Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else

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This is a fun book that starts out in a vein similar to Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers". Later the emphasis of the book changes, and becomes a self-help book. For best performance, the name of the game is "practice", and not any old practice--it must be focused, deliberate, planned practice. This practice is not just for musicians; it is for every type of career, in business, sales, marketing, engineering--you name it, practice is what it takes. This type of practice can be mentally taxing, and very time-consuming--it normally takes years before a truly excellent performance is honed. An interesting read that argues that deliberate practice is the single most important factor in elite performance—far more important than genetics, "god-given" talent, or just the sheer volume of practice. Most studies I've seen indicate that human abilities are usually a mix of nature and nurture, and this book provides compelling evidence that, at least when it comes to world-class performance, nurture plays a much stronger role. Of course, genetics still set your limits (e.g., if you're 5-foot-nothing, no amount of deliberate practice will get you into the NBA), and this book doesn't tell us much about what it takes to achieve great—but not necessarily world-class—results. Nevertheless, it's a valuable read, and I personally found it inspiring to know that even the seemingly-superhuman abilities of the world's best performers are achieved primarily through a tremendous amount of hard work, and not just inborn ability. Here’s the thing: Being slightly better than your peers triggers something called the multiplier effect.

Talent is Overrated Quotes by Geoff Colvin - Goodreads Talent is Overrated Quotes by Geoff Colvin - Goodreads

Deliberate practice is the key to success in any field. It allows you to develop a greater memory for tasks associated with that field, as well as more extensive knowledge of it. This allows you to make careful and refined distinctions between things that others don’t notice, such as predicting where the ball will land based on someone’s body position when they serve it. The book then moves on to discuss what motivates the world's best performers to be able to do the intense amount of deliberate practice it takes to achieve greatness. Scott Rose is general manager of Impact UK Where to start? Sometimes, you just know it’s not working. The problem is you don't know why. The clues on the surface can be very clear: disengagement, poor... The best computer programmers are much better than novices at remembering the overall structure of programs because they understand better what they’re intended to do and how.” But what if the entire concept of "talent" was incorrect? What if there was no such inherent concept as talent? At least as it exists in its current paradigm. What then could be responsible for the competence of high-level performers??It isn't general abilities such as intelligence and memory. The research finds that in many fields the relation between intelligence and performance is weak or nonexistent; people with modest IQs sometimes perform outstandingly while people with high IQs sometimes don't get past mediocrity. Memory seems clearly to be acquired.

Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class

The real gift of genius is composed out of dedication, character and all-around inner strength. Even a celebrity like Michael Jordan didn’t rely strictly on talent, he pointed time after time after time, that his highlight started at the gym. Leopold noticed Wolfgang’s love of music at an unbelievably young age, which led him to begin teaching him how to play at the age of 4. During this time, he noticed just how well young Wolfgang could concentrate.But the time it took was not the only distinguishing factor. Those who were able to create great works practiced much differently than their counterparts who were merely average. They were much more deliberate in their practice. DELIBERATE PRACTICE Niklas Göke is an author and writer whose work has attracted tens of millions of readers to date. He is also the founder and CEO of Four Minute Books, a collection of over 1,000 free book summaries teaching readers 3 valuable lessons in just 4 minutes each. Negatives: chapter 10 promises to look at "why" some people accept to go through terrible training processes and most people don't, but it doesn't even scratch the surface. There could be a gene that determines the willingness to excel, or it could be that you get that drive while living your life. Truth is, nobody will know until we better understand how the brain works. Also, the author never seems to have any understanding or empathy at all for the majority of human beings, who normally get into comfortable daily patterns and dont give a crap about constant learning and achieving excellence. The book repeats much of the content we know about on extrinsic vs intrinsic motivation, and how, somewhat counter-intuitively, extrinsic motivation can reduce creativity. Dan Pink's books do a better job of presenting this content. As science progresses, it takes longer and longer to master any given field, be it physics, biology, or even business.

Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class (PDF) Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class (PDF)

Mozart’s composed his first original masterpiece, the Piano Concerto No. 9, at age 21. That’s a remarkable achievement, but by then he’d gone through eighteen years of intense, expert training. Scientists haven’t yet discovered what all our 20,000-plus genes do. They’ve yet to identify specific genes that govern particular talents.Talent is a concept invented by some ancient community. This concept is built on the fact that some individual is capable of performing some task better than the others. Ltd) • Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi -110 017, India • Expanding on a landmark cover story in Fortune, a top journalist debunks the myths of exceptional performance.