Reflections: Three categories of capital

There are three categories of capital that one can invest in.

Knowledge, skill, experience

This includes what you know, what you know how to do.

But it also includes “experience” the kinds of tacit background that you only learn by interacting with some subpart of the world, and not just reading about it. Often, just having seen how something was done in some related context is more useful than any specific “skill” that you can learn on purpose. (For instance some of the principles that go into developing and running a world class workshop series, are directly transferable to developing public advocacy materials, or having participated in making movies gives one a template for coordinating teams of contractors to get a job done.)

Reputation and connections

The application of many skills depends on access to the contexts where those skills are relevant. As a friend of mine says, “It’s not what you know, or even who you know, it’s who you know who knows what you know.

Throughout most of my life, I tended to emphasize the value of skills, and didn’t think much at all about reputation or connections. This undercut my impact, and left me less powerful today than I might have been.

I’ve invested in skills that can help make teams much more effective, but many of those skills are not carved up very well by standard roles or job descriptions (for instance “conversational facilitation”, and “effective communication”, and “the knowing the importance of getting feedback, for real”). People who have worked with me know that I bring that value to the table. But most people who I might be able to provide value to don’t even know that they’re missing anything, much less what it is, much less that I can provide it.

Plus, relationships really are really powerful for solving problems. The scale of the network of people who know and trust you is proportional to your ability to solve some types of problems.

If I move on from Palisade, one thing that I think I should invest in is my semi-public reputation. (Possibly I should write a blog that is optimized for readers. Instead of writing for myself that I also post on the internet.)

Financial capital

Having money is useful for doing stuff. You need a certain threshold of money for financial independence, and spending money can enable or accelerate the accumulation of the other kinds of capital.