“So what do you actually do?”

A familiar question for those of us who are hard to categorize. The combo left/right brain thinkers. The specialists-turned-generalists. Deep empathy strategists, accidental ethnographers, amateur anthropologists.

Thinking a lot about this lately.

There’s a false narrative in the marketing world that generalists rule the world. One look at job boards tells a different story.

The pandemic cranked up demand for specialists at the expense of generalists. Strategy has taken a back seat to performance and growth marketers.

“What do you actually do?” is a super power, particularly in your 20s when connection and participation in youth culture makes you a valuable (and probably underpaid) commodity.

In times of economic distress, the brilliant and insightful strategist becomes an overpaid liability.

Yes, I’ve read the excellent David Epstein book Range. But IMHO it (commercially) represents a pre-pandemic worldview where the market for experienced and insightful generalists is justified on P&Ls.

It’s dramatically different now. If you’re a generalist, you are feeling this.

A lot of the best senior strategists right now are free agents, freelancing, working on projects to augment specialist teams and organizations.

With a vaccine(s) on the horizon, the big Q is... “should I try and jump back in, or do I see how far I can push this solo thing?”