How to Master Multiple Skills - Talent Stacking
a video made with AI
Consider my second YouTube channel The Polymath as my sink for all my interests unrelated to cybersecurity, for which I have my main YouTube channel. Recently, on The Polymath I began experimenting with AI creation, as in I outsourced part of the video creation to AI. How you may ask?
I created the script in collaboration with GPT3. So the script is in part written by myself, and in part by GPT3
I used murf.ai to voiceover the script (so I’m not using my voice)
I used pictory.ai to find and piece together footage relevant to my script. I abandoned this service after the first video because I was unsatisfied.
I edited the final video myself.
I’ll maybe explain more in a future post that I’ll dedicate entirely to creating with AI.
For now, let’s actually look at one of the creations. Talent stacking.
Talent stacking is a concept by Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, that suggests that people are more successful if they develop multiple talents, rather than becoming experts in one particular area.
How is this possible? It's already hard to become very good at one thing and be considered a specialist, let alone become an expert in multiple areas. It might take years or even decades to develop expertise in a single skill. So, what is actually the catch on this idea by Adams?
Let's turn against conventional thinking for a moment, change the perspective or the frame of mind if I may, and see how this might be possible.
First, let's scratch off "talent" from talent stacking and replace it with "skill". So, we have skill stacking instead of talent stacking. This is not very far off, because we can think of talent as an ability someone develops with deliberate practice.
In order to stack skills you need to develop the first skill. Obviously, right?
Once you have that first skill, you intelligently build or pile other skills on top of it.
But how do you actually develop a solid skill to start off? This is where things get quite interesting. You will need a systematic approach.
The first step is to find reliable resources to learn from. This might take the form of books, courses, teachers and mentors, or a combination thereof. It is essential that you find resources you can trust, so you can be confident in the information you are learning.
Next, you need to have a plan. A solid plan. This plan will help you to focus your learning, and to track your progress. It is important to set realistic goals so that you do not become discouraged.
Finally, you need to practice. This is where the rubber meets the road. You need to learn to go through boredom, and even frustration, in order to master a skill. Remember, practice makes perfect. Deliberate and intelligent practice makes it even more perfect.
How do you go about stacking skills on top of each other?
The key is to find relationships between skills. It's going to be much easier to stack skills if they are somewhat related or relatable to each other.
For example, if you are a programmer, it would be easier for you to learn another programming language or even teach what you know than it would be for you to learn how to cook. You could teach online via YouTube or other platforms, thereby adding multiple skills to your stack, such as recording yourself, editing, uploading videos, and promoting your courses...See where I'm going?
It's much easier to stack skills when they flow from and into one another rather than trying to ace multiple unrelated or vaguely related skills to each other.
There is one extremely important thing to keep in consideration though. And that is time. You need to have enough time to devote to each skill in order to make any significant progress. This is where most people fail. They try to do too many things at the same time and they never get very good at anything.
So, the key to talent or skill stacking is to find the right balance between the skills that you want to stack. You need to have enough time to devote to each skill so that you can master it. Once you have mastered one skill, you can then intelligently pile other skills on top of that skill.
And that is one very efficient way to go about it.
Now, tell me in the comments below what you think about skill stacking. Do you think it's possible? And what is your perfect stack of skills made of?
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