Generalists in a Specialist World ~ by Ruth Ross Saucier

     Generalists.  Are you a generalist? I am.
  
The world to me is full of fascinating ideas and opportunities.  I dabble informally in dozens and dozens of topics, reading widely, but never deeply.  I’m just as interested in an article about the discovery of new earthquake fault lines or the genetic aspects of pharmacology as I am articles about futurism and the predictions of science fiction or a first-person narrative of what it’s like to go caving (spelunking) in a low oxygen environment.  Or owls. Or house building. Or new technology.
     In a world that values specialists, that requires people to know a specific discipline thoroughly, I’m a misfit. Graduate schools are formed around the idea of extensive research in very particular topics. While some programs allow for cross-disciplinary study, none of them award degrees to those whose knowledge is miles wide and inches deep.
     But isn’t this just A.D.D.? Not really. I have read 700-page treatises on disease and the environment and read multiple books on any of the topics that interest me deeply.  I was a Russian literature major who read 10,000 pages in a ten-week quarter.  I can focus very well, thank you; I just can’t commit my life to the understanding of how Chekhov’s boyhood affected his portrayal of a particular character in one of his plays.  There are too many other topics in this world that fascinate me equally.
     How I discovered my generalist proclivities. A long time ago I was a graduate student in both Slavic language and the Library School. I also worked for the Slavic section of the Cataloging Division of my major university library.  There were nine full-time

employees in the section, all dealing with the selection, identification, and cataloging of Russian and eastern European books and other materials. As a part-time searcher, I was responsible for ascertaining whether new books were already owned or on order—books that were written in about fourteen different languages.
     There I got a good look one of the options available to me when I graduated Library School.  One of the librarians I worked with specialized in Bulgarian materials; another was responsible for Czech materials; and others handled Polish, Russian, and other materials from the region. The idea that I might spend my career cataloging Bulgarian periodicals made me a little nauseous.  
     But what can a generalist do? My internship at a community college library saved me.  Here, as a reference librarian, my job was to help students learn to do research.  Every day different students with different topics arrived at my door.  It was perfection! I got to help them discover and define their research and along the way I always learned something new. 
     If you think you might be a generalist, you can find articles on the internet that help you understand your strengths and options. Try googling “jobs for generalists” and you’ll find multiple leads.

[But a librarian can find much more information, something that is always true over googling! Do try your local library if you need more than google turns up.]  If you bore easily with your job, you might need to rethink your strengths – one of which may be generalism. 
Figuring out your preferences and what they mean for you is critical to finding the sort of job you’ll happily stick with for years – 37 years in my case! 
     Entry articles for Generalists: (Click links to read articles)
          Federal Jobs for Generalists
                    Are You a Generalist?
                          Generalists Rule

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