Twenty Years of Experience: Reid Hoffman Quote

Twenty Years of Experience: A year of experience repeated twenty times

By Inspiware Staff Writer

Boston, MA | Updated 30 Mar, 2021

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“For many people “twenty years of experience” is really one year of experience repeated twenty times.” ― Reid Hoffman

“I have twenty years of experience. My beard is older than you. How dare…,”

Does that refrain sound familiar? Reid Hoffman hits the nail on the head of the conventional wisdom that experience is a great teacher and hence people with experience need to be head of the line. But what about the quality of that experience and the variety of experiences? Doesn’t twenty years of doing the same thing may increase the quantity of the experience but does it necessarily lead to the richness of experience and greater accumulation of knowledge?

Twenty Years of Experience: A year of experience repeated twenty times

Let’s assume you joined a firm as a business analyst. And you have been a business analyst pretty much for twenty years and while your title is a VP (Vice President) you essentially do the same work. You follow the same conventions, use the same tools, follow the same processes, and even your documentation is similar. You have not kept pace with the new developments – whether it is the march toward Agile methodologies or practices like DevOps or the breakneck speed of the digital transformation. So, what you have is twenty years of tenure where one year of experience has repeated twenty times.

Of course, if you are a brain surgeon you do the same thing – operate on the brain. But even though the work is same, the tools, the diagnostics, the methods, and the treatment options have all made rapid strides in the twenty years. While the basic work task – operating on the brain – is similar, everything else is different, new, and evolving. So, it is about the richness of experiences and the evolution of your techniques that matter. So, a brain surgeon doing the same thing is great – only if she is constantly improving her knowledge, skills, techniques, and adopting new technologies.

So focus on enriching your mind and improve in every aspect of your career and life. Do not stand still and repeat the same. It will be groundhog day all over again. Let each year add a new wave of experiences and each year accumulate progressively better skills in an area of your choosing. That way your twenty years of experience will matter a great deal.

Read Top 22 Motivational Quotes by Reid Hoffman