{"id":14437,"date":"2022-08-25T08:17:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-25T16:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/?p=14437"},"modified":"2022-08-26T00:10:00","modified_gmt":"2022-08-26T08:10:00","slug":"stop-improving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.scotthyoung.com\/blog\/2022\/08\/25\/stop-improving\/","title":{"rendered":"Why People Stop Improving"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the third lesson in Cal Newport and my week-long series on career improvement. Next week, we are opening our popular Top Performer<\/a> course for a new session. Check out the first<\/a> and second<\/a> lesson here, in case you missed them.<\/em><\/p>\n

The 10,000-hour rule, the idea that it takes about that long to get really good at anything, became popular after Malcolm Gladwell cited it in his 2008 bestseller, Outliers<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But does the research actually show that all we need is ten-thousand hours of practice to get really good? Not quite\u2026<\/p>\n

Anders Ericsson\u2019s work on deliberate practice was the basis for Gladwell\u2019s reporting on the 10,000-hour rule. Yet, Ericsson\u2019s research doesn\u2019t suggest that simply doing something a lot leads to reliable improvement. Instead, he found that stagnation\u2014not progress\u2014is typical and most people plateau far below their potential.<\/p>\n

Violinists who went on to become concert players and those who became music teachers, for instance, did not differ significantly in the number of hours spent playing. However, the top performers spent far more time engaged in difficult, skill-pushing work, while the average players spent more time listening to music and playing songs.<\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Similarly, research in medicine does not suggest that doctors get steadily better as they treat more patients. In fact, more experience might make doctors worse! They often become less effective as more time elapses since their medical school training.<\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Ericsson found that the difference between growth and stagnation was a process he called deliberate practice. He defined this as practice under the guidance of a coach, along with immediate feedback about performance. Without this, performance stalls.<\/p>\n

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Coaching + Feedback = Improvement<\/h2>\n
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