct which topic my self-directed learning will take up and sustain (almost none of which ends up going toward tech stuff, aside from a span of some years in my teens and early 20s—and all of that was motivated by wanting to accomplish specific things with computers) and rely on assignments to motivate me for career-relevant learning.…
So what happens when you can't find a solution to your problem and hit the edges of current research even specialists cannot buckle?
I say, "you're going to need to pay a team of PhDs to work on this to maybe get a solution, eventually, or change your approach. Here's why: [evidence]"
I've never worked with or for anyone who wanted to hire the team of PhDs.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Grounding with a real scenario: You're doing your taxes. At what point do you hand off to a tax expert? OP's asking a tough question. At some point, it's impractical to try to be great at everything.
I hand off to a tax expert when things are too complicated for a 1040EZ. Basically I hand off to an expert when the problem grows beyond my capabilities, same as any other kind of problem. I'm not saying be great at everything, that's literally not possible. What I'm saying is that specialization is not antithetical to generalization. A good generalist should have areas of expertise because we can't cover everything…
> "too complicated...beyond my capabilities"
To OP's question, how did you decide that going further down the tax education wasn't for you? Was it really capabilities?
I propose that what you're really saying is that you're
a. not as intellectually curious about tax matters
b. or not concerned about the opportunity cost of your delegate being wrong
which makes it an easier choice to delegate.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#57When I run into someone in the hall at Defcon and they assume that what we're discussing is my day job.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#58IMHO knowing when to accept defeat in a professional setting is one of the most important skills a generalist can learn. As with everything in tech the answer is "it depends" :)
When possible I'll ask to be either continue to be involved or kept in the loop until a solution is found.
By reaching these boundaries at work it provides me avenues of exploration in personal time to understand where my knowledge gaps are - and quite often find new interesting subjects along the journey.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#59I don't understand the question. One does not simply decide to stop falling down the rabbit hole, you keep going until it stops or you get taken down a different path. Never in my life have I made an active decision to stop learning about any one thing. You learn whatever skill is required to deal with the problem at hand and go on keep learning until you need a new skill or just get distracted. But also you're makin…
Grounding with a real scenario: You're doing your taxes. At what point do you hand off to a tax expert? OP's asking a tough question. At some point, it's impractical to try to be great at everything.
I never hand my taxes off to a tax expert.
If I run into a problem where I can't interpret the tax code myself, I'll schedule an hour appointment with a tax expert to get the answer to that specific question. If their answer sounds too good to be true, I'll schedule some appointments with other experts and take the most pessimistic answer. Ultimately, it's my responsibility that my taxes are correct, so I need to understand how they work.
I switched off of using tax software and do my taxes by hand, including rental income and stock sales. I'd estimate my tax return is 20-30 pages at this point.
If I ran my own company, I'd hand my taxes off to a tax expert at the point where filling out all of the forms represented such a significant investment in time that it detracted from my ability to run the company, but they would have to be significantly more complicated than anything the average person encounters. I would also hand them off to a separate firm if they reached the point where I needed credentials for the tax return to be valid - such as to assess the value of inventory.
It really doesn't take that much effort to learn how to do your own taxes, and the VITA program provides good free training in exchange for volunteering, which provides essential practice time anyway.
Re: Ask HN: Generalists, when do you say "I know enough" about any particular topic?
#60I know that "I know enough" when my predictions are accurate enough.