There’s a reason the unicorn is the symbol for something rare. This mythical creature has become a synonym for billion dollar startups, super talented employees, and other things that are hard to find.

In the web development space, people often think of those rare and talented individuals who can master both development and design as unicorn employees. However, according to Netalya Shelburne, senior manager of design infrastructure at GitHub, these kinds of employees might be more common than previously thought.

Shelburne joined Wix’s Now What podcast to talk about what it means to have a multidisciplinary skill set in the tech industry today and how we should reexamine the way we categorize employees and team members who are masters of more than one field.

“Unicorns should be as common as horses because they are not mythical … You can't leave it in the mythical realm if it's a very valued role people are filling. So, that's where I get pretty fired up talking about it, is why this? Why is it so special to get the term of unicorn when there are just a million different ways to be multidisciplinary in this industry? Why are people who do two things or communicate well across disciplines that have to work together, they get to be called multidisciplinary, but design engineering for some reason, right between those two, it's a unicorn?”

In the full episode, Shelburne expands on this idea and much more. Listen to the whole episode below and if you haven't already, start exploring Velo to see how you can put both your development and design skills to good use.