'Just Focus On One Thing'

Alex McCann recently pointed out that Leonardo da Vinci couldn’t decide between being a painter, engineer, anatomist, architect, botanist, mathematician or theatre designer - so he did all of them.

And that today, we’d tell him to focus.

I used to try and stop doing everything, and just do one thing. I was repeatedly slapped in the face with one realisation, until I eventually got the message - I was never going to enjoy work until I did more than one thing. Not only that, I’d be stopping myself doing the one thing I’m good at - doing lots of things, and showing people how they can all fit together and make sense.

We see it more. There’s no traditional career path anymore. The idea of a career path in a few years is going to sound like a quaint idea. Fewer people run side hustles, more people just do more things simultaneously.

In an AI world where a model can code, translate, analyse, write briefs, specialisation is probably going to be a realm for the robot.

AI has an unbelievable ability to go deep on any subject and it can generate infinite depth on command, but it’s not very good at deciding when those connections can matter, which is where generalists can come in.

We have more information at our fingertips than ever, but we are starved of coherence. We don’t know how to make sense of it all. The generalist is going to turn that chaos into clarity. They will bridge domains, make ideas accessible and let everyone else do their job better.

Innovation is going to happen at the seams where AI meets human, where tech meets emotion, where psychology meets design, where health meets environment.

That’s not to say there aren’t benefits to being a specialist; if you think you are one, you’ll be fine.

But the generalist thrives in flux, and now - more than ever - we’re heading into constant change. When AI models, tools and industries shift every six months, the person comfortable with relentless learning across domains will win by default.