Why Being a Generalist Might Be Your Best Strategy ft Julie Lavergne

What works for other might not work for you. What if your key to success was to not have a niche? What if tring to focus on one thing was actually hindering your path success?

Founder and CEO of 8Ball Clarity, the host of the podcast The Generalist Advantage,  former executive with nearly two decades in a global tech company and holds a masters in Engineering, Julie Lavergne is the quintessential Generalist who challenges the trend and notion of focusing on one niche.

Stay tuned for a direct and thought-provoking discussion on the beauty of the generalist and how it might be your key to success ;) 

 

Stay in Touch with Julie:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/julie-lavergne/

https://8ballclarity.com/

https://open.spotify.com/show/1tgDKNCnTxrLiXCe0n9u8b

 

Script: 

Choosing a nonlinear path is unheard of.

Every time I reinvent myself, I have to reinvent my brand.

I'm going to go and disrupt myself and prove that I can do this.

How do we help generalists understand their value and help them explain their value?

 The common theme was always like, oh, what about this piece? Okay, go do this piece. And then what about this other piece? Go there.

Having a generalist must be, it must feel like having like a cross-functional team in one person.

 We have so many interests. We want to do good in so many areas and trying to pick which one that with our limited resources.

Welcome to Weirdos in the Workplace, the podcast that celebrates authenticity, transparency, passion, and purpose. And of course, I am your host, Erin Patchell, and I'm here with the lovely, I am your host, Erin Patchell, and I'm here with the lovely, amazing Julie Laverne. And Julie is the founder and CEO of 8 Ball Clarity, the host of the podcast, The Generalist Advantage, and she loves to minimize thinking waste and help organizations, teams, and leaders to make better and faster decisions. You are in the right place, Julie Laverne, my friend.

 Oh, thank you. What a lovely intro and lovely podcast host. So thank you. Thank you. So question of the day for those of you who do not know Julie, which is maybe one or two of you, because you're very popular, especially in Ottawa. I want to get to know you a little bit. So tell me about yourself. And also tell me about like, what makes you a weirdo?

Oh, that's interesting. I just, I had a talk just recently. And all I did was like, why am I being asked to talk? And I realized is because I just make my own path. And some people could resonate with that. But I've often asked why fought the system? Why are we doing it this way? And I kind of like, why do those rules exist there? Why are are we thinking this way and so maybe that's a little bit of what makes me um good to have but also really annoying to have perhaps in the meeting room of you know going back of asking why um and so if you're asking a little bit of my journey uh it's I I started as an engineer uh because I couldn't fathom, I wanted to help people. Like this difference between science and engineering was like, no, no, I really want to build things that helps people. So that started with engineering.

 And then I made my way having a lot of different roles and made my way to HR executive and now founder. And that's probably what made me a generalist, but I'm sure we'll get into that. Oh, we'll definitely get into that. So yeah, today we're going to be talking all about what it's like to be a generalist, the journey to being a generalist, and how maybe being a generalist could solve some of these problems that we have in the world today. And I know that is of deep interest to a lot of the people who listen to this podcast and we're all very well aware um of some of the ways you know that our world is you know sometimes daily feels like it's imploding so true yeah yeah and from the macro to the micro you you know? Yep. Yeah. So, yes. So you went from engineer to HR executive and now founder. Julie, wait, before we go any further, though, like how the heck did we meet? Like, I literally can't remember.

I just feel like we absorbed each other into each other's lives somehow. I feel too. How did this happen? I don't know. I want to credit the LinkedIn world. How did this happen? I don't know. I want to credit the LinkedIn world. I find, you know, sometimes like like-minded, you know, people kind of find each other on there somehow. And that's, that's how, that's what I'm thinking. But obviously we have lots of friends in common. We end up in the same circle sometimes. Yeah. 

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