What Skills Matter

What skills matter before I Know my final career destination?

If no one has told you this yet, let me be clear:
You don’t need to know where you’re going to start preparing for the journey.
Most of us imagine careers like destinations on a map--once I pick the city, then I’ll pack.
But real life doesn’t work that way.
What actually matters right now isn’t choosing the destination.
It’s building a toolkit—skills that travel with you, no matter where you land.

Based on my own path through biology, public policy, instructional technology, and building Black-Liberation.Tech, here’s how I think about the skills that matter before clarity arrives.

1. AI Literacy: Use It as a Tutor, Not a Shortcut
AI is not your replacement.
It’s your assistant—and how you use it says everything about how you think.
I teach learners to treat AI like a personal learning assistant that reduces cognitive load, not a shortcut that skips understanding.

• Context changes everything.
  When I use AI, I don’t ask vague questions. I give it my background, my goals, my constraints, my values. The better the context, the better the output.
• Verify before you trust.
  Critical AI literacy means cross-checking responses with trusted sources. Leaders don’t outsource their thinking—they refine it.

If you learn nothing else right now, learn this:
Your ability to ask good questions will outlast any tool.

2. Digital Literacy: Be a Creator, Not Just a Consumer
Knowing how to scroll is not the same as knowing how to build.
Digital literacy means understanding—and controlling—your digital environment.

• Create something.
  A website. A portfolio. A digital brand. A simple coded project. Creation gives you agency.
• Publish, pivot, analyze.
  Share your work. Pay attention to what works. Adjust when tools change. This cycle builds resilience.

You don’t have to master every platform.
You just need to stop being invisible in them.

3. Critical Thinking: Question the Narrative
Before I was a researcher, I was a teacher asking a quiet but powerful question:
Who decides what gets taught in my classroom?
Critical thinking is about interrogating what’s presented as “normal.”

• When I searched for data on Black women and Latinas in tech, I noticed we were often grouped with men.
  The real story didn’t appear until I pulled the data apart.
• Always ask:
  • Whose voice is missing?
  • Who benefits from this framing?
  • What hasn’t been named yet?

That’s how you find your lane—not by copying others, but by noticing what they overlooked.

4. Reading: Read Broadly, Read With Intention
Yes--read, read, read.
But not only what’s assigned.
Personalize your education.
Read authors who pour into you. Writers who remind you of your humanity.
For me, that includes voices like Zora Neale Hurston and Maya Angelou.

• Use accessibility tools.
  I listen to dense academic texts using text-to-speech while driving or doing life. That’s strategy, not cheating.
• Read across disciplines.
  Connections happen when you stop reading in silos.

Reading teaches you how to think when no one is grading you.

5. Writing: Make the Complex Understandable
I had a realization while reading Maya Angelou:
"I realized that I was not a writer who teaches, but a teacher who writes" .
Writing is how you clarify your thinking.

• Big projects are like combing through hair.
  You start at the ends and work your way to the roots so you don’t create knots you can’t undo.
• Outline. Follow the rubric. Revise without shame.
  Writing isn’t about perfection—it’s about precision.

Your voice matters. Writing is how you practice using it.

6. Presenting: Learn to Carry Your Ideas Aloud
Your ideas deserve to be heard—not just understood by you.
I credit 25 years of singing in a church choir for my comfort presenting.
Skills from your hobbies count more than you think.

• Use visuals.
  People scan before they read. That’s why my dissertation included over 20 tables and figures.
• Practice clarity, not performance.
  Confidence comes from knowing your material—not sounding impressive.

Every presentation is a rehearsal for leadership.

7. Remember This: No Education Is Wasted
Let me leave you with this truth:
Nothing you’re learning right now is wasted.
I used:

• Biology to understand systems
• Public policy to understand power
• Technology to build platforms and communities

Every skill went into the bag.
You don’t need a final destination to start preparing.
You just need to keep gathering tools with intention.
When your purpose becomes clear—and it will—you’ll realize you’ve been preparing for it all along.