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The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

147: Anders Ericsson - What Malcolm Gladwell Got Wrong About The 10,000 Hour Rule

The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk

Ryan Hawk

Business, Careers, Management

4.91.4K Ratings

🗓️ 3 August 2016

⏱️ 49 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Episode 147: Anders Ericsson - What Malcolm Gladwell Got Wrong About The 10,000 Hour Rule

ANDERS ERICSSON, PhD, is Conradi Eminent Scholar and Professor of Psychology at Florida State University.  He studies expert performance in domains, such as music, chess, medicine, and sports, and how expert performers attain their superior performance by acquiring complex cognitive mechanisms through extended deliberate practice.  He has edited "Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance" (2006) and "The Development of Professional Expertise" (2009). In the book Outliers Malcolm Gladwell based his "10,000 hour rule" on Ericsson and colleagues's research on musicians. His latest book is titled, "PEAK, Secrets From The New Science of Expertise."

Have you ever wanted to learn a language or pick up an instrument, only to become too daunted by the task at hand? Expert performance guru Anders Ericsson has made a career studying chess champions, violin virtuosos, star athletes, and memory mavens. Peak condenses three decades of original research to introduce an incredibly powerful approach to learning that is fundamentally different from the way people traditionally think about acquiring a skill.

Ericsson's findings have been lauded and debated, but never properly explained. So the idea of expertise still intimidates us — we believe we need innate talent to excel, or think excelling seems prohibitively difficult.

 Peak belies both of these notions, proving that almost all of us have the seeds of excellence within us — it's just a question of nurturing them by reducing expertise to a discrete series of attainable practices. Peak offers invaluable, often counter-intuitive, advice on setting goals, getting feedback, identifying patterns, and motivating yourself.  Whether you want to stand out at work, or help your kid achieve academic goals, Ericsson's revolutionary methods will show you how to master nearly anything.

Episode 147: Anders Ericsson - What Malcolm Gladwell Got Wrong About The 10,000 Hour Rule

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The Learning Leader Show

"Deliberate or purposeful practice involves practicing alongside a great coach or teacher."

In This Episode, You Will Learn:

  • Being really thoughtful and deliberately thinking of ways to get better help you sustain excellence
  • Why it's so important to develop daily habits -- Being aware of the tradeoffs -- Using time wisely
  • The impact of Nobel Prize winner, Herbert Simon -- Anders worked with him for 3 years
  • Impressive listening skills -- How developing your ability to listen will dramatically improve your life
  • He has not found any evidence that shows that people are born successful -- It's learned
  • What does it take to be successful?
  • What exactly Malcolm Gladwell got wrong about the "10,000 Hour" rule
  • It's not just engaging in the domain -- There must be purposeful practice with a coach
  • Always operate on the boundary of what you can and can't do.
  • Why Anders and Malcolm Gladwell do not talk
  • Nature vs. Nurture debate - Family culture and interactions -- How they impact your life
  • A study of quarterbacks and their family backgrounds
  • How do you measure deliberate practice?
  • Creating the gap -- Where you are and where you want to be
  • Keynote speech - Think, Feel, Act -- We want to cover all three and most importantly change how you act
  • The Four Step Process
    • Specific Goal Set
    • Intense Focus
    • Immediate Feedback
    • Frequent Discomfort

"Always operate on the boundary of what you can and can't do."

Continue Learning:

You may also like these episodes:

Episode 078: Kat Cole – From Hooters Waitress To President of Cinnabon

Episode 082: Dan Pink – The Science of Motivation, Legendary Writer & Ted Talk

Episode 086: Seth Godin – How To Become Indispensable & Build Your Tribe

Episode 107: Simon Sinek – Leadership: It Starts With Why

Did you enjoy the podcast?

If you enjoyed hearing Anders Ericsson on the show, please don't hesitate to send me a note on Twitter or email me.

Episode edited by the great J Scott Donnell

Bio From Amazon.com

ANDERS ERICSSON, PhD, is Conradi Eminent Scholar and Professor of Psychology at Florida State University.  He studies expert performance in domains, such as music, chess, medicine, and sports, and how expert performers attain their superior performance by acquiring complex cognitive mechanisms through extended deliberate practice.  He has edited "Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance" (2006) and "The Development of Professional Expertise" (2009). In the book Outliers Malcolm Gladwell based his "10,000 hour rule" on Ericsson and colleagues's research on musicians. His latest book is titled, "PEAK, Secrets From The New Science of Expertise."

Have you ever wanted to learn a language or pick up an instrument, only to become too daunted by the task at hand? Expert performance guru Anders Ericsson has made a career studying chess champions, violin virtuosos, star athletes, and memory mavens. Peak condenses three decades of original research to introduce an incredibly powerful approach to learning that is fundamentally different from the way people traditionally think about acquiring a skill.

Ericsson's findings have been lauded and debated, but never properly explained. So the idea of expertise still intimidates us — we believe we need innate talent to excel, or think excelling seems prohibitively difficult.

 Peak belies both of these notions, proving that almost all of us have the seeds of excellence within us — it's just a question of nurturing them by reducing expertise to a discrete series of attainable practices. Peak offers invaluable, often counterintuitive, advice on setting goals, getting feedback, identifying patterns, and motivating yourself.  Whether you want to stand out at work, or help your kid achieve academic goals, Ericsson's revolutionary methods will show you how to master nearly anything.

Transcript

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0:17.2

Now that kind of ability to perceive a dynamically changing situation in such a way that you will be able to, when you get the ball, know what to do with it, that seems to be something that is very difficult to acquire. And you even have to be sort of aware that that is something that makes the best players different from the less skilled players

0:25.0

that they're actually able to read what other people are going to be here

0:30.4

maybe a second from now because it's going to take time for you when you get the

0:34.4

ball to actually send it somewhere else so it's not enough just knowing where people

0:39.2

are when you last looked you're going to actually have an understanding here what's changing.

0:45.0

Our leaders born or are they made. Our host Ryan Hawk believes that leaders can be

0:50.0

made through determined focused work on learning the art and science behind the makeup of other

0:55.3

successful leaders.

0:56.7

Now it's time to inhale knowledge and exhale success.

1:00.2

You're listening to the Learning Leader Show with Ryan Hawk.

1:03.4

This episode is brought to you by

1:09.4

by D'Or design. If you've gone to learning leader

1:15.6

dot com recently you've noticed a massive upgrade this is in thanks to the great

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leaders at Dior Design.

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So if you're looking for a new website,

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website update, SEO, social media, email campaigns,

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or perhaps you need to create a logo for yourself

1:30.6

or your business, so you're looking to redesign your logo. I cannot emphasize enough how

1:36.4

great the people are at Dayor Design to work with. I personally do not endorse

1:41.8

or allow sponsorships of this podcast for people who I do not either

1:46.4

buy their products or utilize them for their services.

1:49.3

And that is why I'm so excited to partner with, they are Design to sponsor the Learning Leader's show.

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