Would you hire someone with multiple specialized profiles?

[elamanim]

This is a question for clients.

Imagine you are looking for a software developer. You receive two proposals:

One with two profiles:

- Software developer

- Translator

One with only one profile:

- Software developer

Assuming everything else is perfect (a proposal, portfolio, reviews, work history, etc.), which person you'd hire?

[prestonhunter]

Obviously you hire the specialist rather than the dilettante.

[petra_r]

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Preston H wrote:

Obviously you hire the specialist rather than the dilettante.

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Which could be either.

[r_satta]

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Elaman I wrote:

This is a question for clients.

Imagine you are looking for a software developer. You receive two proposals:

One with two profiles:

- Software developer

- Translator

One with only one profile:

- Software developer

Assuming everything else is perfect (a proposal, portfolio, reviews, work history, etc.), which person you'd hire?

---

Imagine you want to eat a pizza with pepperoni:

- They offer you two pizzas
- One with pepperoni
- One with pepperoni and pineapple

Which one do you want to eat? Your question is basically the same. You are looking for a pepperoni pizza, you might like or not like pineapples. But if I get served something I didn't ask for, I'm not going back to the restaurant.

EDIT: those are 2 totally different jobs. Do you want your software to be translated in the future or do you want to publish it in multi-language? Search for a translator then.

[wendy_writes]

Look for a freelancer who also has UX skills - and examples to back it up.

Ensuring an easy and seamless user experience is vital to the success of any website.

[petra_r]

I think you are all missing the point 😉

The OP is not a client, but a freelancer wondering whether to create a specialized profile or not.

[tlsanders]

l find different people (and different clients) have different answers to this. Personally, it would depend on what I needed. If I went looking for a freelancer, chances are good it would be because I needed a specialized skill I couldn't cover in-house, so I'd lean toward the person who was focused in the specific area I needed. Though it's certainly possible for someone to be expert-level in many services, the person who spends all day every day immersed in what I need done is likely to be more efficient and perhaps have more knowledge of the infrequent twists that may arise in that area.

[elamanim]

So most if not all of you tell me that you'd most likely hire a guy with a single niche specialty, rather than someone with additional specialty? This renders this new specialized profiles useless if not harmful.

Now I specialize in Drupal (my profile always had been focused only on Drupal), but I'm also really good React framework. After reading your responses, kind makes me want to pass on specialized profiles.

[petra_r]

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Elaman I wrote:

So most if not all of you tell me that you'd most likely hire a guy with a single niche specialty, rather than someone with additional specialty? This renders this new specialized profiles useless if not harmful.

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I use two very different specialized profiles and have made near  $ 600 k that way.

Despite Preston calling me a "dilettante"  - it seems to work for me and others who know what they are doing and how to do it.

[elamanim]

Why I'm asking this question at all is that, while my profiles views were increase for the past one week, the amount of hires and invites drastically reduced. I'm thinking, it is because of specialized profiles.

I just wanted to know the client's side of thinking.

[renata101]

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Elaman I wrote:

So most if not all of you tell me that you'd most likely hire a guy with a single niche specialty, rather than someone with additional specialty? This renders this new specialized profiles useless if not harmful.

Now I specialize in Drupal (my profile always had been focused only on Drupal), but I'm also really good React framework. After reading your responses, kind makes me want to pass on specialized profiles.

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Hi Elaman,

A good point has been raised about different clients having different reactions. Something I've noticed is that, if the people who are looking to hire you have more than one speciality themselves, it won't be seen as a problem. However, if the person hiring you is an HR person or a project manager, it might be a different story. I've noticed that sometimes these people tend to be more narrowly focussed, possibly because they may have to answer for their hiring choices and they may not want to justify making an "outside the box" choice. These days, it's very popular to talk about creative thinking at work, but no one wants to be responsible for applying it to real world situations. 

I guess the flip side of this equation is getting invites from clients for various kinds of work that I don't do. Sometimes I have to get through a few email exchanges to get them to believe that I really don't handle some of the things they need done. Like writing 200-page consultant's reports with two-day deadlines. In cases like this, people can't seem to believe that you don't have superpowers. 

[sergio-soria]

I would hire anyone as long as they comply with the requirements for the job. A woman can be an excelent gardener and also be excelent at reading bed stories to her children. Why not? So I don't understand the discussion. Freelancers send the proposal focusing on the task they need to cover. If they are applying to a web development job they will not send a cover letter saying "Hey, while doing your website I will also translate it since I am a translator" At least, that's what I guess. They will not be offering their second area of expertise but instead just the one the job is asking for. I could hire a web developer who is also a translator as long as he/she does the job properly as a web developer. There is absolutely no guarantee that someone who only works as a web developer will be good.

That said, I must mention that people who can manage multiple areas usually have a wider perspective to see the big picture. Neural connections work differently, this is especially evident in musicians who can play different instruments and polyglots. So being able to manage different areas can be an advantage, one area doesn't necessarily block the other.