CEO's & HR Folk, would you hire a generalist?
When someone asks me what I do, I squirm a little. It's because I can't give a succinct answer. I never quite know how to say I'm a generalist, and the world is so used to everyone being in a tidy box.
But, I think my skillset brings alot to a company, especially to startups. I also think that generalists are going to be more and more in demand as remote work rises and we care less about titles and more about output. But there's nowhere for companies to hire people specifically like me.
But before I go any further..
Would you hire a generalist? Do you see the value in an all-rounder? Someone who wears lots of hats and can work across multiple different roles and teams.
I have the demand-side covered. I know a bunch of talented all-rounders, some of who are actively looking for work and keep getting pigeonholed into traditional roles. But I need to validate the supply-side. Are companies keen?
Is the world ready for the rise of generalists??
PS: For the record, my official title is 'Director of Misc'. 🤓
I love the title "Director of Misc".
I run a small incubator in the middle of Maine that helps founders go from idea to their first paying customers, and I'm a big fan of generalists.
One mistake that I see rather often is when founders are interested in assembling a large team of people with specialized skills. What they usually fail to understand is 1. managing takes a ton of time and 2. unless the business is growing exceptionally quickly, teammates don't have enough to do (within their "specialty").
Nearly all of the businesses I work with are bootstrapped, and resources are always constrained. Generalists have been essential to the growth of the best-performing businesses. Early-stage businesses need to get things done, and generalists are ideal because they can simply "grab the next task" without worrying if it fits into their job description.
I couldn't agree more that generalists will continue to flourish, particularly with the continued growth of remote work. In early-stage businesses, output matters far more than roles and responsibilities.
What a brilliant summary! (Your incubator sounds awesome btw).
I'm tinkering with the idea of a launching niche job matching solution specifically for generalists. But it's a tricky thing to validate when no job postings really exist!
It's almost like creating a job which nobody's heard of, doesn't have a traditional title, but is HUGELY valuable... Not an easy sell 😅
Although, I think partnering with early-stage start-ups who "get it" is an interesting option!
Thank you, Milly! It's called Tortoise Labs if you're interested in giving it a gander.
Instead of building a job board (because you make a great point that these postings might not even exist en-masse), I'm wondering if you might be able to find a single business that's hiring for a "generalist". Then your job might become to find the best possible generalist (or group of them) in order to suffice the needs of the company and your candidate. That'd certainly validate your thesis.
Perhaps you could start with recently funded startups (who are flush with cash and are likely to use that cash to hire folks)? And perhaps you could narrow that down even further to recently funded early-stage startups?
Not sure if it's helpful or not, but I use GrowthList to find startup leads, and it has proven to be super valuable.
Wdyt?