1334: A Subtle Mistake About How to Acquire Useful Career Skills by Scott Young with CalNewport.com

[00:00:00] At EverNorth Health Services, we believe costs shouldn't get in the way of life-changing care.

[00:00:05] And we're doing everything in our power to make it possible.

[00:00:08] Behavioral health solutions that also keep your projections at their best? It's possible.

[00:00:13] Pharmacy benefits that benefit your bottom line? It's possible.

[00:00:16] Complex specialty care that cares about your ROI? It's possible.

[00:00:21] Because we're already doing it. All while saving businesses billions.

[00:00:25] That's wonder made possible.

[00:00:27] Learn more at evernorth.com slash wonder.

[00:00:31] Your brain needs support.

[00:00:33] And new OLLI Brainy Chews are a delightful way to take care of your cognitive health.

[00:00:37] Made with scientifically backed ingredients like Thai ginger, L-theanine and caffeine.

[00:00:41] Brainy Chews support healthy brain function and help you find your focus, stay chill or get energized.

[00:00:47] Be kind to your mind and get these new tropic chews at OLLI.com. That's O-L-L-Y.com.

[00:00:53] These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.

[00:00:56] This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

[00:00:59] This is Optimal Work Daily, episode 1334.

[00:01:03] A Subtle Mistake About How To Acquire Useful Career Skills

[00:01:07] by Scott Young with calnewport.com

[00:01:10] Now hi again, I am Dan. I am the host and narrator of Optimal Work Daily.

[00:01:15] And what we do here is we share some of the very best articles that we can find

[00:01:18] that cover work, career and entrepreneurship.

[00:01:21] And then I simply share those articles with you.

[00:01:24] I narrate them every single day of the week so that you can maximize your own work life

[00:01:28] with the help of so many great authors.

[00:01:30] So for now, let's get to our post for this Sunday as we optimize your life.

[00:01:38] A Subtle Mistake About How To Acquire Useful Career Skills

[00:01:42] by Scott Young with calnewport.com

[00:01:46] In our early Top Performer Pilots, before we even called the course Top Performer,

[00:01:51] Cal and I made a subtle mistake about the process we taught for acquiring career skills.

[00:01:56] It's one I've seen many people make when thinking about improving their career,

[00:02:00] so I think it's worth exploring here in case you might be making it too.

[00:02:04] A big part of our course is executing a skill building project.

[00:02:08] The goal is to cultivate rare and valuable skills which form the foundation for a successful career.

[00:02:13] What we hadn't recognized in early iterations of our course

[00:02:16] is that there are actually two different ways to go about these projects,

[00:02:20] one of which tends to be much more effective.

[00:02:23] The Difficulty With Drilling Down

[00:02:26] The first way you can design a project to upgrade your career skills

[00:02:29] is to drill down on some aspect of your work that's important to your job.

[00:02:33] One of our students, for example, was an academic philosopher who decided to get better at logic.

[00:02:39] Another student was an architect who decided to deepen his understanding of design.

[00:02:43] On the surface, these kinds of projects sound like they should be helpful.

[00:02:47] Indeed, the entire idea of deliberate practice on which our course is based

[00:02:51] seems reflected in these projects.

[00:02:54] You can take an aspect of your work and then design an effort to focus on improving it deliberately.

[00:02:59] So what's the problem?

[00:03:01] The problem is that a lot of these projects didn't generate spectacular results.

[00:03:05] Sure, the person might have felt good about deepening a skill,

[00:03:08] but these were rarely the projects that resulted in promotions, raises,

[00:03:12] or transformations of a person's work.

[00:03:14] True, there were some exceptions.

[00:03:16] One person decided to dig deep on their understanding of a programming language

[00:03:20] and later translated that into landing his dream job.

[00:03:23] Even then, this particular success didn't come from improving a skill alone.

[00:03:28] In his particular case, the student got the job because his practice activity,

[00:03:32] making online quizzes about the language he specialized in,

[00:03:35] brought him to the attention of experts in his field.

[00:03:38] If those quizzes hadn't been published or acknowledged,

[00:03:41] it's unclear how big an impact his project would have had.

[00:03:44] Benchmarking Success

[00:03:46] A different style of project, however, does seem to work better.

[00:03:50] Benchmark Projects

[00:03:52] Benchmark projects are also about improving skills.

[00:03:54] However, instead of picking a skill and just trying to get better at it,

[00:03:58] you first pick a clear benchmark accomplishment that defines success.

[00:04:02] Examples of successful benchmark projects could be

[00:04:05] 1. Writing

[00:04:07] Creating a blog and producing 100 articles

[00:04:10] 2. Programming

[00:04:12] Designing a useful open-source library

[00:04:15] 3. Academia

[00:04:17] Producing a paper that attracts multiple citations

[00:04:20] 4. Entrepreneurship

[00:04:22] Creating a new product that will sell a certain amount

[00:04:26] Why are these projects often more successful than projects

[00:04:29] which are strictly about drilling a particular skill?

