Want to be an expert? Build deep models

Abstract

Good news! This post is shorter than it looks. There’s a bunch of supplemental info in endnotes if you want the extended edition director’s cut. But it’s much shorter if you skip those. Summary: For impact, we need people who can really understand problems and then act on their understanding. Building deep models of a field is necessary for understanding problems and therefore developing expertise. I claim that researchers or strategists who want to have the most impact should spend a significant amount of time building these deep models early on in order to develop expertise as soon as possible. This could be 50%+ of your time for the first year or two, and then 10% or so on an ongoing basis.  It is really easy to fail to have an impact because you didn’t know something.