2016: MASTERY OF YOUR CRAFT

                                     
                                       

                                       Do you see a man skilled in his work?
                                           He will serve before kings:
                                           he will not serve before obscure men. ~ Proverbs 22:29 (NIV)

As we come to the close of the year, it is prudent that each one of us takes stock of what we have accomplished throughout 2015 viz a viz the goals we set at the beginning of the year.

It might well be a personal responsibility as we cross over to 2016 for us to assimilate the concept of Mastery in to our goals for the year; if only to affirm what we already know in terms of the importance of possessing a specialised and transferable skill, as well as the virtue of patience, persistence and hard work towards that end.

Author Paulo Coelho tells of a story, as narrated by his mother when he was a little boy, of how a man walked by a construction site and saw three masons separately working with bricks. He asked the first mason what he was doing to which he replied,

“Can’t you see? I’m cutting stone!”

He moved on to the second mason and asked him the same question,

“Can’t you see? I’m trying to make a living to take care of my family!”, was his reply.

He then posed the same question to the third mason who answered,

“Can’t you see? I’m building a Cathedral!”

While the first and second masons' explanations involved the physical nature of the work and meeting basic human needs respectively, only the third mason attached purpose or real meaning to his work.

This metaphor attempts successfully to explain that mastery of one’s craft in whichever trade or profession can best be achieved when one attaches meaning or purpose to it; that only when you are passionate about something can you be able to overlook any temporary obstacles while maintaining  course to the goal.

The cliché goes that professionals who lack this element of passion in their work will only work hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.Such people are susceptible to cutting corners in order to finance their real passion which mostly lies outside of their profession. 

Their heart lying elsewhere,they do not mind having their hands soiled by engaging in corrupt activities, and thus are easily swayed by any of the key elements in the fraud triangle,viz.,pressure, opportunity and rationalization.

Therefore,people in the various professions, more so Accountants,need to endeavor to attach meaning to their craft, bigger than themselves, if they are to maintain integrity in their work;or else they’ll only be mastering ways on how to break the rules without getting caught, which will be at their profession’s detriment.

It is said of Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb (who had failed 10,000 times), that he was motivated to light up the world at night more than anything else. Imagine how many more decades it would have taken to attain this had his goal been to light up his mother’s house, considering that he would have probably given up by the 20th attempt! That’s how important attaching meaning to your craft is.

Various studies have shown that one needs to have worked for 5-7 years in the same field to be able attain mastery. What should be emphasized here is that, routine work from 8-5 without any personal development or planned career progression does not count as mastery. It has to be purposeful, challenging to the mental faculties and aimed at a goal higher than self.

Though the 10,000 hour rule of deliberate practice to mastery popularised by Malcolm Gladwell in The Outliers has been challenged by various studies, and more so due to its failure to consider talent as important, it is still a close benchmark as far as objective self-review is concerned. 

Excellence is achievable as a result of doing the same work over and over and thus bypassing obvious deficiencies, as ways of improvement through incubation of ideas receive a conducive environment for their eventual actualisation.

Thus, the way new frontiers will be reached in any given profession is through innovation- providing better solutions than those already in existence. By filling a knowledge gap through research and continuous improvement, while endeavouring to meet a market need better than competition, progress can be said to have been attained.

In his book ,Mastery, Robert Greene emphasizes the need for creativity in finding solutions by fusing child-like wonder with experience. This is telling of many a professional who wrongfully imagine that experience alone is enough, and at some point in their career think that they know everything.

An education system that has solely appraised candidates based on cognition (What is) rather than meta-cognition (The why), could be their undoing.

Robert Kiyosaki opines that employees who excel from such systems, unless mentored early in to entrepreneurship, are usually at a disadvantage when they retire from formal employment because they are not accustomed to the consequences of failure. They usually have a false sense of entitlement since good grades have granted them access to opportunities over the years, and thus are not prepared for the real world in which failure is a key step in learning.

This partly explains why some will lose their entire retirement package as a result of bad investments, indecision as well as hardheadedness in just but a few years. Nonetheless, most employers are now putting in place interventions to try to mitigate this, for instance, through financial literacy classes.

It is therefore incumbent on the Accountant who is on someone’s payroll to have a goal-oriented plan on how to attain mastery of his area of specialization in order to ease the transition from employment to a self-actualised professional pursuit. For those already in practice, regular assessment of their growth and update of knowledge similar to the Trainee Accountant Practical Experience Framework (TAPEF) recently launched by ICPAK  in conjunction with PKF for Associate Members is paramount.   

We should also ensure that such mastery does not disappear with the life-span of the member by harnessing the experiences of pioneer accountants and according them more opportunities to share their wealth of experience acquired on their way to mastery. By giving, that’s how we are left with room for more.

The trainee accountant can be mentored towards excellence and mastery of their craft by assisting them to identify and connect their passion to the profession, and if non-existent, gently nudge them towards their real calling elsewhere.

Masters Degree

Napoleon Hill aptly defines an educated person as, ''One who has so developed the faculties of his mind that he may acquire anything he wants, or its equivalent, without violating the rights of others.''

Formal education therefore cannot be the sole barometer for mastery, going by the number of underemployed Masters Degree holders in the market today. Therefore, a person pursuing such a qualification should not primarily aim at rising to a bigger position at the workplace and getting a better pay, but rather should aim at attaining Mastery in a certain area first, and these rewards will follow for the rest of his or her life.

This is because the significant amount of financial investment involved while acquiring such an education might obscure the objective of mastery,as a faster return on such investment is prioritised.

Also, it is noteworthy that positions may be scrapped and income lost, but it’s the skill that one has mastered that will outlast any such eventuality and keep them afloat as others sink in despair.

Having said that, such a Masters qualification or its equivalent, coupled with sufficient experience aforementioned, will give the holder a peculiar perspective on issues that can only cement their position as an authority in their area of interest. I imagine a Doctorate goes a step further.

What I do not need to imagine, however, is the other qualitative advantages a Masters degree confers upon the holder: A curious mind is sharpened in such a way that one is able to follow up on any aspect of life to its logical conclusion. Put differently, for instance, if you find an author’s style appealing, you end up looking for his catalogue and reading all of his books; or if a musician sounds a little poetic to your liking, it is not unusual to find yourself singing to any of his music word for word after acquiring the album(s).This cuts across all areas-sports,food,religion and so forth.

It might be due to the conditioning of the mind to see the whole picture by getting to the bottom of the problem, rather than having dangling bits and pieces of information.

It is important, therefore, to have the awareness that you are on to mastering your work to expertise level, and that you are not just performing tasks for others for a pay.

A management approach that shifts from the industrial age definition of getting work done through others, to ‘Developing people through work’ will go a long way in ensuring that those pursuing nothing short of mastery do so more effectively and sooner.

Let’s purpose that by the end of the year 2016, we’ll all have made significant steps towards completion of our respective cathedrals.

P.S
Published for The Accountant,ICPAK