The Dilbert Blog

You can also just drop the “very”. There’s no need for a fancy word to replace the thing you’re very very about. For example, if you’re writing “very tall”, change it into “tall” and re-read the sentence. It’ll be better. I learned this by reading Scott Adams’ excellent 3-minute essay on writing: https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/06/the_day_you_b…

Great presentation! Another short read that covers similar ground is "The Day You Became a Better Writer" by Scott Adams (creator of Dilbert): https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/06/the_day_you_b…

Scott Adams offered this as “Career Advice” (http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… in July of 2007: "But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort." See also https://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2010/04/18/jack-of-all-trades/ for an exploration of how deep knowledge of multiple domains enables opportunities for knowledge brokerage.

Scott Adams (yes, the Dilbert guy) wrote an insightful piece on career advice in his blog a few years ago. In it he asserts that to have an extraordinary career you should become very good at two different things. I believe this article popped up on HN a couple of years back: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

I like Scott Adam's take: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… To be especially valuable and impactful, it's easier to be very good at two things and own the intersection than it is to be the best at one thing.

This is the best advice I've seen on this topic: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

Interesting to learn that programming is being taught to writers. Perhaps it's a poor analogy, but the term Singer/Songwriter comes to mind when I imagine such a hybrid. Either one of the two component skills could earn a living; but the two together have greater potential for producing works of significance. Also, it reminds me of Scott Adams career advice[0], where he suggests being "good" at more than one thing. [0] http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

my favorite advice on writing form Scot Adams: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/06/the_day_you_be…

Most people do :) Take a look at Scott Adams' post on dual areas of expertise. It's one of the best primers on how to think about a career: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

(See http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/04/my_new_favorit… — "I’ve noticed that a lot of people, if not most, have sharp disagreements with what they hallucinate to be my opinions.")

If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. -Scott Adams http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

Scott Adams (of Dilbert), also inspired by Cialdini, found an excellent use for the consistency principle. See [0] (text possibly nsfw) [0] http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/03/today_i_will_i…

This has been crowdsourced once. Scott Adams, from Dilbert, once postulated that most hit lyrics are nonsense, and asked his readers to post random phrases to create a song: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2008/01/write-a-hit-so… A German band picked it up and selected the best random phrases and recorded it: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2008/01/the-hit-song-y… http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=GB&hl=en-GB&v=TiH9dbAsAp0 It's not bad actually.

I think your objection is a good one. Horizontal scaling in humans has low efficiency, so it's usually best to max out the benefits of vertical scaling first. That being said, Scott Adams' career advice[1] seems pretty solid. In short, it is usually just as useful to be competent at three different things as to be extremely good at one thing. [1] http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

He makes a good point - sometimes it's that last little bit of skill that makes the difference between a success and a failure. When you completely master something, the whole game can change. The problem is that it's insanely hard to completely master something - there's the time involved in doing it, but there's ALSO the fact that you're competing with everyone else who's also trying to master it. The real value of the 80/20 rule, I think, is that it gives you the ability to devote time to several different pursuits, giving you a combination of skills that few other people can match. Call this the 'Scott Adams Rule' of success - you can either be the very best at something, or be in the top 25% of 2 or more things and combine them. See: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

Ideas/books/concepts of George Lakoff and his colleagues. In the same way, Jeff Hawkins. Their approach to cognition as a problem that is comprehensible is incredibly far-reaching. In a similar vein, the writing and blog of Scott Adams: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/ The vast majority of it is humor, and the inspiring pieces are subtle, but they're like a honey bunch of oats in your cereal (except more rare (and with better metaphors than this)).

