Projecting ROI to yourself

I was thinking whether the position I'm an ideal candidate for is the ideal for me. Am I satisfied with my own (professional) profile and what skills should have I had to satisfy the dream job of mine? I've looked at my 10-year career and tried to analyze my strongest and weakest skills. The first candidate to dig for the strengths was the professional spot - what I've been doing for living for these years - the professional (in my case -  the technical) skills. The weakest ones presumably might be found in areas where I've had a little exposure according to my professional charter - marketing, business development, sales, management of big groups and budgets. Categorizing the existing skills is not a problem on a scale of "strong-weak". More interesting task is to analyze the weaknesses and strengths from an investment perspective. Have the investments in the strongest been justified and which one out of the weakest to pick up to increase ROI? If I were in the beginning of my career now would have I invested in the same skills?

I describe here the skills relevant for a hi-tech guy on dawn of his career. The set is fictitious and but even this set will change as time goes by. But I'm sure that the idea is simple and the example is illustrative.

I found useful to characterize every skill by these parameters:

• Applicability. Whether a skill is applicable to what you're doing (now - for a short-term return and in the future for a long-term investment). The more the skill is applicable the more attractive it becomes to invest. For one knowing C++ it may be Java or for one moving to Germany it may be German language;
• Longevity. How long will you use the skill in the future. COBOL was applicable and in high demand 25 years ago but today? German makes less sense to invest if you relocate to Germany only for a year. Speaking skills, though, will be in use as long as you live (or at least speak);
• Precocity. How long does it take to grow the skill. Mastering public speaking takes a bit longer than learning HTML. Mastering playing cello takes much longer than playing poker.
• Complementarity. Whether a skill complements other skills to make you more professional as a possessor of the combined skills as a whole. Java, networking, security - together make you a good software architect with wide vision. Although if you're a Java developer not targeting an architect role learning security may not be in your focus.

I depicted an imaginary set of skills where the longevity and the applicability are chosen as the axes and the circle diameter denotes the precocity (time to master the skill), colors represent clusters (a kind of complementarity).

Looking at the diagram we see that to grasp HTML skills is simpler than VB or project management but easier to find application. Obtaining negotiation skills is much harder than presentation skills and can be practically applied (or paid for) after quite a long.

I hope the idea is clear. When choosing a next skill to pick up and grow we should analyze it from a complex perspective taking into account a number of aspects. We also should pay more attention to strategic (long-term) skills that maybe not bring immediate return but will be repaid hundredfold with the time. It seems that the soft skills are, actually, harder than some of the hard skills. Public speaking, presentation skills, team management are ones that harder to master but which remain with us forever in their relevancy. You (most likely) won't want to be a programmer for 40 years, one day your preferences will change and the skill set is better off be ready. In your forties you (most likely) won't play basketball (at least to enlarge the network). Isn't it better to invest in learning golf than poker?:-)

Technorati tag: skill, career, roi