What is the Core Competitiveness for Individuals

A core competency must have scalability—meaning it can help you develop more commercializable products (i.e., products you can sell).

A core competency must be useful: simply put, it should be reflected in customers being willing to pay you a price above the market average.

A core competency must be unique—difficult for others to imitate.

The author began exploring their own core competency back in 2005, building a blog and accumulating readers. In 2011, they also started offering public courses; although only a dozen or so people attended, it attracted some loyal readers. As those readers grew, they were invited to conduct corporate training, which in turn led to consulting work. With greater visibility came more collaboration opportunities—lectures, talks, and conferences. Throughout all of this, the author carefully managed their time, reserving as much as possible for research and output, and dedicating only a small portion to money-making activities like training and consulting. The reason was simple: they didn't want to end up with nothing but a mouth.

How to Explore Your Own Core Competency(Or more accurately, how the author turned their side hustle into their main business)