As a recruiter (or inadvertently, a career advisor sometimes) we are often asked, what specific Salesforce technology (or clouds) should someone focus on and should they be a specialist in a specific area or more of a generalist?

In Tim Ferriss’ latest video (in the comments) he suggests your best bet is striving to be a:

A Specialized Generalist

Meaning to combine a series of skills that are rarely combined together but are still very effective.

Rather than trying to know a thousand different things (as a generalist) and losing focus or to not be so siloed in 1 specific area that opportunities pass you by (unless you’re known to be in the top 1% in the industry), the specialized generalist is the way to go.

3 skills that can help in that equation: Public Speaking, Writing, Negotiating

Some additional ideas that come to mind:

Being both a Developer and also a Trainer

Being a Technical Architect and also responsible for Sales and Business Development

Being a Marketing Cloud functional professional and also knowing JavaScript, HTML, CSS

Being an Administrator and also developing API’s

Being a BA and also a Test Engineer

Being a Solution Architect and also a Project Manager

Being a Technical Team Lead and also the lead content writer for your company

I’m sure there’s more good combinations where others have seen success.

It may take some time to hone in on a few if you’re rather new, but once you find those that you enjoy most, focus on those.

The rarer the combination, the better (assuming both are in high demand).

Being both a Visual FoxPro Developer and RJ11 cable installer is probably not such a hot combination.

Any other suggestions where you’ve found success?