Throughout a career spanning a variety of domains* I have shifted as needed from being a generalist, crossing organizational and functional boundaries to see how everything fits together, to being a specialist, working deep in the self-contained silos that make up the parts of the whole. The context of my work determines the extent to which I generalize or specialize.
A neo-generalist, I am naturally drawn to the big picture, the “so what”, and at the same time driven to develop a deep understanding of the specializations required to achieve the desired big picture outcomes.
My favorite projects are the ones in which I start out having no idea how I will complete them or how they will actually turn out and for which which I am, in a traditional sense, generally unprepared to tackle.
* such as designing and deploying mobile communications networks, logistics, product delivery, knowledge management, systems engineering, platform integration, and digital transformation in government