You know, I keep thinking about that old line, something like, “See a man skilled in his work? He won’t hang around with nobodies.” Makes sense when you really chew on it.
I remember this one place I worked years back. Total chaos, honestly. Nobody seemed to really master anything. We were just bouncing from one fire to the next. Management loved buzzwords, loved starting new things, but never really stuck with anything long enough to get good at it.
We had this project, supposed to be the next big thing for the company. I got put on it. Day one, I asked for the plan, the specs. You know what I got? A shrug and a “figure it out, be agile!”
My attempt to actually build something
So, I started trying. Really digging in. I spent weekends learning the tools we were supposed to use, the proper way, not the slapdash methods everyone else was using. I’d:
- Read the actual manuals (shocking, I know).
- Build small test pieces on my own time.
- Try to document what I was doing, step-by-step.
It felt like swimming upstream. Every time I showed progress, or suggested a more solid way, it was always “too slow” or “not flexible enough.” The folks in charge just wanted flashy demos, didn’t matter if the foundation was sand.
I saw guys who were good at talking, good at making slides, get promoted. They weren’t really skilled at the actual work, the nuts and bolts, but they knew how to play the game. They stood before the “kings” of our little company pond, alright.
After about a year of this, banging my head against the wall, I just had enough. I started looking around. Found a smaller shop, place that actually cared about craftsmanship, about doing the job right. It wasn’t glamorous, no fancy office.
But the boss? He was a guy who came up through the ranks. He could do every job in that shop, and do it well. He appreciated when you took the time to hone your craft. You could see the skill in how he approached problems, how he taught the younger guys.
It wasn’t about standing before actual kings. But it was about respect. Respect from people who knew what they were looking at. You did good work, solid work, and it got noticed by the people who mattered, the ones who actually understood the skill involved. You weren’t just floating around with the clueless folks anymore.
So yeah, I see that Proverb thing play out. Maybe not always with literal kings, but being truly skilled? It separates you. It puts you in a different league, eventually. Took me a while, and a frustrating job, to really get it, but I did.