[00:04:32] My experience tells me that there are two distinct advantages at play here.

[00:04:36] The first is that by tying your project to a benchmark,

[00:04:39] you can't avoid the uncomfortable work.

[00:04:41] A deliberate practice project that's disconnected from real-world results

[00:04:45] can unintentionally be steered away from hard efforts that move the needle,

[00:04:49] allowing you instead to wallow in that pleasing state of tractable hardness,

[00:04:53] a state that feels good but generates minimum growth.

[00:04:57] Second, benchmark projects produce a recognizable achievement at the end.

[00:05:01] This helps by allowing you to point at something concrete

[00:05:04] when trying to articulate your newly acquired skill.

[00:05:07] Good work alone can propel you forward,

[00:05:10] but making your skills more legible to outsiders

[00:05:13] is often a key part of translating those skills into actual career benefits.

[00:05:18] 5. How You Can Create Benchmark Projects to Grow Your Career

[00:05:22] The way I like to think of benchmark projects

[00:05:24] is to pick something that I can't do right now,

[00:05:26] but I might be able to do if I improved my skills and worked at it.

[00:05:30] These projects tend to work better when the benchmark itself

[00:05:33] suggests what kind of efforts you might take to improve.

[00:05:36] Improving as a writer, for instance,

[00:05:38] it would be better for me to pick a project like

[00:05:40] get published in a national newspaper or magazine

[00:05:43] rather than sell one million books,

[00:05:46] since the former will suggest a lot of specific actions I need to take

[00:05:50] to get my writing to the level where I can be published in a prestigious place,

[00:05:54] but the latter doesn't really suggest anything concrete.

[00:05:57] Good benchmark projects are often scarier than drill-down projects.

[00:06:01] Getting better at research is a lot more comfortable a goal to set

[00:06:05] than get my work published in a top five journal.

[00:06:08] Yet that uncomfortableness also encourages you to take a hard look at your own work.

[00:06:13] What are some benchmarks you could strive to attain in your own work?

[00:06:16] How would those look different than attempts you've made in the past

[00:06:19] to simply get better at your work?

[00:06:26] You just listened to the post titled

[00:06:28] A Subtle Mistake About How to Acquire Useful Career Skills

[00:06:32] by Scott Young with CalNewport.com.

[00:06:35] When it comes to hiring, don't go searching for the one.

[00:06:38] Just meet your match with Indeed.

[00:06:40] Indeed is your matching and hiring platform

[00:06:43] with over 350 million global monthly visitors

[00:06:46] and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast.

[00:06:50] Ditch the busy work.

[00:06:51] Use Indeed for scheduling, screening and messaging.

[00:06:54] 93% of employers agree.

[00:06:56] Indeed delivers the highest quality matches compared to other job sites.

[00:07:00] And one of the things I really love about Indeed

[00:07:03] is that it filters out those incompatible applicants.

[00:07:06] So when you're hiring, the process is much faster

[00:07:09] and you only have to consider applicants that are already likely to be a great fit.

[00:07:13] And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit

[00:07:17] to get your job's more visibility at Indeed.com slash Startup.

[00:07:22] So just go to Indeed.com slash Startup right now

[00:07:26] and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast.

[00:07:30] Indeed.com slash Startup.

[00:07:32] Terms and conditions apply.

[00:07:43] Because you're staying at La Quinta by Wyndham.

[00:07:45] Their free bright side breakfast will give you energy for the day ahead.

[00:07:48] And after, you can unwind using their free high speed Wi-Fi.

[00:07:51] Tonight La Quinta. Tomorrow you shine.

[00:07:54] Book your stay today at LQ.com.

[00:07:57] And thank you to both Scott and Cal.

[00:08:00] Cal is a popular writer with a book that seems like everybody's talking about right now.

[00:08:05] That is Deep Work, one of six self-improvement books that he has written.

[00:08:09] He completed his undergraduate studies at Dartmouth College in 2004,

[00:08:13] received a PhD from MIT in 2009 in computer science.

[00:08:18] He was then a postdoctoral associate in the MIT computer science department for a couple years.

[00:08:24] And then in 2011, he joined Georgetown University as an assistant professor of computer science

[00:08:30] and was granted tenure in 2017.

[00:08:32] His work focuses on distributed algorithms in challenging network scenarios.

[00:08:37] You know, basic stuff.

[00:08:39] And again, he has multiple popular books that are worth checking out.

[00:08:42] Plus his blog called Study Hacks.

[00:08:44] And lastly, you can check out his relatively new podcast called Deep Questions.

[00:08:49] You can find all of that right at his website, which again is calnewport.com.

[00:08:55] Alright, that's going to do it for me today.

[00:08:57] Hope you have a great rest of your day.

[00:08:59] And I'll be back here reading to you tomorrow.

[00:09:01] And that's where your optimal life awaits.