Six Keys to Being Excellent at Anything

I've been playing tennis for nearly five decades. I love the game and I hit the ball well, but I'm far from the player I wish I were.

I've been thinking about this a lot the past couple of weeks, because I've taken the opportunity, for the first time in many years, to play tennis nearly every day. My game has gotten progressively stronger. I've had a number of rapturous moments during which I've played like the player I long to be.

And almost certainly could be, even though I'm 58 years old. Until recently, I never believed that was possible. For most of my adult life, I've accepted the incredibly durable myth that some people are born with special talents and gifts, and that the potential to truly excel in any given pursuit is largely determined by our genetic inheritance.

During the past year, I've read no fewer than five books — and a raft of scientific research — which powerfully challenge that assumption (see below for a list). I've also written one, The Way We're Working Isn't Working, which lays out a guide, grounded in the science of high performance, to systematically building your capacity physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually.

We've found, in our work with executives at dozens of organizations, that it's possible to build any given skill or capacity in the same systematic way we do a muscle: push past your comfort zone, and then rest. Aristotle Will Durant*, commenting on Aristotle, pointed out that the philosopher had it exactly right 2000 years ago: "We are what we repeatedly do." By relying on highly specific practices, we've seen our clients dramatically improve skills ranging from empathy, to focus, to creativity, to summoning positive emotions, to deeply relaxing.

Like everyone who studies performance, I'm indebted to the extraordinary Anders Ericsson, arguably the world's leading researcher into high performance. For more than two decades, Ericsson has been making the case that it's not inherited talent which determines how good we become at something, but rather how hard we're willing to work — something he calls "deliberate practice." Numerous researchers now agree that 10,000 hours of such practice as the minimum necessary to achieve expertise in any complex domain.

There is something wonderfully empowering about this. It suggests we have remarkable capacity to influence our own outcomes. But that's also daunting. One of Ericsson's central findings is that practice is not only the most important ingredient in achieving excellence, but also the most difficult and the least intrinsically enjoyable.

If you want to be really good at something, it's going to involve relentlessly pushing past your comfort zone, along with frustration, struggle, setbacks and failures. That's true as long as you want to continue to improve, or even maintain a high level of excellence. The reward is that being really good at something you've earned through your own hard work can be immensely satisfying.

Here, then, are the six keys to achieving excellence we've found are most effective for our clients:

1. Pursue what you love. Passion is an incredible motivator. It fuels focus, resilience, and perseverance.
2. Do the hardest work first. We all move instinctively toward pleasure and away from pain. Most great performers, Ericsson and others have found, delay gratification and take on the difficult work of practice in the mornings, before they do anything else. That's when most of us have the most energy and the fewest distractions.
3. Practice intensely, without interruption for short periods of no longer than 90 minutes and then take a break. Ninety minutes appears to be the maximum amount of time that we can bring the highest level of focus to any given activity. The evidence is equally strong that great performers practice no more than 4 ½ hours a day.
4. Seek expert feedback, in intermittent doses. The simpler and more precise the feedback, the more equipped you are to make adjustments. Too much feedback, too continuously, however, can create cognitive overload, increase anxiety, and interfere with learning.
5. Take regular renewal breaks. Relaxing after intense effort not only provides an opportunity to rejuvenate, but also to metabolize and embed learning. It's also during rest that the right hemisphere becomes more dominant, which can lead to creative breakthroughs.
6. Ritualize practice. Will and discipline are wildly overrated. As the researcher Roy Baumeister has found, none of us have very much of it. The best way to insure you'll take on difficult tasks is to ritualize them — build specific, inviolable times at which you do them, so that over time you do them without having to squander energy thinking about them.

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Uit zijn onderzoek en gesprekken met tientallen managers in evenveel bedrijven concludeert Schwartz dat het mogelijk is om elk talent of capaciteit op eenzelfde manier te verbeteren als sportlui spieren sterker maken door ze voortdurend te trainen. De Griekse filosoof Aristoteles zei 2000 jaar geleden al: ‘We zijn wat we steeds opnieuw doen’. 

Die stelling wordt ook verdedigd door neurowetenschapper Daniel Levitin. Volgens hem en ook andere  wetenschappers bestaat er zelfs een magisch getal dat toelaat ware expertise te bereiken: 10.000 uur. ‘Studie na studie, of het nu om componisten, basketballers, auteurs, schakers of meesteroplichters gaat, telkens opnieuw komt dit cijfer tevoorschijn. 10.000 uur is het equivalent van 3 uur per dag, zeven dagen per week, gedurende 10 jaar. Niet één keer heeft iemand een voorbeeld gevonden van iemand die de absolute wereldtop bereikte in minder tijd.'

Schwartz geeft de zes sleutels die u zullen toelaten uit te blinken in wat u ook maar wil:

1. Doe wat je graag doet. Passie is een onwaarschijnlijke motivator. Het zorgt voor focus, veerkracht en doorzettingsvermogen.

2. Doe het moeilijkste werk eerst. Uit verschillende studies blijkt dat we steeds opnieuw de neiging hebben om plezier op te zoeken en pijn weg te duwen. Maar uit die studies blijkt ook dat mensen die het hoogst mogelijke hebben bereikt in hun vakgebied de minder aangename delen van hun dagtaak ‘s morgens al aanpakken, vooraleer ze iets anders doen.  Net dan hebben ze de meeste energie en de minste afleidingen.

3. Oefen continu en zonder onderbreking voor periodes van telkens 90 minuten. Neem dan een pauze. Niemand kan langer focussen dan 90 minuten. 4 1/2 uur per dag oefenen is ook een maximum.  

4. Vraag om feedback van een expert, maar met mate. Hoe eenvoudiger en preciezer de feedback, hoe beter je je oefenschema zal kunnen aanpassen. Te veel feedback heeft vaak een verlammend effect en vertraagt de leercurve.

5. Herbron. Relaxeren nadat je je hebt ingespannen geeft de mogelijkheid om te herbronnen en de opgedane kennis te verwerken. De meeste creatieve ideeën komen trouwens tijdens momenten van ontspanning.

6. Maak een ritueel van je praktijk. Discipline en inzet zijn overroepen. Wie moeilijke taken tot een goed einde wil brengen, moet er een ritueel van maken. Doe ze op een specifiek tijdstip en wijk daar nooit van af. Daarna hoef je er geen energie meer aan te verspillen.