How to think about ‘prolific’

Prolific, by definition, is about producing much or being present in large numbers. When used as an adjective to describe people, the most common groups being described are writers, actors, composers, and serial killers. However, it might be helpful for anyone to think about how they can be more prolific.?

Why would you want to be prolific??

Because you want to have an asymmetric impact. You are only one person, but one person can make a huge difference if they do the right things in the right ways at the right time. How does producing much increase the odds of having an asymmetric impact??

Scott H. Young answers this clearly and succinctly:?

1. You get more chances for a home run.
2. Your quality goes up the more you practice.

Being prolific, or attempting to be prolific, makes sense to me because A) we don’t 100% know what people will hear (neurodiversity) and B) practice compounds (10,000 hours).

This is sort of like a VC investing in dozens of startups looking for just one billion dollar hit. Home runs matter.?

It’s also consistent with the explore vs. exploit trade-off. You can fine-tune your craft as you learn from a rapid feedback loop (assuming you develop a good feedback loop). Talking without listening will teach you nothing.

Putting writers, actors, composers, and serial killers aside, who else is prolific? I think of a few individuals I would consider prolific…

The prolific Multidisciplinary Thinker

Shane Parrish, founder of Farnam Street, publishes a weekly newsletter (called BrainFood), creates a regular podcast (The Knowledge Project), makes online classes (like Decision by Design), writes blog posts as well as books (The Great Mental Models)… all about model thinking. He attempts to reach a lot of people in different ways. He tries to communicate about his domain, multidisciplinary thinking, via many different mediums. Thinking about being prolific this way, I think we can apply it to many other crafts that don’t create artifacts as the end goal.?

The prolific Data Scientist

When I look up ‘most prolific data scientist’, a Google search returns lists of the top data scientists. What does it take to be a ‘top data scientist.’ It appears that the top data scientists are ones who educate others on data science (not exclusively, but the balance tips toward that direction). Creating a website that teaches data science doesn’t really strike me as someone that is prolific. However, a data scientist that is doing their own work and educating others in multiple different ways does fit my definition of prolific. While she doesn’t hit some of these ‘top data scientist’ lists, Cassie Kozyrkov consistently hits my radar. She, most likely, has a strong voice and influence inside Google. She writes on Medium as well as HBR. She creates videos, including MFWML that has at least 17,000 views). She’s articulated her ideas in podcast form. That’s a lot of ways to reach the audience.?

The prolific Nurse

Florence Nightingale was the first person Jess mentioned when fleshing out this idea of being prolific. Is a prolific nurse, one that sees and supports a lot of patients? That’s not how we thought about it. Nightingale was a nurse herself, yes, that cared for many patients. However, she also did statistics and pioneered data visualization to communicate her ideas. Wikipedia says “Nightingale was a prodigious and versatile writer. In her lifetime, much of her published work was concerned with spreading medical knowledge.” Finally, she set up the first nursing school (1860) which resonates with the idea of educating others about your domain.

The prolific Leader

Last, but not least, we consider the prolific ‘leader.’ Similar to our examples above, the prolific leader communicates their ideas in a lot of different ways (writing, visualizations, audio, video and/or face-to-face). What do they communicate? A few things. First and foremost, a vision for what and why the organization is striving for something. Great leaders, I believe, are consistent with their core message(s) because that makes them predictable. Additionally, they celebrate/recognize people and champion behaviors. In my experience, there is ample opportunity for most leaders (including myself) to march toward being more prolific which would both educate and inspire dozens or even hundreds of people.?

One way to think about prolific

No matter what you do, the idea of being prolific can help you magnify your impact. The first level is creating a lot (i.e. publishing a lot of books). But there’s a second level that might be more important; the key is to communicate your ideas in a lot of different ways.

You don’t necessarily have to write (in the traditional sense). We know that books, blog posts, and emails are all popular tools for communicating ideas. However, we have many options today. Podcasts can be heard by millions, as can videos (even videos of a great talk like TED). I also believe we will start to see new technology (leveraging large language models) that turns voice transcripts into good writing. Using these different options will force you to think about your domain differently, elevating further your understanding of the subject matter.

Finally, don’t just push a lot of stuff out into the world and walk away. Remember the 2nd reason you want to be prolific - to increase your quality. This likely won’t happen without a feedback loop. Listening - either literally or through the data - will help you to know where you are doing well and where you need to fine-tune.