An M-Shaped life. Unlocking career success and Financial Independence
“Have you ever climbed a mountain?” I looked up as Nimit posed his question.
It was Madrid. About 10pm on a beautiful Iberian night. I was in my second year as a management consultant and I’d been sent to Spain to help an internet start-up. As was pretty typical for our company it was a lean team so it was just the project manager, Nimit, and me as the analyst.
In the two weeks we had been out there, if I’m honest, I had developed a bit of a man crush on Nimit. He was unbelievably cool. In his early thirties he had done it all. His career had started at Goldman Sachs before he did an MBA at Insead and came to us. He spoke three languages fluently, went skiing in Chamonix and lived in a flat in Chelsea. His suits were tailored in Hong Kong, he rode a motorbike, and he would get up at five every morning to work out. 5am!
I’d been aware of him as a big personality around the office but I didn’t really know him. Like most of us he was out of the office during the week. But, we all tried to come back to the office on Fridays if we could. I would slip in, grab a desk and start quietly tapping away. Niraj was different. He would swoop in and spend the first quarter of an hour or so wandering around the office cracking jokes and chatting to people. Even when he got down to work you could hear his voice and laugh from the other end of the office.
“Have you ever climbed a mountain?”
The thing is with someone like Nimit is you want him to be an utter doofus right? But he was good at his job. Really good. The more I worked with him the more I realised he was also kind and supportive. As a second-year analyst I was mostly consciously incompetent. On this project he took time to explain what I needed to do without patronising me. If I needed showing again he would happily do it and then check in to make sure that I had got it.
Like most nights on this project we had worked in the client’s office until around 8pm then headed out to the Plaza Mayor to get some food. I know, I know. But in my defence two decades ago the Plaza Mayor was less touristy than it is now.
We’d ordered a paella to share and it had just arrived as Nimit asked his question.
“Have you ever climbed a mountain?”
He didn’t pause for an answer before he continued.
“Amazing. Do it. Thing is, on top of a mountain, you’re looking across at the other peaks while looking down at the clouds.
“Want to get ahead? That’s what you need. Climb to mountain peaks of knowledge about a few things and look down on a broad cloud layer of lots of things.
“Do that, you’re gonna knock it out the park.”
At the time I nodded along to what Nimit said (I mean I wasn’t going to disagree with Mr Awesome right?) but I didn’t really understand what he meant. It took me years to work it out, and you know what? He was right. I needed to live an M-Shaped life.
Living a M-Shaped life
This post is all about that idea of living an M-Shaped life. I’m going to kick off by answering
What is an M-Shaped life? Before moving onto look at
Why living an M-Shaped life can help you defend your career against risk and
Why an M-Shaped life can help your career to take off. I’ll then share my tips on
How you can build your M-Shaped mountain peaks and
How you can build your M-Shaped cloud layer before closing out with a
So off we go!
What is an M-Shaped life?
If it helps then think of a M-Shaped life as being a mountain shaped life. An M-shaped life is similar to the idea of the T-Shaped life that has been kicking around for a while. The idea behind being T-Shaped is that you should try to be excellent in one thing and competent in lots of things.
The thing is, that’s too restrictive in the world that we now live in. Does anyone think that it is risk free to just be good at one thing anymore? So T-Shaped is out and M-Shaped is in. More precisely, be very good at a few things and also be competent in a decent range of other areas. Maybe the peaks of your ‘M’ won’t be as high as that of your ‘T’ but the trade off is that you’ll have more of them.
Let me give you an example in my work life. The peaks of my ‘M’ are public speaking, indepth sector insights, and a wide range of contacts. There’s no one in my company can match me in those areas and for the last two that’s acknowledged from the board downwards. [I realise that this is coming across as boastful – sorry!]. Even though those last two aren’t essential to my core day job, because I have those peaks they are now seen as critical for anyone who would do this role in my company.
The things that I’m competent at, my cloud level, include chairing meetings, writing reports, managing a team, managing a budget, meeting deadlines, project delivery and probably a few others. There are definitely people who are better than me in those areas. But, I can do them well enough.
