Why Specialized Knowledge Matters More
08/26/2021
You don’t need to know everything about an industry to be successful. Business coaches are steering us right when they tell us to "niche down" and focus on one area of expertise.
Here's a surprising insight from Think and Grow Rich: there's no such thing as "Knowledge is power." It becomes actual power only when intelligently directed through specific plans of action and a well-defined purpose. Hill classifies knowledge into two categories: general and specialized.
- General Knowledge
General knowledge is common knowledge. Although easy to learn, general knowledge isn't of much use. This is why you don't use half of the things you learned in high school. A lesson on finding x, for instance, doesn't empower us to advance in our career or do essential tasks like pay taxes.
- Specialized Knowledge
Specialized knowledge is less common. It also requires higher education and life-long learning.
Specialized knowledge is necessary for success for two reasons. First, time is money. So, the person who can effectively do a job in less time makes more money. Second, people seek experts. Job qualifications, more often than not, ask for degrees, certifications or previous work samples.
Why Specialized Knowledge Matters More?
Everything doesn't matter equally. Having common knowledge may seem important to you but it doesn't help you achieve success. While you're watching the general news, Bill Gates watches the business news. Common knowledge distracts you from specific learning that refines your skills.
Takeaway:
Success requires specialized knowledge. After graduation day, you need to keep learning skills that help you fire your boss and get tasks done in less time.
This article is part of our Business Coaching blog series. At Dataczar we talk to a lot of small businesses. We’ve found a few books that we keep recommending time and again. To better help our customers, we’ve added a Reading List for Small Businesses to our website. We encourage every small business owner to read and keep these timeless business books on their office shelf.
