How does a misunderstood quote about generalists reveal deeper truths about branding, perception, and the rise of AI?

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“…but oftentimes better than a master of one” is the complete quote of that famous passage.

Mind-blowing how taking things out of context, and turning it into a quote cited in hundreds of books and tens of thousands of articles, used to mean the complete opposite thing before.

Talk about branding and PR after!

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Dharmesh ShahDharmesh Shah • 3rd+Influencer • 3rd+Founder and CTO at HubSpot. Helping millions grow better.Founder and CTO at HubSpot. Helping millions grow better.12h • 12 hours ago • Visible to anyone on or off LinkedInFollow

PSA: Many of us have read/heard the phrase:

““A jack of all trades is a master of none”

And most of us (including me) thought of that as a ding on generalists that are good at a lot of things but not great at any of them.

What most people *don’t* know is that this is not the full text.

Here’s the full version:

“A jack of all trades is a master of none,
but oftentimes better than a master of one.”

Which turns the meaning around. Now, it’s basically saying that being good at many things (i.e. being a generalist) is often better than being great at one thing (i.e. a specialist).

I think this distinction is even more relevant now.

The age of generative AI is the age of generalists.

Part of:

The Author

Mario Peshev is a 5x CEO and operator, founder of DevriX and Growth Shuttle, global value creation advisor, angel investor, and author of “MBA Disrupted.”

His original background in engineering rode the wave of IT entrepreneurship in the last 25 years, from product and service entrepreneurship through acquiring and selling businesses, to investing in global startups like beehiiv, doola, the Stacked Marketer, Alcatraz, SeedBlink.

Peshev spent over 10,000 hours in consulting and training contracts for mid-market and enterprise organizations like VMware, SAP, Software AG, CERN, Saudi Aramco since 2006. His books and guides are referenced in over 50 universities in North America, Europe, and Asia.

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