Taken together those peaks and that floor make me pretty valuable. If my firm lost me then it would likely take a mix of people to fill the gaps I would leave.
Why living an M-Shaped life can help you defend your career against risk
But why bother. Doesn’t this all sound like a lot of effort? Why put in the effort to try to master multiple things?
The world we live in is changing fast. The things that we’re an expert in that allow us to be able to charge more for our time can disappear in no time at all.
When I started consulting a large part of my job was research literally reading paper reports and going to business libraries. I was known for being really good at it. By the time I left consulting 3-4 years later, Google had taken over and the ability to find out facts was a commodity. It had become a much smaller part of an analyst’s job. If that was my only key skill then I would have struggled.
Hanging your hat on just one specialism is risky. I’ve touched on my views about automation previously. No matter what you do, artificial intelligence and automation is likely to impact your career. We all need to find ways to stay ahead of the robots. If you can find a few areas where you’re really good then it makes you much more flexible and employable.
Even if one of our peaks gets eroded away you’ll have others to fall back on.
Why an M-Shaped life can help your career to take off
But developing an M-Shaped skillset isn’t just defensive. Being an expert in something feels good even if it’s only acknowledged in your department. It means that you’re asked for your opinion and listened to. It feels good to know the answer to things and to have a focus for some of your reading.
Similarly having an M-Shaped broad base means that you have the knowledge to be able to understand much of what is going around you. If you understand simple accounting you’re contributions to a budget meeting are more nuanced. When there is a discussion about product launch if you understand basic marketing you can engage more effective. As much as anything, if you know what’s going on then those sorts of meetings are much more interesting.
Where the alchemy really happens though is when you put you peaks and your cloud layer together. I’ve found that being able to have enough knowledge to be credible is what allows me to get around the table and hold my own. But, why people invite me back is because I can bring insights and suggestions through my peaks that no one else can provide. With what I bring, I can change the tack of a meeting or a conversation and help move things meaningfully forward.
When it come to Financial Independence, the important part of building an M-Shaped life is that it’s made me more valuable and flexible. This has made it easier to get promoted or a new job or to argue for a raise. And that means more money.
More generally I’m one of those people that enjoys learning. In my quest for happiness a combination of learning lots of things while striving for mastery in a few areas has brought me a lot of satisfaction. That combination is one that I also try to bring to my personal life. Even just starting this blog I’m learning a whole bunch of things that I’m finding fascinating while it’s simultaneously building my M-Shaped cloud layer.
How you can build your M-Shaped mountain peaks
So this still all sounds like a lot of effort right? How do you become an expert in something? Even becoming an expert in one thing is difficult, never mind more than one.
Fortunately I’m here with my top tips:
- Choose. Decide what you want to be good at. Most things can be learned, don’t assume that you have to have a natural talent. I realised that with public speaking. As part of my first job I had to make lots of presentations. I was terrible at making presentations so I was dreading it. I mentioned this to my boss and he sent me on a course. Turns out that there are lots of tips and tricks that make it easier. Similarly with industry insights and contacts. I realised the value that they would have do I chose to pursue them.
- Practise. There’s that whole thing about needing 10,000 hours to become expert at something. I’m sure that’s true but you can become better than most people with a lot less than that. Despite finding it hard, I took every opportunity I could to present. The more I did the better I got.
- Prioritise. Don’t try to master all the areas at once. Choose one. Feel like you’ve cracked in then move onto to the next.
- Promote. This may be something that you find uncomfortable but there’s no point being an expert in something if people don’t know. To take my peak of industry insights the value in this is sharing it with other people. I don’t do it aggressively but, say I’ve had a meeting where I’ve found out something that’s useful, I’ll send out a quick note to people who may find those things helpful. Or possibly wander over to a couple of people to share a nugget. As long as those things are genuinely valuable people will be grateful. They then often pull me into interesting projects which provide further opportunities to showcase my skills.
