This is such a sharp, insightful post, Matt. It really nails a pattern I've seen play out countless times across different sectors of the tech industry. The way you've broken down "The Playbook" into those six stages is brilliant. It creates a perfect diagnostic tool for evaluating the next "hot" job category that pops up.
It's particularly powerful to see you connect the dots to demonstrate how this cycle revolves around a repeatable, commercially-driven strategy for creating market dependency. It actually felt quite spooky, after reading your piece.
I'd love to hear you expand on a few points to help us navigate this more effectively:
You mention that companies invent new titles ("Salesforce Administrator," "GTM Engineer") to augment their implementation partners. Could you delve deeper into the financial mechanism behind this? How much cheaper is it for a vendor to create an "army" of customer-side implementers versus staffing their own internal professional services team or truly robust support? What's the ROI calculation for the vendor that drives this decision?
You point out that not all new job categories are scams, and genuine innovation does create new roles. What are the key differences or "green flags" you've seen in the roles that do stick and become sustainable, cross-vendor careers (e.g., Data Scientist)? Is it the presence of deep academic research, cross-industry standards, or something else entirely?
For those who have already "bought in" at Stage 4 (The Loyalty Engine), what practical advice would you give them to start diversifying their skills before The Inevitable Crash? How can someone who built their identity around a single tool pivot their narrative and skillset back toward transferable skills?
Thanks for taking the time to write this, it's a valuable piece of skepticism. Looking forward to reading what you write next.
This is such a sharp, insightful post, Matt. It really nails a pattern I've seen play out countless times across different sectors of the tech industry. The way you've broken down "The Playbook" into those six stages is brilliant. It creates a perfect diagnostic tool for evaluating the next "hot" job category that pops up.
It's particularly powerful to see you connect the dots to demonstrate how this cycle revolves around a repeatable, commercially-driven strategy for creating market dependency. It actually felt quite spooky, after reading your piece.
I'd love to hear you expand on a few points to help us navigate this more effectively:
You mention that companies invent new titles ("Salesforce Administrator," "GTM Engineer") to augment their implementation partners. Could you delve deeper into the financial mechanism behind this? How much cheaper is it for a vendor to create an "army" of customer-side implementers versus staffing their own internal professional services team or truly robust support? What's the ROI calculation for the vendor that drives this decision?
You point out that not all new job categories are scams, and genuine innovation does create new roles. What are the key differences or "green flags" you've seen in the roles that do stick and become sustainable, cross-vendor careers (e.g., Data Scientist)? Is it the presence of deep academic research, cross-industry standards, or something else entirely?
For those who have already "bought in" at Stage 4 (The Loyalty Engine), what practical advice would you give them to start diversifying their skills before The Inevitable Crash? How can someone who built their identity around a single tool pivot their narrative and skillset back toward transferable skills?
Thanks for taking the time to write this, it's a valuable piece of skepticism. Looking forward to reading what you write next.