Think Like a Craftsman and Master a Skillset; it Will Give You Meaning and Transform Your Career
The best career advice was handed to me in my final year of business school when a senior career consultant delivered a keynote speech at one of our exclusive leadership seminars.
At the time, it seemed insignificant, but after working in the corporate world for a few years and then as an entrepreneur, today, I look back at that advice and I realize the profoundness of it.
He advised us that, every year, we should print out a copy of our resumé, review it, and then ask ourselves these three questions:
What skills do I have?
What skills do I want to enhance?
What new skills do I want to add to my CV?
He spoke of nothing else but skills. Which is ironic, given how too often in life, we chase the job titles and company names. “I want to work for Google,” or “I want to be a Marketing Manager at this startup,” or “I just want to be a life coach.” Sure, that’s great, but here’s the universal truth about job titles: Job titles are empty.
Anyone can call themselves a CEO, but it’s the ones who actually practice the role, day-in, day-out that build the skills of a CEO. Anyone can be a writer, but it’s the ones who publish articles every single day that will hone their writing skills and thus develop their persuasive and storytelling skillset.
When I worked at Google, I was part of a team of ten Account Managers and almost each one of us had a different title on LinkedIn: Account Strategist, Agency Manager, Agency Account Manager, Digital Marketing Manager, Digital Strategy Lead.
Did these variations in titles matter?
Absolutely not.
Some sounded sexier and perhaps a little more senior than others, but at the end of the day, each one of us had the same responsibility: Manage a portfolio of clients and grow revenue. What differentiated us from one another were our work ethic, the set of skills we brought to the role, and the extent of skill growth we experienced through that role.
Titles Inflate Your Ego, Skills Inflate Your Value
When you apply to a new role at a company, the employer won’t ask you “what was your job title in your previous role?” They’ll ask you “what did you do in your previous role? And what did you achieve?” In essence, what they’re asking is “what set of skills can you offer us that someone else can’t?”
Your goal then shouldn’t be to look ahead into the future and think: “What do I want my next role to be?” Instead, you must look inward, reflect, and ask yourself “what skills do I want to sharpen?”
The reason comes back to this:
Titles inflate your ego. Skills inflate your value.
Titles are shallow, obsolete, and vague, and they inflate and deflate with the trajectory of the economy. For instance, there was a 2008-2013 study done by LinkedIn that examined over 259 million LinkedIn users’ profiles to determine the 10 hot job titles that barely existed in 2008.
Here’s what they found:
With the rapid advancement in technology and the growth in automation, those jobs may no longer exist in ten years’ time. Maybe digital marketing becomes automated by artificial intelligence. Maybe the demand for Zumba plummets in popularity due to a surge in demand for pilates and yoga.
Regardless of what happens to the jobs above, it’s the depth of skills that these developers, instructors, and specialists will compound over the next ten years that truly matters because it’s these skills that will form the currency through which their value will be appraised. They can charge higher for a client, or demand a higher pay grade, based on the skillful expertise and years of experience in a particular field—but not on the titles they’ve previously held.
Here’s what makes skills so special:
Skills are concrete. You either have a skill or you don’t. You can’t fluff your way around it. You either have the skills to facilitate a workshop or you don’t. You either know how to set-up and optimize a digital advertising campaign or you don’t. And if you’re not very good at this particular skill, you can improve it by practicing it.
Skills are complimentary. You can combine different skills to form a skill set. I combine my skill of writing with my persuasive copywriting (to drive action), storytelling (to entertain), and SEO (to publish articles that rank higher on Google search).
Skills compound over time. The more you practice a skill, the better you become at executing it. Think of Picasso and the skill of painting. Think of the greatest salesman you know and their skill of selling. Think of you and the skill of driving.
This last pointer is the most important of them all because if we learn how to embrace it and apply this kind of thinking to a particular set of skills, and hone that skill set so well, in due time, we can be recognized for our mastery of it and this will really transform the advancement rate of our career.
This idea of dedicating our time to mastering a skill is what craftsmanship is all about. If we genuinely approach our working life from the craftsman mindset, we can expect two things to happen:
We will find more meaning in the work we do.
