Skill demands evolve over the course of individuals’ careers, as new roles demand different kinds of skills from previous jobs. Yet, skill portfolios can be slow to change. We posit that this tension between dynamic job demands and durable skills creates career dilemmas for building the right portfolio of skills for long-term success. Studying a group of scientists in the pharmaceuticals industry, we argue and find that while specialization helps scientists to advance faster initially, it holds scientists back once they reach managerial ranks where coordination skills are required. Within managerial ranks, scientists with broader experience will advance faster since their experience will develop broader knowledge and more diverse social capital, which in turn will help them build coordination skills. While we find some evidence that employees try to adapt to these changing needs over their careers, such efforts to adapt are insufficient. Instead, we find that the level of specialization acquired while working as a scientist continues to influence promotion rates after people are promoted into management. We thus show that a skill portfolio built to help advancement at one stage of the career may hold employees back at subsequent career stages.
Chattopadhyay et al. (2026) studied this question.