- Refresh. The final tip is not to rest on your laurels. Becoming expert in something isn’t a one off. Maintaining expertise is easier than getting it in the first place but knowledge gets outdated, contacts move on, skills get rusty. You have to keep working at it. Reading, talking to people, going to conferences all that sort of stuff. Once you’ve got the knife sharp you have to keep sharpening it.
How you can build your M-Shaped cloud layer
Given that the hardest bit it to build up those peaks it’s easy to forget to lift your floor level up. Don’t neglect it. In the work environment the value of being easy to work with is underrated. If you’re competent at lots of things, including basic skills, you’ll be easy to work with.
As a trivial example, I started work just as email was becoming prevalent. Now that people drown in email it’s easy to forget how transformative it was. Unfortunately, in the early days, there were a number of people who refused to embrace it. If they were senior enough they could get away with it (like the partner who got his secretary to print out all of his emails. He would then scribble responses on for her to type out and send. Those were the days).
For those who were less senior it was a case of adapt or fail. Everyone got training but then they had to get on with it. Those who adapted were fine, but others couldn’t get to grips with it and started to miss critical messages about deadlines or changes to plans. Their performance suffered and the cut throat reality of consulting meant they would either be sacked or would leave of their own accord.
So keeping competent across a wide base of skills is important. Fortunately I have some tips for this as well.
- Copy. We all know someone more successful than us in our chosen line of work. They may be in our company or they may be somewhere else. We can totally learn from them. Look at what skills they have and see if you can copy what they’re doing in your own context.
- Ask. There will be people around your office that are good at stuff. Ask them for some tips, or even if they can show you how to do something. I find people are often happy to take the opportunity to show off so long as you don’t do it all the time or take up too much of their day.
- Google. As in so many other things the internet is your friend. When it came to starting this blog I knew nothing. A combination of websites and a few YouTube videos has meant I built the basic knowledge to get started in an afternoon.
- Read. Yup in addition to looking online, go old school. I mean books. If you read two of three of the key books in an area you’ll have most of the basic idea and concepts of that subject. Read more by all means but in an 80:20 world you’ll have the 80.
- Hang around. The benefits of time are under rated. I’ve never studied law, but after spending fifteen years working with them I have a solid basic understanding. While I wouldn’t know how to draft a contract I know what questions I need to ask them and the areas to probe. That’s come from simply paying attention to what those more experienced that me have done over the years and realising what works and what doesn’t
Wrap up
There we have it. A conversation in Madrid almost two decades ago has shaped my life and turned into a philosophy that has supported my career. For those of us on the journey to Financial Independence building an M-Shaped life may be a tool to help us to move ahead.
Many of you will be very happy in your work and the trajectory you are on. If so that’s great. We all need to find what works for us. But, there may be a few of you that are feeling stalled in your careers. If you are then think about what I’ve said about an M-Shaped life. Pulling up some of your peaks or building your cloud layer could be just what you need.
Thoughts
Does the idea of an M-Shaped life resonate with you?
Are there areas where you think you have peaks of knowledge?
Do you work on developing a wide base of knowledge?
I work customer service, so my situation is a tad different from yours. But it’s a small company, and neither the owner nor the other people who work there are as good with writing and grammar as I am. So from time to time I rewrite some of our pre-written emails to make them sound a little more human/approachable. And I sometimes tailor the pre-written ones I do use so that the person I’m writing to feels specifically heard.
Because of that, I’m getting paid more than the other person who does the same job I do. I don’t know how much more, but it’s enough that my boss quickly had me stop sending my timesheets by company email “in case anyone sees and gets their feelings hurt.”
My boss knows that I will pretty much always go the extra mile (barring the occasional bad day) and knows that if I suggest a rewrite of an email or something on the site it’s probably best to do it. And he appreciates my putting in a little extra work. For that reason, he considers me integral and also keeps giving me raises even though I’m already paid far more than what a customer service rep should get. (Not that I’m complaining, obviously.)
That’s about as close to an M-shape as you can get with my position, but I think it’s somewhat analogous.
