Deliberate practice

Developing the ‘right stuff’

Chuck Yeager hit the nail on the head when he dismissed the concept of being born with “the right stuff” – maintaining that he got to where he did by experience and hard work. However, on any car trip we can readily observe drivers who have large amounts of experience, but are average, at best, in their driving skills. In fact extensive research in a wide range of fields shows that many people not only fail to become outstandingly good at what they do, no matter how many years they spend doing it, but that they frequently don’t improve past the basic level of skill they attained when they first started.

Hence there appears to be a missing ‘ingredient’ that determines how our experience develops into expertise. As the age old saying goes – “practice only makes permanent, it is only perfect practice that will make perfect”.