We will advance our career at a much faster rate.
Think Like a Craftsman and You Will Give Meaning to The Work You Do
How does thinking like a craftsman give you a sense of meaning and fulfillment?
To better answer this question, let’s flip back to the purpose equation which states that “meaning” is the outcome of doing something you’re good at, in a domain that interests you, exercising a philosophy you believe in, all while positively impacting someone’s life because of the work you do.
Meaning = Skill + Interest + Belief + People.
The equation above is inspired by the Japanese concept of Ikigai and influenced by the work of positive psychologist Martin Seligman, who defines meaning as: “Using your signature strengths and virtues in the service of something much larger than you are.” In other words, meaning taps into a core skill or strength and it arises when we share that skill in the service of other people.
Cal Newport echoes this idea as well.
In his book, Deep Work, he relates the modern-day knowledge worker to the traditional craftsman. He argues that a craftsman’s meaning is derived from the deliberate work they do, the skill they hone, and the innate appreciation for this process. Passion is not the driving force for their work, but the by-product of the deliberate practice a craftsman puts into his or her skill in order to master it and become so valuable at it:
“The meaning uncovered [by craftsmen] is due to the skill and appreciation inherent in craftsmanship—not the outcomes of their work. The same applies to knowledge work. You don’t need a rarified job; you need instead a rarified approach to your work… Whether you’re a writer, marketer, consultant, or lawyer: your work is craft, and if you hone your ability and apply it with respect and care, then like the skilled wheelwright, you can generate meaning in the daily efforts of your professional life.”
I embraced this mindset less than a year ago and within that short timeframe, it has already transformed my perspective and approach to life. What began as a journey to find the “best-suited job for my interests,” has now shifted into a voyage of “I want to master the art of writing and storytelling.”
Today, I see myself as a craftsman who is in the service of his readers. I wake up every morning to sharpen my writing skills—and that, in and of itself, gives me meaning. Perhaps that’s what Gandhi meant when he famously said that “the best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”
Master a Set of Skills to Accelerate The Advancement of Your Career
So thinking like a craftsman gives you meaning. Sure, but how does it help advance your career?
Well let me ask you this:
If you want to learn how to build better habits, who would you turn to the work of James Clear (author of Atomic Habits) or to a blogger who’s published a few personal development articles on his website?
If you want to learn the ins and outs of painting and sculpting, would you ask for advice and painting lessons from your neighbour, who has three finished canvases, or from Pablo Picasso (assuming he was still alive)?
If you want to perfect your squat, would you ask your gym buddy for advice or would you watch a few videos posted by Dr. Aaron Horschig, author of The Squat Bible?
If you want to get tips on how to improve your writing, who would you turn to Stephen King (who has published over 60 novels) or… you get the idea.
We seek experts, not generalists.
And we pay them hefty fees for their time and guidance. Why? Because they’ve mastered (and continue to master) a very specific skill set. They’ve put in the time and the deliberate practice.
As a result, they’ve inflated their value and have become thought leaders within the ecosystem of their creative pursuits, and thus, they’ve advanced their careers to attract more reach and greater opportunities.
As Naval Ravikant, co-founder of AngelList, explains:
“Become the best at what you do. Refine what you do until this is true. Opportunity will seek you out. Luck becomes your destiny.”
You’re someone who has spent more than a decade deep-sea diving and now you’ve become one of the best in the world at it. If by sheer luck, somebody finds a sunken treasure ship off the coast that they can’t get to, they’re going to turn to you. They’ll hand you the task of retrieving that treasure and they’ll pay you a hefty sum for it. And that’s how opportunities seek you out after you’ve put in the time and practice to master a skill. Someone’s luck can become yours.
So where do you fit into all this?
Here’s what you can do: First, audit yourself and identify your top skills. Next, ask the three questioned mentioned earlier:
What skills do I have? (List them out and rank them based on competency).
What skills do I want to enhance? (Align this with your long-term goals).
What new skills do I want to add to my CV? (Based on #1 and #2, decide).