I think that’s very analogous. One big thing about being M-Shaped is to find those thing that you are better at then anyone else. That’s totally what you have done. I touched on it in the post but didn’t dwell on it.
Don’t undervalue what you do, the other person isn’t doing the same job as you (even if you have some similar tasks). Your boss wants to keep you and pays you more because you do more. That’s a great place to be, it suggests that he see you as more than a customer service rep, because you ARE more than a customer service rep!
It’s nice that you write about this as I only read about this from the tech community. There we call it Optinality. Check out Taylor Pearson https://taylorpearson.me/optionality/ and he refers to Nassim Taleb’s concept of anti-fragility in your career. Both great.
Thanks for that Akis, I hadn’t seen that post or read the book and you’re right there are similarities. I guess my take on it is a bit more focussesed as I argue that there is a benefit striving for mastery in a few areas as well as having a wide base.
In general though it’s clear that the more skills you have the more options you have. I can see how the tech industry would have embraced this idea. The nature of the role must mean that skills can very quickly get outdated as technology moves on so you would want to have a number of alternatives if you could.
Good post Caveman. I’ve not heard of these concepts before but see them in practice. Very good advice for anyone regardless of what stage in life they are at. Even once FI, building an M shaped life will continue to add value. I’d even say more so, in order to keep me focused and not “chill out” too much.
You’re right this is useful for everyone wherever they are at. In fact arguably even more so after FI. Working to develop new peaks helps to add purpose and direction to life and I read a lot about people who struggle to find purpose after they get to FI.
I would say though that there’s nothing wrong with chilling out for a while…with two kids I’m not sure that they’ll allow you to chill out for too long anyway!
Hi Caveman,
this post finds me exactly at the right time. I’ve been working in different areas in my career in software development, but I don’t feel I’ve reached a peak in any of them. It’s all clouds for me 🙂 I like the mountain peaks metaphor because it gives me something tangible to climb. I’ve just become a member of a ToastMasters club so I’m excited to build up my first peak.
When did you become aware of your peaks? Did you just follow what you’re naturally good at and at some point you realized those are your competitive advantages?
I’d love to read more about your approach to networking. How do you judge if someone would be a valuable contact, how do you engage, how do you build and maintain the relationship?
I’m glad that this was useful Kate! It’s definitely easy to keep moving forward in a career without really becoming seen as an expert in anything. Nothing wrong with that but it does make longer term progress more challenging.
In terms of becoming aware of my peaks they were all conscious choices around what I saw would be useful in my career. It wasn’t necessarily around what I was good at. In fact I was terrible at public speaking but I realised that in my career as a consultant you would not get far without being able to present well. So, I chose to work at it (even to the extent of doing some stand up comedy at one point). Like anything else, the more I did the better I became. I am a big believer that almost everything can be learned and that most people can achieve competence at most things if they want it enough and are prepared to put in the hours.
You ask about networking and that was something else that I wasn’t natural at. I wrote about some of my initial thoughts on how to start networking here and I actually have a follow up to that planned for next week! On your specific questions I don’t worry too much about whether someone is going to be a useful contact or not, I just try to make a connection. I don’t really want to invest time in someone if I don’t like them no matter how useful they will be. The flip side is that people careers can go all over the place as can your own, so just because someone may not be directly useful today doesn’t matter so much to me.
On your other two questions I explictly write about those in next week’s post so rather than repeat it now feel free to put any questions you have after that in the comments and I’ll do my best to answer them!
I really love this concept and find it very unique (especially as someone who has never “peaked” but hopes to….).
Thanks for introducing me to it because analogies like this are awesome, effective, and easy to remember. I’ve definitely heard of the “T-shaped” life, even if it wasn’t called that, and I can see why the “M-shaped” life would be more fulfilling and guard against hard blows.
You’re being FAR too modest! I reckon that you already have peaks. Music and home renovation for starters.
Like all of this sort of stuff if there are just a few corners that you remember than that’s good enough for me!