While I agree with the fact that an organization should be generalist heavy. There are some areas that I think there is no substitute for specialist, security and HCI are two areas that we rely on specialist to helm the direction, there is so much domain knowledge in both that it is money well spent to carry specialist in these areas. It looks like the author implied this by using the word culture, but I felt that it is probably worth expanding on so that the avoidance would not be taken to the extreem by a reader.
But would you want to hire a mobile HCI specialist? Or someone who is great at consumer HCI and will apply that understand to mobile within mobile design constraints?
My personal bias would be to hire the consumer HCI specialist and have them work on / learn mobile.
Yep, I agree someone that know's the principal of HCI to any problem set. In the technical world, were things move so quick they have to be able to adapt to new technology. I see HCI as a discipline unto itself and would not see the value in such fine grain specialization, like mobile HCI specialist. But I don't see HCI as a generalist.
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Avoid a “specialist” culture at your company
While I agree with the fact that an organization should be generalist heavy. There are some areas that I think there is no substitute for specialist, security and HCI are two areas that we rely on specialist to helm the direction, there is so much domain knowledge in both that it is money well spent to carry specialist in these areas. It looks like the author implied this by using the word culture, but I felt that it is probably worth expanding on so that the avoidance would not be taken to the extreem by a reader.
Agreed.
But would you want to hire a mobile HCI specialist? Or someone who is great at consumer HCI and will apply that understand to mobile within mobile design constraints?
My personal bias would be to hire the consumer HCI specialist and have them work on / learn mobile.
Yep, I agree someone that know's the principal of HCI to any problem set. In the technical world, were things move so quick they have to be able to adapt to new technology. I see HCI as a discipline unto itself and would not see the value in such fine grain specialization, like mobile HCI specialist. But I don't see HCI as a generalist.