Would you consider yourself an expert in your chosen field?
 

I know the question is a bit open ended.

Been reading and watching a number of things about people working on their craft or becoming experts in their chosen jobs and it is always interesting to me. Saw a few documentaries with a few guys...one is a famous fashion photographer for the NY Times and the other owns one of the world's most highly regarded sushi restaurants (it only has 10 seats).

It was eye opening how both of these guys made their work their lives...there wasn't room for anyone else. They are at the top of their game professionally and still are never content rest or even admit success. In the first example so much that they wondered if he ever had a romantic relationship in his life.

These are extreme cases but do you constantly work and strive to improve your abilities or what you bring to the table in your line of work? Would you call yourself an expert? Or do you get to that point where you reached a level of happiness where work maintains the life you want to live away from it.

Currently contemplating my own work life balance and I always find the varied perspectives of CP'ers compelling.

I can color inside the lines, show up for work with both shoes tied, and have 0 DWI's.

I'd say I'm easily in the top 10% at work...

There is ALWAYS room for improvement, but yeah. I'm pretty damn good at what I do.

ROFL

who's political office do you work for?

I do my job, but I have no passion for it. It's not something I ever anticipated doing and I don't want to do it for the rest of my life. But I'll probably have to. That's just how things have played out.

As far as being an expert, well, I have a lot of issues to work through. It's difficult to explain without going into my life story (which most of the old timers have probably heard by now) but I have to fight every day against low self confidence and low self esteem, basically an attitude burned into me growing up that I'm worthless and nothing I do will ever be worth a damn, so why even try. I think I'm fighting it harder now than I ever have before. But I'll never be able to think of myself as being good at something, or the best at something, and that's because I know I'll never have the ambition or the drive or the dedication that it takes to get there. "Good enough to get by" is about the tip of the iceberg for me. And I am good enough to get by at my job.

Yes, with room to grow.

LOL...expert? Ummm...no!

My profession is a jack of all trades kind of thing. I'm really good at some of them, weak at other aspects, shitty at being a mechanic and fab work. Most of it though is more management, and I'd say I'm pretty decent.

Unless you're talking about the part time tax work I do. Then I suck.

I've been doing the same thing for over 20 years. While I'm very good at what I do, I also know that you never know it all and there's always room for improvement

This is pretty much my assessment of myself.

Of course.

I've been at mine for 20 years, and I'm using all of the state of the art technology available that is actually worth using. The things I don't enjoy doing, I refer to a specialist, even though I used to do just about everything myself. For better or worse, in my job, you have to be an expert or you aren't going to be doing it for very long.

Changed roles at my company about a year ago. Went from being a data analyst (manager of a team) to a business analyst.

Still have a lot to learn in the new role and I am working towards a certification. Not an expert in the overall job but working of getting there.

nope. i scraped by on good luck and sleeping my way to the top.