Defining, Categorizing, and Defining Some More

Nope, this isn’t a post about filing or being a librarian (despite the number of books pictured in the previous post). Instead, it’s a post about how when we jump into life, we sometimes need to step back and look at what it is we’re doing and define roles we’ve been playing. I’ve been working my way through the marketing classic, The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing by Jack Trout and Al Ries. While reading the book, I came to a conclusion: I’ve been in business for four years and I’ve been approaching it wrong.

I’ve been a generalist – or at least, I considered myself a generalist. That is, I would take on any client project that came my way, rather than specialize. But as I was reading, i realized that I was a generalist for at least 9 different businesses that I’ve been running as one business! So, in addition to keeping up on client work, I’ve been busy separating out my businesses, defining them, and deciding which ones I will run right now, which I will launch later, and which I will set aside. I’ve also been voraciously reading books that MBA candidates read – not just for the sake of running my own business, but because knowing these tricks and techniques will help me to help others run their own businesses.

It’s amazing how much can change in a year, much less how much can change in four years. When I started my business, I was fresh out of leaving grad school, and I had a lot to learn about running a business. Now that I’ve been in business for four years, I’ve learned a lot, and there’s still a lot out there to learn! (That goes for life too!)

What sorts of things have you learned in your career, and what sorts of things do you believe you still need to learn? What do you do to define roles for your career?