The good people over at Healthcare IS have put together an interesting slide share discussing whether contractors should be generalists or specialists. You can see the slideshow embedded below:
I especially like the chart on slide 6 which shows the way a hiring manager looks at the skill profile of a possible hire. It makes a solid case for why it’s better for a contractor to specialize in one application as opposed to being a generalist that can work on all the various applications.
Of course, this is a great strategy if you choose an application that sticks around for a long time to come. However, if you’re a specialist on an EHR application that gets sunset, then you’re going to regret putting all of your eggs in one basket.
What does seem to hold true is that people who specialize get paid more. I just wonder if someone can specialize in a certain vertical category as opposed to specializing in a particular software application. If someone becomes an expert at implementing lab software across all the top lab software, that seems to be a different way to specialize, but not put your skills all in one vendors basket.
The other way to diversify your skill set is to focus on two major vendors. This way you still have deep expertise in both software systems, but you still have some diversification in case something goes south for a vendor.
The other thing to consider when thinking about being a generalist or a specialist is that most people enjoy being a generalist a lot more than being a specialist. As they say, “variety is the spice of life.” Certainly, there is a lot more to the decision of generalist vs specialist than just money. Although, I’m certain that every generalist who’s out of work would give up that “spice” for a paycheck.
Do you see this trend in your organizations? Do you want to hire the person who’s most specialized over someone who’s more of a generalist?
There are at least two types of consultants.
“General Management” consultants are typically software system agnostic and tend to stick to providing advice and assistance in the area of strategy formulation, ROI preparation, objective setting and assessing progress toward reaching objectives.
Two or three days with an experienced consultant of this type can save organizations from false starts in the selection of software solutions. Many times clients do not know what their problems are with the result that they end up with the wrong solution.
I suspect these consultants work the same way we do, referring customers to implementation consultants who have specific experience with a particular software system.
IMO the days of the latter are numbered as we find more and more customer-configurable software suites that do not need customization.