Switched Keys

A person that does many unrelated things is often referred to as a "Jack of All Trades", with the afterward "master of none." Unfortunately, that does not consider the possibility that a gifted person may in fact be a master of many trades or skills. In the dated commercials on television this tax season there is a mockery of the idea that a tax expert is also a master plumber. That jest has some truth, but it does reflect the reality that people are often segregated into separate professions indiscriminately. I'm something of a tax expert (VITA Advanced) and also a graphic design expert (literally, an Adobe Certified Expert).

Also, I graduated summa cum laude, highest honors, top of the class, in Accounting and in Computer Information Systems. Does that mean I divide both accomplishments in half and become jack of two trades. This very concept is the issue that many geniuses have to deal with. (That's right; not all geniuses are in high paying jobs) People cannot grasp the idea that one person can be incomprehensibly excellent in a single field or a master of many fields.

Indeed, it is difficult to measure a person's abilities based on either education or experience. A person with 10 years of experience may only really have 4 weeks of experience doing the same thing and not even doing it well. Similarly, there is a large percentage of honor graduates of Ivy league schools who have not actually earned those honors other than through generous donations from their parents. Even IQ tests may be biased toward a certain types of logic, though they are rarely taken anyway.

One of the marks of expertise is essentially based on what a person has accomplished and those accomplishments can only happen when that person has been given the opportunity to prove himself. Although we are in a land of opportunity, opportunities are still very limited and many times they are wasted. Those geniuses that are labelled as jacks will continue to carry that label until an opportunity in given to them and they actually take that opportunity to demonstrate themselves. Even then there are those who cannot believe that a jack of many things is actually a master of them.

In the job market, there is a wealth of talent on the street because employers can't see beyond  preconceived ideas such as this. Like in "Good Will Hunting,"  geniuses are working as janitors because they haven't found a path of opportunities. In the movies, some of those geniuses have the opportunity to show their accomplishments to those who previously dismissed them. In reality.. I'm curious..