Specialize or Generalize?

It might be because I now work in a medical setting, full of specialists of one type of medicine or another, but I find myself wondering if it is better to specialize in a specific skill set, or attempt to learn "everything" and make yourself valuable in many areas. This is a hard question to answer because so often companies either want someone that can do everything, (to avoid having to hire multiple people), or they want someone that specializes in a specific area. Specializing means you risk being pigeon-holed to one career path, but generalizing means that it takes longer to be viewed as an expert in any specific area.

This question is one that echos across many areas as more and more businesses are tasked with the same question. Marketing agencies, for example, have experienced whiplash with that question. A few years ago, when I started, the boutique agency was thriving and seemed to be the future of the marketing landscape. Just a year later and it seemed that everyone was struggling to accommodate clients that wanted more and only wanted to deal with one agency. Agencies now had to learn new trades or expand with new specialists. As the pendulum swings back, and now that the number of marketing channels grows daily, we again see a rise in agencies, or consultants, that pick one area and specialize in it.

Someone once told me that to be a successful manager you have to know 80% of everything that is going on with all of your departments. You don't have to be 100% committed to any specific discipline, but you should know the big picture and be able to operate effectively within it. I think the same should be applied to both a young professional and a young business. It is important to not only understand the industry or discipline that you claim to specialize in, but to undertand how that discipline functions in relation to the areas closest. So if you run a social media agency than you should understand how it works with advertising or PR, and be able to answer questions, and facilitate as needed.

As an employee you should know your area, but also know how it fits with other departments. If your specialty is one that overlaps with other areas it would be extremely helpful to learn as much as you can about the other areas to be able to put your work in context. The same way you would want to understand your competitive landscape or marketplace, you want to be aware of your professional landscape. Find out if you have a limited skill set, (In which case you want to make sure you're the best at what you do), or if you know a little or a lot about many thing. Then you can figure out if you need to expand your base, or start to grow in a few areas. Either way this question brings about an interesting discussion: which is better, to be a master of your craft, or a jack-of-all-trades?