This is similar to the Scott Adam's advise- which was great: https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice… If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it. I always advise young people to become good public speakers (top 25%). Anyone can do it with practice. If you add that talent to any other, suddenly you’re the boss of the people who have only one skill. Or get a degree in business on top of your engineering degree, law degree, medical degree, science degree, or…

If this is essay is a representative sample of how you express yourself in general, then one recommendation is to improve your communication ability/style [1]. Stream-of-conscious may work in online chatrooms, but not in professional settings. In any team-oriented setting, clear and organized communication is non-negotiable. Your writing here signals intelligent, but manic, frantic, and maybe not a great communicator. It sounds like you're a good technical writer when you need to be, based on your anecdote about writing up the problem with Amazon's anti-fraud system. But you need to be a good communicator in general, not just specifically to technical writing. However, if my overall impression here is inaccurate then feel free to ignore. For example, up until the following line you were at least understandable, but this line was unclear: >"Got referrals etc. dropped out my freshmen year at a top 40 college. Was on the cyber security team etc. too expensive so I had to dropout." Are you saying you were on the cyber security team at your university, but it was too expensive so you had to drop out? If so, just say that in a sentence: "I was on the cyber security team at my top 40 university, but it was too expensive so I had to drop out." (also, did you apply for student loans? Most top 40 universities can put together a package of grants and loans to keep the folks they admitted). And referrals from who for what? Also this: >"Also was concerned about support…

There are several diverse viewpoints on this. One aspect is that being excellent at one thing is hard. Be really good at two things. And thats how you will stand out because it is the fusion of two skils that makes you unique. First: Some advice on this by Scott Adams. https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice… I love this one. Also a book that pretty much centers around the same point. I think the book itself is a great read. And I recommend it. https://www.amazon.com/Medici-Effect-Elephants-Epidemics-Innovation/dp… And then there is a quote by Robert Anson Heinlein, if you want to take it to heart and live on other extreme. By no means it is a career advice but surely an interesting take. A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”

If you're always able to come up with topics to write on, that itself will become an excellent motivator to write more. Maybe take a step forward and imagine how you'd feel once you publish the post—the exhilarating feeling. Awesome, right? Initially, I used to think it's not a good idea to blog if you're not saying something new. So I tried hard to come up with topics to write on, and that process consumed most of my time. And I ended up not writing anything at all. Later I changed the way I thought about blogging. - Blind posts. What's obvious to you isn't obvious to others. No matter what it is about, keep writing. - Writing is thinking. It's the best way to become aware of your biases and ignorance. A sure shot way to improve the way you think. - New knowledge. What was the last thing you searched on the internet? Can you write about that? Here are a few essays that have helped me get past my 'writing lethargy': https://sivers.org/nod https://sivers.org/7 https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/06/the_day_you_b… http://paulgraham.com/useful.html I hope this helps. :)

I recommend Scott Adams’ advice. If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it. https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice…

>>> I had 4 different jobs, and 4 different career paths, in the 10 years after college.... Each time I switched jobs... I also realized that I’d gotten older, and started to fear that I did not have the time to get great. I too have changed jobs and careers several times since graduating college. Strangely, doing so has actually been liberating for me. I entered a PhD program immediately after college, obsessed with not only being the greatest, but also the youngest. (I didn't just want to "break records," I also wanted to be many years younger than the previous record holder when I did.) I let go of these fantasies the moment I dropped out of grad school though. I was starting over from scratch which meant I'd be too old to be the best and youngest at anything. And not chasing that goal has pretty much set me free. Everything is way more fun now, including being a complete noob in a room full of experts. http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… <-- I always appreciated this Scott Adams post. It helped me go from path #1 to path #2. Ps. Your photos are phenomenal. Thanks for sharing, even though it was scary to! You are (almost certainly) already the top 25% at two or more things. Now how bout dat?! :D

