Are you an expert who fully uses your expertise? I prefer expertise over being an expert.

For me, this post has taken a while to publish.  Posts like this are a hot-button topic for many professionals in different fields. I supposed what I have written below is not going to win friends or influence people. 

I am amused when someone calls me an “expert”. Privately, I will question why a person would consider me an expert in my profession.  Maybe, it is because I have met “experts” and I am mostly not impressed.

I will admit to this, I am an “expert learner”. That is a title I am proud to receive from my colleagues and fellow industry professionals. I digress, back on topic.

Both personally and professionally, I am a self-declared journeyman and proud of it.  As a result, I will always be a journeyman and have no plan to be anything other than, say, a skilled practitioner. 

Prefer expertise. Does that make sense?  Does that connect?

I read that at different points in time, the sum of human knowledge and gathered information is doubling at an amazing pace. A recent post highlights my point.  It is mind-blowing and mind-numbing at the same time.  With all this experience being cataloged, no one person can be an expert for any length of time.

This has weighed on my thematic posts about “#humans_being” and “#showing_up”.  We have created a point of cause that has resulted in the pursuit of experts at the expense of humans being and developing expertise.

I want you to take a moment to pause on this point.  Could all the experts in a given field be wrong because they are so knowledgeable that they have forgotten how to listen, learn, and connect to others with different experiences?