Of late I’ve had too many conversations about growth, what will we do with a plethora of entry-level skills? Parade them like empty medals on a wall of participation? Great job you focused on growth, do you really understand what you learned? Maybe it’s time we focus on honing instead.
You have a choice, you can read this article as I originally wrote it - or you can scroll down and read the ChatGPT version of the same thing, I am verbose, ChatGPT has proven this many times, the choice is yours.
Origonal Article:
“I’m focusing on growing my skill set”, I had this conversation twice in the last week, perhaps three times. That was enough to put fingers to keys so to speak. In my line of work, as with many, you never stop learning and gaining skills – in many cases just enough to solve a problem. But now I’m wondering if we spend enough time honing our skills.
When I need or want to learn something I admittedly rarely assess if it is for necessity or a long-term skill. A straightforward question to start with is “Am I learning for growth or honing?”, ”is it an aligned skill or something outside of my daily activity?” - making shoes for example, If your work is primarily business analysis is an outside skill. These simple questions start to create a grid of skills acquisition questions that can help focus your attention and investment and not just on what is good for your career, I am way more proficient at some DYI skills than I am at my job, it is good to know things and its good to have skills.
What is Honing? The difference between growing skills and honing is that one adds to your growing list of “things you think you can do” and the other ensures you can actually do them. Honing is a term most often used when working with sharp-edge objects, knives, scissors, cavalry swords etc. The idea is that you hone the edge, the more you hone the sharper it gets. I don’t need twenty knives to cook a meal, I do need one good one with a good edge and a good understanding of how to use it, yes there is more to using a knife than just cutting. By the way, did you know you rarely cut yourself with a sharp knife? Yes, it’s strange, most people cut themselves with blunt knives because they lose their healthy fear of a sharp edge. If you know it’s sharp you are way more careful. Sidetrack sorry, but important, the more a skill is honed the better you understand its application and the more you understand about the risk of applying or not applying this new skill.
I wrote an article a long time ago about learning stuff from films, “Is the juice worth the squeeze” is one of them. It’s a fun article, but it does express a specific driver. Is the investment I am about to make going to yield dividends that are worth it. Not every skill is learned to help your career, heck I know a lot of stuff that serve no purpose other than to bring me joy. I can play a bit of guitar, less well than I would like but enough to annoy my family, I know my way around a forge and anvil, I can do basic upholstery and sewing, I know my way around jeweller tools and I quite like defacing old currency to turn them into pendants. None of these skills are aligned with my income-generating skill set, but they bring me joy so I have invested time in some of them to become quite good.
For example, in upholstery, it takes an active effort to research the skills required to pleat fabric, double back stitch joins and apply the correct amount of tension to the fabric to reupholster a bench. This is the difference between growing and honing. At some point I couldn’t do any upholstery, then I understood the tools and how they work - I messed up my first dining room set, but now I can confidently say I am honing the skill to the point where disgust has turned into compliments - achievement unlocked people will sit on my chairs now.
Learning and honing skills just to have them is fine, nothing wrong with that, but time is limited and if you are growing skills for your career some careful consideration should be made to acquiring or deepening a skill. The example of never cutting yourself with a sharp knife comes into play. When you grow and hone skills for your lively hood it is pretty damn important to understand not only the awesomeness of the skills but also the risk, dangers and traps. I far too often see people learning new skills just enough to solve a problem or more often bolster a resume but when the rubber hits the road those skills are found to be, well, flat. You are then far more likely to be put in a difficult position where you have to hone skills on the fly and that is not a conducive learning environment - stress is a brain killer. This becomes more important the weirder or more sophisticated your work becomes because, in my experience, weird work isolates you and then it’s just you and your command over your skills.
I have always found it interesting that most people with a narrower band of skills tend to have a far better command over those skills, some people just don’t know a lot, but in effect, the rest have chosen to limit the brethd of skills but deepen their command over those skills they treasure, they honed a smaller set of skills into very sharp tools indeed. The question of specialisation now also comes into play, in the industry I’m in the world changes on an hourly basis, yes it’s not quite that fast but compared to other spaces Information Technology is astounding. Can you really afford to still be a specialist?
The Specialist, Honing vs growing - you are basically always growing, Let’s not try to think that we aren’t but there is a choice to make will I grow wide or will I grow tall, it is exceptionally rare to see both in the same space. Growing tall is looking into specialisation, having a smaller toolbox but having great command over those tools, their capabilities and their application. Growing wide is not bad, it’s just very different, you have a far larger toolkit, you can use the same tool for different jobs with varying success, you tend to have your favourite tools on hand and some dusty ones in the back, but you are capable, all be it with some support. Wide toolboxes can work in more places, and narrow toolboxes work in fewer places, but they pay better. The danger with specialization is that you specialise yourself out of the market or become trapped in a specific area of expertise. I have personally always gone for the wide toolbox myself. but I think I’ve reached a point where I have enough tools and I need to sharpen some of them up way more than they are now.
It’s always good to think things through I do it by writing or talking, and now towards the end of the article I’m confused but relieved, I know a lot of stuff and some of those tools are honed to perfection (in my opinion). I got the advice many years ago, ” Choose something and be the best you can be at it” but I think that advice needs to change a bit “Choose something and be the best you can be at it, then choose something else and do the same”. Growing and Honing are not divergent concepts they are indeed extensions of the same, you must grow before you can hone, the amount of honing applied varies from task to task, and you can choose to “find something and be the best at it” but you don’t have to, what you should do is at least hone the skills you have to make them safe to use.
Please remember, that learning, growing and honing is a team sport, if you are done being a player, see if you can be a coach.
The ChatGPT Version of the same - I asked for it to be rewritten succinctly – it did
In recent conversations about growth, the focus on accumulating entry-level skills prompts reflection on their meaningful application. Rather than showcasing these skills as mere badges of participation, a shift towards honing them for practical proficiency seems essential.
The frequent declaration of “I’m focusing on growing my skill set” raises questions about the purpose and longevity of acquired skills. It’s common in various professions to continually acquire skills to address immediate challenges. However, distinguishing between learning for growth and honing for mastery becomes crucial.
Asking whether a skill aligns with daily activities or serves a long-term purpose provides a foundation for effective skill acquisition. For instance, if business analysis is the primary focus, delving into unrelated skills like shoemaking may be reconsidered.
Honing, unlike growth, ensures practical application and mastery of skills. Analogous to sharpening a knife’s edge, the more a skill is honed, the better it is understood and applied. This concept extends beyond accumulating skills for career advancement; personal satisfaction and joy can also be valid motivations for skill development.
The analogy of never cutting oneself with a sharp knife underscores the importance of understanding the risks and benefits of honing skills. Superficially acquired skills may prove insufficient in challenging situations, emphasizing the need for a thoughtful approach to skill development.
Specialization introduces the dilemma of growing wide versus growing tall. While growing wide entails a broad toolkit with diverse applications, growing tall involves specialization and deep mastery of a narrower skill set. Striking a balance between the two is crucial, considering the ever-changing landscape of certain industries like Information Technology.
The advice to choose something and excel at it is complemented by a nuanced perspective – choose something, excel, and then diversify your expertise. Growth and honing are not mutually exclusive but rather sequential stages in skill development. Learning, growing, and honing are emphasized as collaborative endeavours, with the suggestion to transition into coaching once an individual’s playing phase concludes.
Mind, on the rocks?! 