I don’t think the linked post implies that? Generalists are extremely hard to hire for, so the fact that those roles are very selective doesn’t mean there’s an oversupply of talent.
Also I don’t think of “generalist” and “operator” as synonyms. I would define them as:
generalist: you can fully trust this person to do basically any task, and to do the meta-task of figuring out what tasks are worth doing
operator: this person is good at executing on operations tasks, which are important and high-skill but do not require strategic thinking—things like filing the paperwork for 501(c)(3) status, setting up your org’s content management system, office management, setting up a hiring process, etc.
My friend’s recent EA forum shortform seems to imply that there is an oversupply of talent on the generalist/operator side also.
I don’t think the linked post implies that? Generalists are extremely hard to hire for, so the fact that those roles are very selective doesn’t mean there’s an oversupply of talent.
Also I don’t think of “generalist” and “operator” as synonyms. I would define them as:
generalist: you can fully trust this person to do basically any task, and to do the meta-task of figuring out what tasks are worth doing
operator: this person is good at executing on operations tasks, which are important and high-skill but do not require strategic thinking—things like filing the paperwork for 501(c)(3) status, setting up your org’s content management system, office management, setting up a hiring process, etc.