Another excellent recent read has been the book ”Peak”, by the late K. Anders Ericsson and Robert Poole. The book is essentially a reader-friendly summary of the work that Ericsson had done throughout his extensive career looking at what makes experts as good as they are. As such, it provides some fascinating insights into many aspects of human learning and development - some of which are quite surprising. It was just by luck that I had also recently read a review on this topic by Duncan Chambliss entitled “The Mundanity of Excellence”. There are some overlapping themes here and both of these pieces are well worth a read. This blog post will primarily focus on the book but I shall draw any parallels where relevant.
What's it About?
As already noted, the book is a joint work but focuses primarily on the lengthy career of research that Ericsson had spent looking into the theme of human excellence and it is narrated from his perspective. He brings together the key parts of this research and uses elaborate examples to make the lessons stand out. There is probably one key message that he is trying to convey - the route to excellence is almost entirely through deliberate practice. This is a very empowering and a slightly surprising conclusion when it becomes clear how singularly important this principle is. The myth of talent is effectively dismantled and replaced with the evidence of the profound adaptability of the human mind (and to a slightly lesser degree, body).
What are the key points?
Perhaps the most important opening point is to emphasise this concept of human adaptability. This can be clearly seen in the ongoing improvement in human abilities in almost every field of skill. World records are continuing to be broken to such an extent that the world records of just decades ago would barely qualify an athlete for the top flight competitions of today. This is not because we have physically changed or evolved but because our training has improved. Indeed, Ericsson does not see any examples of a field where there is evidence that we have reached the limits of human potential. Such barriers as were erected in the past (he gives the example of the 4-minute mile) look almost comically pessimistic when looked back on now. The reason for this is that we are a species that has incredible adaptability, especially when it comes to our neurology, and this is coupled with an ability to be self directed. This leads to the concept of practice and the transformative power of it.
However, Ericsson is quick to point out that not all practice is the same, a much misunderstood idea. The gold standard is deliberate practice, standing at the opposite end of the spectrum from naive practice, with purposeful practice between them. Naive practice is what a lot of people might confuse for practice; that is, time just spent doing an activity. Examples could be the time we spend driving a car or playing a sport socially. Because we put the time in it feels like we should be getting better, almost by default. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Indeed, there are certain examples of this where skill may actually deteriorate over time as we become lazy or develop bad habits. Instead, practice has to have some additional features to it to allow one to develop steadily over time. Purposeful practice is the next step along this dimension and is typified by some notable characteristics: there is a clearly defined goal in mind, there will be focused adjustments of the skill towards this goal, and there will be feedback about the effectiveness of such adjustments. Also, the difficulty of practice will be in a sweet spot of being beyond the comfort zone of the individual but still achievable. All these features will result in a steady improvement towards the desired goal. However, some domains are also amenable to what Ericsson terms “deliberate practice”- the most effective form of training. This is seen in some of the skills that have been around for a long time with a well established tradition of training, clear objective outcomes, a competitive drive amongst trainees and a cohort of trainers who were/are experts themselves. A good example of this could be ballet, or proficiency at a classical musical instrument. In deliberate practice, a skilled teacher will be able to guide the trainee through their training, in many ways similar to purposeful practice but with the benefit of their own deep rooted expertise of the domain to hone the appropriate exercises and feedback.
Ericsson describes that the key underpinning reasons for the effectiveness of this training lies within the idea of mental representations. Experts are as good as they are because they have the best mental representations. These are the psychological models for the skill in question, and likely represent numerous models within models. Indeed, our limited working memory means that we can only hold a few models within our mental workspace at any one time. The expert has honed these models over years of practice to make them incredibly efficient as well as powerful. A tennis professional can integrate huge amounts of information about the flight of a ball, the position of himself and the opponent on the court, and the opponents abilities, all within the fraction of a second that the ball is crossing the court. An amateur may have to focus on making contact with the ball, think about his foot positioning and also be thinking about his opponent's court position - an amount of cognitive processing that one can not effectively process actively. Experts, in contrast, have excellent automatic processing of information that they are able to keep under close active review with their free cognitive bandwidth.
One final crucial insight that Ericsson provides is the dismantling of the myth of talent. Ericsson describes his detailed exploration of this myth over his years of research. This has included a detailed look at the many prodigies that have been lauded through history, from Mozart through to world class athletes. Despite some of their incredible abilities, he still finds the same story behind their success. They have become so good after many years of intense practice within that field, with no examples that he can find of this not being the case. He does concede that there can be a genetic influence in some abilities, and these are the most clear in cases where physical attributes give a definite advantage (it’s hard to be a short basketball star). There may also be certain difficult to assess traits that would make someone more inclined towards effective deliberate practice (for instance, some genetic predisposition towards concentration or the like). However, whatever your starting genes, you cannot become an expert without putting in the hard work of repeated deliberate practice and it seems to be the practice that is the main determinator for the end result. This seems both empowering and a touch daunting. On one hand it hands us all the potential to become incredible at almost anything that we would wish to pursue. On the other hand it reminds us that this is a very challenging path to walk. Indeed, Ericsson deconstructs the notion that you can just put in the 10,000 hours of time that was popularised by Malcolm Gladwell on the topic. Instead this time (plus or minus a few thousand hours, depending on the expertise desired) has to be spent undertaking a high degree of cognitive effort that is usually at least a bit unpleasant to do. There is nothing passive about becoming an expert.