Once you have the answers, I want you to ask yourself one more question:
What skill do I want to master?
What skill do I want to hone and sharpen day in, day out? What’s the one skill I want to offer this world? What’s my craft?
Identify your craft (that one core skill) and then list out all the complementary skills that are essential for you to learn so you can master that core skill. It’s the deliberate daily practice of your core skill, combined with your complementary skills, compounded over time, that will help you achieve mastery:
Mastery = Core Skill + Complementary Skills + Deliberate Practice + Time
Here’s an example of mine:
For the next few years, I’m working on mastering the art of writing and storytelling. That’s the core skill that I’m focusing on. That’s the craft that I want to master. Learning more about SEO, how to write better headlines, how to build a narrative, and how to structure a story—these are all complementary skills I will learn to help me hone and differentiate my craft.
You can do this for any field of work.
Are you a content creator on YouTube? Your craft is videography, but there are a ton of skills you will need to learn: Storytelling, editing, lighting, voice adjustments, transitioning, narrative building, community management.
Are you an Account Executive? Your craft is the art of selling and your complementary skills include cold calling, objection handling, persuasive selling, and relationship management.
While it’s your craft that you want to master, it’s your attention to the complementary skills that will differentiate you.
One More Thing, Don’t Confuse Mastery with Perfectionism or Success
Mastery is a word we don’t use often.
Perhaps it’s because the philosophy of thinking like a craftsman has eluded us. Or maybe it’s because, as a society, we’ve grown fickle. We’re now easily bored, excessively hopping around, and never truly committing to one thing and staying consistent in it long enough to experience what it means to master something.
Mastery is not the same thing as perfectionism because perfectionism is an illusionary construction. It cannot be measured and it cannot be reached. Perfectionism is completely subjective and its value is weighed in the eye of the beholder. Mastery is not the same as success either because success is an event-based outcome. It’s defined by a single moment of victory in the future.
So what is mastery?
Mastery is the constant pursuit of continuous growth and infinite improvement within a specific subject matter. It’s the persistent compounding of knowledge and experience in a subject or a skill. It’s more a process of refinement than it is an outcome.
Mastery in any area of life is the natural aftermath that sprouts from the deliberate practice and engagement in that area over a prolonged period of time.
Everyone can master a skillset in their lifetime. We just think we can’t because we look at someone’s chapter twenty and compare it to our chapter two and think “I suck at this” before even considering the fact that the person we’re comparing ourselves to has put in the time over years to master that craft.
We all begin as novices. With time and deliberate practice, we become experienced. We go from an intern Account Executive (novice) to an Account Manager (experienced) with three years under our wings.
As we continue honing that skill set, we move into the professional field (5-10 years of experience). Add another ten years of deliberate practice of that skill set and you’re now playing in the league of mastery.
To become a yoga instructor, you need to log in 200 hours before you can collect your first certification and move from novice to experienced. To become a commercial airplane pilot, you need to clock in 1,500 hours of flying to become a professional licensed pilot. But to achieve mastery, both vocations will require years and years of further practice, education, grit, and growth.
As Daniel Pink writes in his book Drive:
“Mastery is a mindset: It requires the capacity to see your abilities not as finite, but as infinitely improvable. Mastery is a pain: It demands effort, grit, and deliberate practice. And mastery is asymptote: It's impossible to fully realize, which makes it simultaneously frustrating and alluring.”
What Matters to You
Don’t chase titles. Build a skill set that will inflate your value and accelerate the advancement of your career. How? Think like a craftsman.
Choose a craft you want to master.
Identify the one core skill that will form the foundation of your skillset.
Identify the complementary skills that are essential for your growth.
Get to work and hone that skill set through deliberate practice every single day for the next decade.
As you continue to master your craft, so will you open the doors to new opportunities in your career.
“If your goal is to love what you do, you must first build up “career capital” by mastering rare and valuable skills, and then cash in this capital for the traits that define great work.”— Cal Newport
A craftsman is a person who is incredibly skilled in a particular craft. What’s your craft? And what skills are you sharpening or adding to your arsenal?