What if Roger Federer, Tiger Woods, a Raccoon and a Koala were UXers?
By: Arup Roy
Tags: Design, Careers, User Experience, UX, Career Change

Introduction — Specialists vs Generalists — I had passed my Masters in Industrial Design from a premier institute in India and had been working in the automotive industry as a User Experience Designer/ Industrial Designer for about 3 years in the best automotive companies in India. In spite of all of the quality industry experience, I had an unanswered career related question in my mind. I had a feeling that that if I asked the question to a senior at work, I might get a biased answer due to a conflict of interest and if I asked it to some senior from university who had just a few more years of experience than me, then, I might get a relatively uninformed answer, for how could someone who has not travelled far enough herself/ himself show the the way to others. So, I thought of taking that question back to my professor from university, my mentor and also one of the stalwarts of Industrial Design in India. The question — “ Should I be a generalist or a specialist?”, and the prompt but well thought of and confident answer — “ be a specialist first and then a generalist”.

It is quite common for any professional, in any field of work to face this dilemma. These days, while participating in discussions on various User Experience R&D forums and 2D and 3D Physical and Digital Design forums, I often find people asking questions of a similar nature — should I learn Figma or should I learn Sketch or should I learn Adobe XD?; should I restrict myself to just being a UX Researcher or should I be both a UX Researcher and a UX Designer?; should I just be a UX R&D professional or should I be a Product Manager?; should I just be a Product Designer or should I spread my wings and attempt to be that cool rare species called the UX-Unicorn who can do it all from research to design to development? These are all very valid questions. Applying the wisdom from the previous paragraph, we can easily deduce that the logical way to proceed would be — Be a Specialist in one particular software in one particular field and in one particular industry. Do not stagnate and keep pushing your boundaries in to being a Specialist in the next software while keeping the field and industry constant, then try to be a Specialist in the next field while keeping the industry constant and then jump to be an expert in another industry and so on. Don’t bite more than you can chew but keep progressing, keep taking that one step at a time forwards.

Generalist = Specialist1 + Specialist2 + Specialist3 …. and so on.

Way to becoming a Generalist

Lessons to learn from the Animal kingdom —

Lessons from Nature: Raccoon (generalist) vs Koala (specialist)

According to the National Geographic Channel — In the field of ecology, classifying a species as a generalist or a specialist is a way to identify what kinds of food and habitat resources it relies on to survive. Generalists can eat a variety of foods and thrive in a range of habitats. Specialists, on the other hand, have a limited diet and stricter habitat requirements. Raccoons are an example of a generalist species. They can live in a wide variety of environments, including forests, mountains, and large cities, which they do throughout North America. Raccoons are omnivores and can feast on everything from fruit and nuts to insects, frogs, eggs, and human trash. The Koala on the other hand is a super specialist. Native to Australia, Koalas are herbivorous marsupials that feed only on the leaves of the eucalyptus tree. Therefore, their range is restricted to habitats that support eucalyptus trees. Within this diet, some koalas specialize even further and eat leaves from only one or two specific trees. But what does specialization or generalization of the Racoons and the Koalas have to do with us humans? And here is the gem. It has been observed by the ecologists that the effects of climate change or habitat loss are far greater in animals that are specialists like the Koala, as compared to that on generalists like the Raccoon. This ranks the generalists much higher in the survival of the fittest scale compared to the specialists. I am not over here saying that there is no scope for professionals in UX who specialize either in research or in design or in coding. There are thousands who have specialized and lead a very rich and fulfilling career. What, I am saying is that, being a generalist increases your chances of doing well in this very uncertain and volatile job market which can be effected now by a virus, some other time by stricter border controls and yet another time by AI! Who knows? So better be safe than sorry.

Lessons from the World of Sports —

Lessons from the world of sports — Roger vs Tiger

A few weeks back, I read a book called — Range by David Epstein ( also the author of the best seller — The Sports Gene). Unlike, popular advise that urges us to specialize deeper and earlier in life, this wonderful book has a different take on life and the way we can shape a safe, secure and flourishing career. It advocates the case how Generalists can Triumph in a Specialized World. The most striking example that I found in the book is a comparison between two of the topmost athletes of recent times, legends of comparable stature, Roger Federer and Tiger Woods. While Tiger is the child prodigy, the guy who gets in to golf at ten months of age accompanying his dad to the golf course and by age two wins an under ten golf tournament, Roger is pretty diversified till a much older age. While Tiger would play nothing but golf, Roger would be playing anything that involved a ball as a little kid, focusing specifically on tennis much later. However, as we all know, later in life both of these wonderful athletes reached the top of their respective sports. So how did this happen? The point that writer is trying to emphasize here is that more skills are transferable than we we think. A good percentage of ace athletes, according to research, go through, what is called a sampling period. In this time, they hone their skills playing different games, the learnings of which they transfer later in life to their chosen game of specialization. This is a very happy news, particularly for career switchers. The skills that you have developed as a journalist or a blogger can be easily transferred in to a UX-content writer’s job, the skills you have as a sales person can be transferred to a researcher, the skills you develop as a logo designer can be transferred to being a UI designer and the skills you have as a 3D digital sculptor in the automotive industry handling top end 3D CAD softwares can easily be transferred into working on 2D softwares like Figma, XD and so on. The research based design skills which some one from any design background learns — be it fashion design, shoe design, furniture design, accessory design or industrial design can easily be upgraded to the more well articulated UX-Research method using Empathy maps, Personas and Journey Maps. If you have been working on physical products there is nothing stopping you from transferring the skills to digital products. This can been further backed up by Indiana University’s Professor Douglas Hofstadter’s contributions in to the study of Analogy as the Core of Cognition, where in he stresses the point that “Analogy making = the perception of common essence between 2 things”.

Finally let us focus on the “T” between Roger and Tiger. The “T” signifies an employee or a professional who has has a “T” shaped knowledge. While Tiger’s skill can be equated to the vertical line of the letter T, Roger derives his skills from a wide range of experiences. According to the Harvard Business review, there is going to be a growing need in future for employees who have both — Depth of knowledge in their field of expertise as well as a Range of knowledge of various other related and not so directly related fields. Any innovation book you pick up will tell you that innovation happens at the intersection of various fields coming together. A “T” shaped employee is much more likely to be innovative than an “I” shaped employee.

Conclusion: Let me end this blog by saying that, while my professor’s wisdom teaches us how to be a generalist, picking up examples from the animal-world and from the sports-world helps us understand why one needs to be a generalist. In a race where only the fittest survive, the generalist certainly has a clear edge over the specialist. However, may I stress the point that Generalist here is not expected to be the typical Jack of All Trades; rather he is expected to be a King of All Trades… and he achieves than by being a King at one thing at a time … step by step by step …..