However, Ericsson is quick to point out that not all practice is the same, a much misunderstood idea. The gold standard is deliberate practice, standing at the opposite end of the spectrum from naive practice, with purposeful practice between them. Naive practice is what a lot of people might confuse for practice; that is, time just spent doing an activity. Examples could be the time we spend driving a car or playing a sport socially. Because we put the time in it feels like we should be getting better, almost by default. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Indeed, there are certain examples of this where skill may actually deteriorate over time as we become lazy or develop bad habits. Instead, practice has to have some additional features to it to allow one to develop steadily over time. Purposeful practice is the next step along this dimension and is typified by some notable characteristics: there is a clearly defined goal in mind, there will be focused adjustments of the skill towards this goal, and there will be feedback about the effectiveness of such adjustments. Also, the difficulty of practice will be in a sweet spot of being beyond the comfort zone of the individual but still achievable. All these features will result in a steady improvement towards the desired goal. However, some domains are also amenable to what Ericsson terms “deliberate practice”- the most effective form of training. This is seen in some of the skills that have been around for a long time with a well established tradition of training, clear objective outcomes, a competitive drive amongst trainees and a cohort of trainers who were/are experts themselves. A good example of this could be ballet, or proficiency at a classical musical instrument. In deliberate practice, a skilled teacher will be able to guide the trainee through their training, in many ways similar to purposeful practice but with the benefit of their own deep rooted expertise of the domain to hone the appropriate exercises and feedback.
Ericsson describes that the key underpinning reasons for the effectiveness of this training lies within the idea of mental representations. Experts are as good as they are because they have the best mental representations. These are the psychological models for the skill in question, and likely represent numerous models within models. Indeed, our limited working memory means that we can only hold a few models within our mental workspace at any one time. The expert has honed these models over years of practice to make them incredibly efficient as well as powerful. A tennis professional can integrate huge amounts of information about the flight of a ball, the position of himself and the opponent on the court, and the opponents abilities, all within the fraction of a second that the ball is crossing the court. An amateur may have to focus on making contact with the ball, think about his foot positioning and also be thinking about his opponent's court position - an amount of cognitive processing that one can not effectively process actively. Experts, in contrast, have excellent automatic processing of information that they are able to keep under close active review with their free cognitive bandwidth.
One final crucial insight that Ericsson provides is the dismantling of the myth of talent. Ericsson describes his detailed exploration of this myth over his years of research. This has included a detailed look at the many prodigies that have been lauded through history, from Mozart through to world class athletes. Despite some of their incredible abilities, he still finds the same story behind their success. They have become so good after many years of intense practice within that field, with no examples that he can find of this not being the case. He does concede that there can be a genetic influence in some abilities, and these are the most clear in cases where physical attributes give a definite advantage (it’s hard to be a short basketball star). There may also be certain difficult to assess traits that would make someone more inclined towards effective deliberate practice (for instance, some genetic predisposition towards concentration or the like). However, whatever your starting genes, you cannot become an expert without putting in the hard work of repeated deliberate practice and it seems to be the practice that is the main determinator for the end result. This seems both empowering and a touch daunting. On one hand it hands us all the potential to become incredible at almost anything that we would wish to pursue. On the other hand it reminds us that this is a very challenging path to walk. Indeed, Ericsson deconstructs the notion that you can just put in the 10,000 hours of time that was popularised by Malcolm Gladwell on the topic. Instead this time (plus or minus a few thousand hours, depending on the expertise desired) has to be spent undertaking a high degree of cognitive effort that is usually at least a bit unpleasant to do. There is nothing passive about becoming an expert.
Final Thoughts
To summarise, this book provides an excellent review of the evidence behind becoming an expert. The formula for this is surprisingly straightforward. First, there might be some benefit to having a good genetic starting point but this will mostly not limit your ultimate final potential (with some physical exceptions). Secondly, you move towards your desired goal with a deliberate practice approach. This approach involves the support of an expert teacher who will help you identify key development goals, utilise exercises that will most effectively move towards these goals, and push you just the right distance from your comfort zone, all whilst providing focused feedback. After extensive time with this approach (many hours over many years) you will become an expert. Whilst some of the conclusions that Ericsson comes to are surprising (the myth of talent stands out to me) he argues his case powerfully and he clearly has a wealth of experience in trying to answer this question. Ultimately, I think his message is an empowering one as he reiterates how maleable our neurology is and how much potential control we have over it. You just need to be sure you know what you want to do before you set out to achieve it, as the path is definitely not an easy one.
Thank you for reading and, as always, I would love to hear your thoughts on the topic.
Tom
Thank you for reading and, as always, I would love to hear your thoughts on the topic.
Tom
Links & References
- K. A. Ericsson, R. Poole. Peak. Random House. 2016
- Chambliss, D. The Mundanity of Excellence. 1989. https://academics.hamilton.edu/documents/themundanityofexcellence.pdf
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