I had a good conversation with a fairly new colleague yesterday, wherein she mentioned that she really liked working where she was and hoped to continue on … but she knew that she was working a bit out of the track her education had set her in and understood that someone else more qualified might come along to do what she does.

I realized something important (even Seth Godin-esque) in that moment:

What do I mean by that?

Most jobs you learn to do by doing them. Education is important—sure, we like our videographers to come in knowing how to operate cameras and edit footage—but what kinds of stories tend to create the greatest emotional effect, or what kinds of preferences a particular client has? These instinctive senses are things honed with experience. (There's a reason why people generally put their work experience, if they have any, at the top of their résumés.)

A favorite rhetorician of mine refers to this concept as metis—"cunning intelligence, [...] the ability to act quickly, effectively, and prudently within ever-changing contexts." And that's as apt a description of my work as any I've read.

Institutional memory is a huge advantage. As we go through our work lives, we create mental schemas—pictures of how different parts of our jobs work, of how certain work can be done well (or not!). It's much easier to adapt a past successful strategy to a new project than to pioneer a new strategy for handling a project. Both can be valuable, but the former has the advantage of prior knowledge of results and expediency. If your colleagues can say to you "this new project is a lot like [PAST PROJECT]" and you immediately have an idea of the scope and game plan you will need, you're that much easier to work with.

The more institutional memory you gather, the more valuable you are to your employer—though you do need to balance the learning of the past with an openness to new ideas and strategies. Stodginess is not a plus.

Cross-training creates more opportunities. Larger or more traditional workplaces might not have as many opportunities for this as I've experienced here, but I've found it to be true. Your past and present adaptability to meet needs creates future opportunities.

So maybe you were along on that video shoot as a non-videographer mainly to learn about the client, but you learned some valuable production assistant skills, gathered some ideas of what good shot framing involves, and got a better sense of the time involved in creating a few minutes of art. You take that better understanding with you into the next new project. You understand your coworkers better. You can talk intelligently about what they do and help sell their services. You can help out again more easily, if there is a need.

So don't be afraid to take on new tasks and new challenges—you're creating your own education in how to do the work and setting yourself up for future success. Even if you fail.

How do you think about job qualifications? How have you seen your experience grow over time?