Respectfully there are two separate things here: 1. The notion that 'coding' is exactly what you're doing now. I think that doing actual development varies far more widely between roles, company sizes and verticals than in other careers. As an example: in my programming career I've done everything from work with Navy SEALS (handheld athletic training software) to attend rock festivals (making sure scheduling software stays up and working) to some AR. I have a friend that makes robotic control software for nuclear plants and flies around the world collecting stories of people who have seriously messed things up. Another friend works at a big bank as one of a floor full of people doing something insanely boring with credit cards. They both seem happy. They both are developers. Their lives could not be more different. Coding doesn't have to mean 40hrs a week in a windowless office and all of those roles varied between 20% to 60% coding (at a rough estimate) and if you've only ever worked in a large company it's crazy how different building even building your own apps/services can even be. 2. Switching careers. I've always really liked Scott Adams career advice to try and be the top 25% of two different subject areas: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… Being a developer is a great '1st skill' because it mixes so well with nearly everything else in today's society. So, I'd say don't abandon it (or your knowledge) but try to pair it…

>> A very workable and easy to understand formula early in your career is specialize in two things; you don't have to be better at X and better at Y than everyone you meet, you have to be "better at X than anyone who is better at Y" and "better at Y than anyone who is better at X." This is very, very achievable, regardless of how highly competent your local set of peers is. Scott Adams says something similar: If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

From Scott Adams: "If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it. I always advise young people to become good public speakers (top 25%). Anyone can do it with practice. If you add that talent to any other, suddenly you’re the boss of the people who have only one skill. Or get a degree in business on top of your engineering degree, law degree, medical degree, science degree, or whatever. Suddenly you’re in charge, or maybe you’re starting your own company using your combined…

Please consider this extraordinary advice: If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. The second strategy is fairly easy.[0] I used to do 1.) and now I focus on 2.). Its been very effective for my career and general happiness. I consider myself a dreamer and this philosophy leads me to generate very actionable ideas. If you can read code and understand what code does - you're well on your way to being in the top 25% of people working in IT. Getting into the top 25% of programmers is probably easier than you think.[1] There are so many careers where even a basic understanding of coding will give you a huge advantage. You'll be a superhero if you take these skills to a job where you're surrounded by non-programmers. Seriously. One more thing: C++ is not a wise choice for a first language. Its fucking hard. Python is considered a good choice to learn programming. [0] http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… [1] http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/02/why-cant-programmers-program.…

I agree that a PhD is not the only way to get domain knowledge. Working in industry and private research into a problem are other ways (amongst many). No matter how obtained, domain knowledge can be a great advantage for an entrepreneur. Scott Adams attributes his success as a cartoonist to his rare combination of ability to both draw and write jokes well (http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.… For a software entrepreneur, programming is analogous to drawing (as the base skill) and domain knowledge analogous to writing jokes (as the differentiator). It’s also worth noting that technical PhD research is often based on a real problem; gives exposure to a broad range of hard problems and solutions; and teaches the process by which problems can be solved. Thus it can both help you find and solve problems (particularly those in the same field), whether those problems were the focus of your initial scholarly research or not.

From Scott Adams old blog post on the redesign of the website: "The fascinating thing about the responses is that it revealed three distinct types of Dilbert readers: The first group is the ultra-techies who have an almost romantic relationship with technology. For them, the new site felt like getting dumped by a lover. Their high-end technology (generally Linux) and security settings made much of the site inconvenient. Moreover, the use of Flash offended them on some deep emotional level. The second group objected to the new level of color and complexity, and the associated slowness. They like their Dilbert comics simple, fast, and in two colors. Anything more is like putting pants on a cat. The third group uses technology as nothing more than a tool, and subscribes to the philosophy that more free stuff is better than less free stuff. That group has embraced the new features on the site and spiked the traffic stats. For you first two groups, if you promise to keep it to yourselves, we created a stripped-down Dilbert page with just the comic, some text navigation, and the archive: www.dilbert.com/fast. This alternate site is a minor secret, mentioned only here and in the text footnote to the regular site as “Linux/Unix.”" (source: http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2008/04/dilbertcom-red…

On a similar note: If you want an average successful life, it doesn’t take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths: 1. Become the best at one specific thing. 2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things. The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. Few people will ever play in the NBA or make a platinum album. I don’t recommend anyone even try. The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I’m hardly an artist. And I’m not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I’m funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It’s the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it. http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.…

It's Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice…