Amazon.com: Customer reviews: Talent Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else

Top positive review

Yes, talent is overrated

Reviewed in the United States on December 6, 2008

"Talent is overrated" is about how YOU can become a superstar in your chosen field. To be more precise it is about how others have made it!

Filled with interesting facts, this is the map for those who already visualize a high standard goal. Based on scientific research, you can rest assure that you will find the whole truth about what it really takes to achieve greatness. The basic premise is that those who started earlier in life have a greater chance of becoming the next superstars in their fields. The right kind of practice, not talent, is what sets super-achievers apart from the rest.

You will find examples of people who were able to go beyond average performance. Of course the strongest point the research suggests is that you need not have special talents. Isn't that great! Isn't that a great relief! No matter who you are, no matter if you have no talent at all, still you can become great!

The most fascinating example in this book is that of the Polgar's sisters. Polgar was an European scientist that decided to conduct an experiment on his children. He wrote a book about how anyone can become a genius and he decided to prove his theory with his daughters -hence the Polgar's sisters. After many years of very specific training the sisters went on to become the first women to hold chess grand master titles in the history of humanity!

So, with this book you can become a great achiever! The keys to stardom in any field are right here! The secrets are right here! Or are they not? Let's move on to...

Be aware that the book will be of special interests to those who are already on the path to greatness. The research suggests that unless you started very early in life practicing what you want to become great for, then you are pretty much in a huge disadvantage since you would have to practice a great more deal than most professionals practice. Only to catch up!

But professionals have been doing the activity for so long that they are trained to practice a great deal. An amateur is very unlikely to sustain that level of practice with out reaching exhaustion very quickly.

If your interest is to become better at what you do there are other books you could use that are more targeted to the average person. Two examples would be "One small step can Change Your life - the Kaizen way" or "Mastery". Both books can help just about anyone without the extreme demands of super-achievers. By the way, in my opinion both books have a more positive approach to self improvement than what I read in this book.

I really don't want to become great, I just want to enjoy the process and constantly improve my performance. It might not show but there is a slight difference between wanting to become great just for the sake of it, and wanting to improve because you actually love your activity.

Why be obsessed on becoming great? Why not just do what you like and devote your time and effort to it because you love it.

The point I'm trying to make here is that this book might not be beneficial to people with low self-esteem.

Life has much more to offer than just becoming "great". You don't need that kind of success to be valuable. Only passion should drive your art.

To sum up:

This book might be good for you if you are already in love with what you do and you do it to the exhaustion and you want to learn how to train better, and if you have very specific goals and if you are relatively young and if you are willing to sacrifice or devote most of your time and energy to achieving that goal.

This book is not for you if you don't care about becoming "great". If you understand the differences between being successful and be greatly acknowledged in one field.

Successful people are "complete" people. They have balance in their life, they have good relationships, healthy eating habits, exercise, they enjoy an evening in nature or in art and they enjoy their profession, their practice. They are not completely obsesed with one goal, and certainly not with greatness.

In a certain way it makes sense, people that devote their entire life to become "famous" or "great" or "champions" or "superachievers" very often don't build healthy relationship, don't devote time to their spirit. In reality, they are not successful, because they are not really happy and because they don't have real balance in their life.

Now, that doesn't mean super-achievers are not complete. I think many superstars are actually very complete persons. They have plentiful lives. But they didn't strive for greatness. They became great because of their love for their activity, their respect for their activity and their self respect.

Just enjoy your profession or sport or art! Practice, practice, practice! But for the love of it! Practice not because of what you can get from your practice, but to try to give your best to your practice! Life is too short! Live plentifully! If you are to become great, good, if not, good as well!

That's an area the author could have developed a great more deal. He could have written about the social and psychological consequences of working to become a super-achiever.

If you have more important things to do or if you don't have much time to devote to an activity or if you are not relatively young then you might not benefit from this book.

My advice is that you go first to Kaizen and Mastery. If after that you still feel the need to take your performance to a greater level then get this book or search for the original research articles online.

Another great book is "Way of the peaceful warrior" and its movie "Peaceful warrior" It is just about how to take out all that "success" trash that limits us instead of helping us improve. If you are interested in this subjects, I think you might very well enjoy the movie. It is based on a true story.

One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way
Mastery: The Keys to Success and Long-Term Fulfillment
Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives

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Top critical review

Critical reviews›

Jonathan D. Harnum

Geared towards a business audience, but worthy...

Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2010

If you're interested in the research and want a pretty easy read, I'd recommend Colvin's book, Talent is Overrated.Most of the relevant research on excellence was covered and he explained it in terms that didn't immediately put the reader to sleep. His examples from the real world were varied and interesting, and although they were leaned towards business heavyweights, there were examples from comedian Chris Rock, football player Jerry Rice and golfer Tiger Woods. One the things about this book I most appreciated is that Colvin was able to speak directly with Professor K. Anders Ericsson, one of the leaders in the research on excellence for the last 30 years.

Colvin's strength in writing about the business world is also a source of one of the book's weaknesses. The text is specifically geared towards a business audience, likely by design, because it's an audience that almost guarantees robust sales for a book, and with Colvin's notoriety in this realm, it's no surprise that this was a specific strategy. Nothing wrong with this, of course, but I found many of the attempts to connect the literature on excellence to the business world to be strained and the connections themselves tenuous at best.

This relates to another shortcoming of the book, which is that it's long on theory and short on practice, as many books about a topic this complex tend to be. We hear a lot about what excellence is, and get anecdotes and vignettes that help us imagine how excellence is embodied in the world, but when the rubber hits the road, when we need to know what to do if we want excellence for our very own, we don't get much help. Colvin makes many vaguely helpful suggestions, but most are general and abstract and not particularly helpful. It felt like some adult telling a kid, "Just do your best." Good advice, but not very specific.

The final slice of meat in this criticism sandwich is that we never hear an alternative viewpoint about the "talent" concept in the expertise literature. If you're out to prove a belief and are using research to back it up, you should also provide the research that points to the alternative hypothesis, namely that innate ability (talent) does matter. One key piece of writing on this is by Simonton in his piece (in a book edited by Ericsson) entitled "The Hidden Cost of Expertise." The Road To Excellence: the Acquisition of Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports, and Games, or The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance (Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology). The fact that this opposing viewpoint was omitted entirely is perhaps the most significant criticism of the book.

I would have liked to have seen more of his references throughout the book. Granted, this wasn't a piece of scholarly work in which every reference must be catalogued and clearly cited, so it might be a little unfair to demand this, but for those who want to either read the source material or want to learn more about a particular topic and/or ancecdote, there were many gaps.

Finally, I found I struggled with the tone of the book from the moment I read the sub-title: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else. This implies an exclusionary bent, which seems to say that experts are somehow fundamentally different from the rest of us, and much of the writing throughout reinforces this approach. It's my firm belief, which is supported by some of the same research in addition to other research, that experts are normal, everyday people who simply have spent the time and energy in ways that earn them the title of expert. There is no separation involved other than the behavior that anyone can learn to do. The trick is always finding the passion that will sustain the behavior.

If you're interested in expertise, this book does a fairly decent job of reporting on the research and Colvin brings in a wide array of examples from the real world, from disciplines other than business. The writing style is journalistic, so it's clear and concise and "just the facts, ma'am," so don't expect to be captivated by this writing as you might with Malcolm Gladwell, who has written a vaguely similar, though more entertaining book, Outliers: The Story of Success.

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From the United States

Rodrigo Carranza

Yes, talent is overrated

Reviewed in the United States on December 6, 2008

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Fr. Charles Erlandson

Take Its One Big Idea, Then Get Busy Applying It To Your Passion

Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2010

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Any book that has one big, seminal idea that impacts your life is an excellent book. Talent is Overrated by Geoff Colvin is just such a book.

Other reviews on Amazon have done an excellent job of providing details from the book, so I'll just summarize Colvin's one Big Idea: what separates world-class performers from those who aren't is something called deliberate practice. This is the big secret that this book reveals. What is deliberate practice? It is practice over a 10-year period that is designed specifically to improve performance, can be repeated a lot, has continuously available feedback, is highly demanding mentally, and isn't much fun.

So What?

That's the question we should ask about all such Big Ideas. The "So What?" of Talent is Overrated is that Colvin and others have unlocked part of the mystery of how we achieve greatness. Part of the "So What?" is also that Colvin helps debunk the myth of genius. Genius can often be a convenient excuse. After all, if I haven't been born with a certain gene or genius, then I'm not accountable for having reached certain goals. The concept of genius may become (but certainly doesn't have to be) part of our larger cultural flight from responsibility. Colvin doesn't argue his point this way, but this is an important application of his research.

For these reasons, Talent is Overrated is a very challenging and motivating book. On the one hand, we have a large part of the answer about what is necessary to achieve greatness. On the other hand, we may not like the answer.

Let me address the issue of Colvin's ideas and evidence. Colvin's research is solid and can't be denied. Therefore, we would be wise to understand and apply what he has taught. Some of the other Amazon reviews rightly mention that Colvin's research is, in fact, based on the research of by K. Anders Ericsson and others.

This is important in 2 ways. First, although Colvin's research is not original, it is significant. The article by Ericcson, et al. in the Harvard Business Review is fairly brief and doesn't elaborate or give examples. Colvin's examples of people that fascinate us, like Mozart and Tiger Woods, are important to us receiving what he teaches. Ericcson's book, The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance is more academic and original, but also more inaccessible. Colvin's work is an important popularization of Ericcson's work that has brought this important research to a much larger audience.

I want to address 2 other issues: what Colvin leaves out and how us mere mortals can make use of his research.

First, a few important warnings about Talent is Overrated. What Colvin writes is true and yet not complete. Human achievement is not solely the product of deliberate practice. An athlete or musician may spend the requisite 10 years of deliberate practice with the right coaches and yet not become world class. However, it is certain that if the 10 years are spent wisely, that person will have achieved at very high level. Ericcson's research emphasizes 2 other aspects that Colvin does not give enough weight to: deliberate practice must be accompanied by a succession of great coaches, as well as by a family or strong support system. A lack of either of these may help explain why some who labor diligently for 10 years never approach the very top.

Second, where does this leave the rest of us, those who will never become world class? Rather than despairing that somehow we may miss out by not having had the right parents with enough money pushing us early enough, we should apply Colvin's wisdom to our lives in a way the fits with our own vision of life.

Everyone who would pursue world-class excellence must ultimately ask the question: "Is it worth it?" The entire life of an Olympian, for example, must be dedicated to just one thing. For the single person, such single-focused dedication may be possible. But is it wise to pursue anything to this degree if one is married and has children? What else, possibly more valuable, must be sacrificed to become world-class?

Even if you don't become world-class in your chosen pursuit, the motivation to excel makes the idea of deliberate practice a worthy one. It turns out that the concept of compound interest applies to much of life and that those who start early and are diligent will bear much fruit.

My particular pursuit in life is that of a disciple of Jesus Christ, and deliberate practice has relevance here. I may not become a world-class teacher or writer as I'd like to, but my pursuit of my highest goal in life should be carried out with the same diligence, intensity, and passion as those who pursue music, art, or sports. In the religious life, or the pursuit of any ultimate goal, deliberate practice must be accompanied by a succession of great coaches, as well as by a family or strong support system. And anything that is of lasting value is likely to take a lot of time, be highly demanding, and will often not be much fun.

Interestingly enough, even teenagers can benefit from these idea. I used parts of Talent is Overrated in a high school Biblical Ethics class I taught, and it intrigued and challenged my students.

My advice is to read this book, ingest its one Big Idea, and then get to work in applying it to your own vision and passion!

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staicovici

Looking in the mirror : generally unspoken truth finally becomes readable. A personal testimony.

Reviewed in the United States on May 16, 2014

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In this book the author makes constant reference to a selection of high-profile fields ; among those, piano playing. Thus numerous examples are used from the instrumental practice to make a number of points. For a classically trained, young-age starter professional pianist with extra long studies in a handful of musical domains at the highest level, the book hits home grand style.
In fact, reading it took me through a journey of staring in the mirror. I literally grew up transcending every one of the myths presented here, gradually learning to separate hard truth from alleged misconceptions. So here's a personal testimony in this sense, based on my own hard truth. The following may seem subjective ; indeed I believe it is. But think of it as the exact counterpart to support the findings in the book with actual life experience from someone who's ever been there (and will no doubt forever be).

My journey started at age 4 as the 3rd generation of professional musicians - grandfather and both parents. Therefore I can wholeheartedly support Mr. Colvin's assertions regarding long-term professional building : they're all true and I've known them all.
The supporting family with a naturally oriented bias towards a given field : music ; the constant availability of all forms of material therein : records, scores, training at home by both parents, answers available to any question, guidance and follow-up ; the long years of "drought" as I labeled them - during which one continues to practice an instrument not by pure personal choice but rather because it's so normal, so ingrained in family values that nobody even thinks it could be otherwise (drought means you get almost no pleasure in so doing, it's a constraint. Pleasure comes years later) ; the constant help and feedback from trained, sensitive and, may I add, unforgiving ears ; the double peer pressure - at home as stated and in musical school, where most of the others also are early go-getters in permanent competition for attention, rewards and so on.

So how do you do it ? Here are a few answers. Dig within yourself to find the patience needed to pour in the long hours when no or so little juicy pleasure comes out of them. Try to believe your elders when they keep assuring you that the base you are currently building will forever serve you and place you among the highest achievers in music. Accept to forfeit football games with friends, Sunday mountain excursions, prolonged breaks in week-ends and many of childhood's perks. As the author writes, it may seem barbarous. But reinforce yourself every Monday morning in school, seeing all the other ambitious youngsters around striving likewise towards the same goals. Try to inhale the positive of competitiveness and let it drive you to do more and better. As you finally grow to understand what you're in, you will distinguish your advantages : your advance compared to some others, your self-assurance in performing, your emerging image as a local heavyweight, your future options. Around 14 or 15 things start to be exciting. Instinct tells you you're on the right path. Go on like that for years and yes, you do become a different person as Colvin states. He says the 10 year rule is nothing great comes before that. I would add this : no real pleasure in the meantime either.

But I believe the most important is this : the flow concept discussed in the book. That's where the bulk of it all hit me in the stomach. The day some hidden door opens in your brain and you suddenly witness yourself playing AS YOU WANTED, doing exactly what you hoped for and matching reality with dreams - that day you will never forget. That day I guarantee you will be happy. You will cry with happiness as you play the music, fly on its wings and forget yourself in the process. forget about time, about the noise you make, about the neighbors, even about your teacher's advice etc. When you flow with it, you'll know it. There's no description to match. Flow is the ultimate motivator ; your first-ever flow, a defining experience. Once you taste it, it all will have been worthwile : 10 years of drought, 4 to 6 daily hours of work and concentration on the instrument AND other subjects ; sacrificed week-ends and terrorizing from unforgiving teachers. Mozart did it, Woods did it, they all did it.
And whether history acknowledges you or not, if you've got it you actually don't care. Of course glory is not an achievement ; it's meant to convince others about something. When you really have it, convincing becomes irrelevant.

It's so good to have it all written in words. To me this is more than a book ; it is the chronicle of my story. Thank you Mr Colvin.

PAUL C. STAICU

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Robert Tsai

Overrated Talent and Investing in the Credit Crisis

Reviewed in the United States on April 7, 2009

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Colvin's message in his recent book is very democratic. Everyone can be great. You just have to want it badly enough. And, you have to be smart about how you devote your energy to chasing it.

One of his anecdotes struck home to me in a very personal way. In describing how most people practice golf, he tells the story of his own practice methodology. He goes to the driving range, hits his irons at a pretend green with a fake flag. Takes a bunch of swings. Goes home. The problem with this methodology is it doesn't lead to improvement. You just reinforce your bad habits. And you never get better.
'Contrast that with Tiger Woods' practice routine, where he may take a ball, smash it deep into the bunker, and practice chipping onto the green hundreds of times a week, in the knowledge that a few times a year, that shot could make all the difference. It's tough, and generally no fun practicing for a shot that you might only see a few times a year (and that's for a pro golfer who is playing tons of rounds).

In order to get better (or great) at something, you need to do "deliberate practice", which is quite different from how we typically think of practice. It involves identifying quantitatively and objectively what "better" really is, and following a structured method to achieving that "better." I think his argument carries more weight in fields where "better" can be measured. Sports, for example, where bigger, stronger, faster can all be measured in pounds, seconds and points.

But how does greatness manifest itself in business and finance?

It is especially deceptive in stock picking, as this recent financial meltdown has shown that many great managers, whom we adulated as superstars, were not able to navigate their portfolios in this bear market. So people who were perceived at one time to be great turned out to be not-so-great.

One of my favorite financial bloggers, Trader Mark, has chronicled the performance of erstwhile fund manager extraordinaire Bill Miller, whose investment strategy achieved stellar returns for years before unraveling during the credit crisis.

And so it's clear that performance matters, but also the risk taken to achieve that performance. Modern portfolio theory typically uses volatility of returns as a proxy for measuring risk.

But if you look at Nassim Taleb's Rule #4 from his 1997 tome Fooled By Randomness, "Beware of the trader who makes steady income. Those tend to blow up. Traders with very frequent losses might hurt you, but they are not likely to blow you up. Long volatility traders lose money most days of the week." So if you were running a fund and improved your performance by writing put options in a bull market, you look like a champ, until the market tanks and wipes out your years of gains and then some. Or if you're an insurance subsidiary like AIG Financial Products, you write Credit Default Swaps that you have no ability to pay if the trades go bad. In the early years of the bull market, your selling volatility looks like a great trade. You collect steady and consistent premium. So it looks like performance added at no measured risk (no volatility because the options are expiring worthless to the buyer). But, of course, there was risk and the risk comes to roost when the market tanks.

So it makes us ask, what does Colvin's notion of Deliberate Practice look like in the world of investing? I'll pose the question here - and welcome comments to continue that conversation.

From my blog entry:
[...]

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Coert Visser

Deliberate practice stretches you

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2008

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I intended to write a review of Malcolm Galdwell's book Outliers: The Story of Success but I came across this book and I was surprised to find I like this book more (which is not to say that I don't like Outliers by the way). The book not only debugs the talent myth, the believe that talent is a dominant factor in high achievement (which Gladwell has done too in several publications). It also operationalizes the concept of deliberate practice. This concept was introduced by Anders Ericsson, a leading researcher in the field of expertise development. Colvin explains that deliberate practice can be described by these five characteristics:

1. It's designed specifically to improve performance
2. It can be repeated a lot
3. Feedback on results is continously available
4. It's highly demanding mentally
5. It isn't much fun

Deliberate practice is hard and not particularly enjoyable because it means you are focusing on improving areas in your performance that are not satisfactory. Thus, it stretches you. If you'll be able to do deliberate practice, you'll benefit by becoming better. Especially if you'll be able to keep it up for extremely long periods of time. Much research has shown that top performance in a wide array of fields is always based on an extreme amount of deliberate practice. It is hard to find a top performer in any field that has not been working extremely hard to get there. What does 'extremely hard' mean? Well, researchers Herbert Simon and Allen Newel used to say that you need at least 10 years before reaching top performance. Now, researchers have refined their estimate, saying coming up with a figure of 10000 hours. An interesting thing about deliberate practice is that its effect is cumulative. You can compare it with a road you're traveling on. Any distance you have travelled on that road counts. So, if you have started at an early age, this will lead to an advantage over someone who started later.

The book is written by a journalist, not a scholar. And it is well written and the journalist has done a good job in doing his homework. It is full of relevant references to research. It deals with the subject matter in a nuanced and informative way. Overall, it is very convincing.

If I had a say, I'd change two things in the second edition of this book. First, I'd change one section in chapter 1 in which the author talks about the abundance of financial resources. It seems a bit odd to read about that now, when this major economic crisis is hitting us. Second, I'd mention the work by Mindset: The New Psychology of Success . The authors remarks in the last chapter refer so clealry to her body of research. In such a well documented book as this is, this is an omission. One last comment: I would have liked this title better for this book: DELIBERATE PRACTICE.

CONCLUSION: a terrific and thought provoking book. I am glad I have read this. It triggers many thoughts and invites you to take action.

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Amazon Customer

Rethinking the Concept of "Talent"

Reviewed in the United States on November 30, 2016

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Colvins main argument in this book, which goes against most people's beliefs, is that becoming great at something is not dependent on natural talents, but rather many hours of deliberate practice over decades. Deliberate practice is focused practice designed to improve specific needs. It “can be repeated a lot; feedback on results is continuously available, and it is highly demanding mentally” (66).
The book showcases countless examples of how high achievers train and work on their craft. Many of the examples of people who have achieved success are well-known individuals. Colvin explains that even “child geniuses” that are renowned for their incredible achievements from a young age, such as Mozart and Tiger Woods, were not born doing these things. The subjects used as examples range from the 1700s to today, and from the fields of sports to music to business. The wide range of evidence helps to prove how universal the need for deliberate practice is, and certainly helps his other claims.
The people cited in this paper are inspirational to many, and appeal to different reader’s interests. For example, as someone interested in financial investing, learning about Warren Buffett's interests and work ethic is very intriguing to me. Colvin explains the long process that Buffett went through to achieve success and his ventures along the way. Buffett learned as much as he could about the field of investing and eventually was able to “accumulate a world-class record for performance” (35).
It is proven that general abilities such as intelligence or memory are not great indicators of success, which is an assumption that many make. This delves even more into the idea that talent is unimportant. As far as the structure goes, the reader can flip to any chapter and get an explanation about an aspect of great performance or an application of it. The writing can be bland at times, but flows well and is easy to read, as the prose showcases the author’s vocabulary without making his explanations difficult to understand.
This book still certainly has its fair share of issues. Colvin does not talk about the importance of environment much at all, and doesn’t recognize that many people don’t have access to good mentors and coaches or are able to get feedback on their work. He fails to realize that having a lucky break or good connections often have a huge influence on people’s success.
Overall, the book brings a new perspective to a widely accepted view that is prevalent in every one of our lives. Colvin explains and helps people understand how some are able to achieve great success at what they do. The book is very valuable, and can help anyone to become better and more efficient at what they do for a living. It shows you that is never too late to push yourself and work on becoming extraordinary.

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Jonathan D. Harnum

Geared towards a business audience, but worthy...

Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2010

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If you're interested in the research and want a pretty easy read, I'd recommend Colvin's book, Talent is Overrated.Most of the relevant research on excellence was covered and he explained it in terms that didn't immediately put the reader to sleep. His examples from the real world were varied and interesting, and although they were leaned towards business heavyweights, there were examples from comedian Chris Rock, football player Jerry Rice and golfer Tiger Woods. One the things about this book I most appreciated is that Colvin was able to speak directly with Professor K. Anders Ericsson, one of the leaders in the research on excellence for the last 30 years.

Colvin's strength in writing about the business world is also a source of one of the book's weaknesses. The text is specifically geared towards a business audience, likely by design, because it's an audience that almost guarantees robust sales for a book, and with Colvin's notoriety in this realm, it's no surprise that this was a specific strategy. Nothing wrong with this, of course, but I found many of the attempts to connect the literature on excellence to the business world to be strained and the connections themselves tenuous at best.

This relates to another shortcoming of the book, which is that it's long on theory and short on practice, as many books about a topic this complex tend to be. We hear a lot about what excellence is, and get anecdotes and vignettes that help us imagine how excellence is embodied in the world, but when the rubber hits the road, when we need to know what to do if we want excellence for our very own, we don't get much help. Colvin makes many vaguely helpful suggestions, but most are general and abstract and not particularly helpful. It felt like some adult telling a kid, "Just do your best." Good advice, but not very specific.

The final slice of meat in this criticism sandwich is that we never hear an alternative viewpoint about the "talent" concept in the expertise literature. If you're out to prove a belief and are using research to back it up, you should also provide the research that points to the alternative hypothesis, namely that innate ability (talent) does matter. One key piece of writing on this is by Simonton in his piece (in a book edited by Ericsson) entitled "The Hidden Cost of Expertise." The Road To Excellence: the Acquisition of Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports, and Games , or The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance (Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology) . The fact that this opposing viewpoint was omitted entirely is perhaps the most significant criticism of the book.

I would have liked to have seen more of his references throughout the book. Granted, this wasn't a piece of scholarly work in which every reference must be catalogued and clearly cited, so it might be a little unfair to demand this, but for those who want to either read the source material or want to learn more about a particular topic and/or ancecdote, there were many gaps.

Finally, I found I struggled with the tone of the book from the moment I read the sub-title: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else. This implies an exclusionary bent, which seems to say that experts are somehow fundamentally different from the rest of us, and much of the writing throughout reinforces this approach. It's my firm belief, which is supported by some of the same research in addition to other research, that experts are normal, everyday people who simply have spent the time and energy in ways that earn them the title of expert. There is no separation involved other than the behavior that anyone can learn to do. The trick is always finding the passion that will sustain the behavior.

If you're interested in expertise, this book does a fairly decent job of reporting on the research and Colvin brings in a wide array of examples from the real world, from disciplines other than business. The writing style is journalistic, so it's clear and concise and "just the facts, ma'am," so don't expect to be captivated by this writing as you might with Malcolm Gladwell, who has written a vaguely similar, though more entertaining book, Outliers: The Story of Success .

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Debra Eve

Great News for Late Bloomers and Those Still Searching

Reviewed in the United States on July 12, 2012

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In this book, Geoff Colvin explores controversies about talent -- including the idea it may not exist.

And something called "deliberate practice" may be more significant. Deliberate practice isn't mindless repetition. It's hard. It hurts. And the more you do it, the closer you move to greatness.

Where Did The Idea of Innate Talent Originate?

Colvin traces it to Francis Galton, 19th century English aristocrat and college dropout. Galton and his peers believed that people came into the world with pretty much the same capabilities, which they developed (or not) throughout their lives. This concept arose from the Age of Enlightenment and the French Revolution -- liberté, égalité, fraternité and all that.

Then Galton's cousin Charles Darwin published On The Origin Of Species. It inspired Galton to change his tune and write a book called Hereditary Genius, which influenced the next several generations.

Does Talent Even Exist?

Scientists haven't yet discovered what all our 20,000-plus genes do. They've yet to identify specific genes that govern particular talents.

What About Mozart?

Mozart wrote music at age 5, gave public performances at age 8, and composed some of the world's most beautiful symphonies before his death at age 35. Yet a close look at Mozart's background reveals:

His father, Leopold, was an expert music teacher who published a violin textbook the year Mozart was born.
Leopold systematically instructed Mozart from at least age 3 (probably sooner).

Mozart's first four piano concertos, composed at age 11, contained no original music. He cobbled them together from other composers' works.

Mozart 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.

Colvin concludes that years of deliberate practice can actually change the body and the brain, which is why world-class performers are different from the rest of us. But they didn't start that way, which is great news for late bloomers like me! It's never too late to follow a passion, especially if "world-class" is not your goal. This book is accessible and tightly written. I highly recommend it if the subject even vaguely interests you.

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Coops

Makes you think

Reviewed in the United States on October 22, 2012

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I read this book several months ago, and have had time to digest it's message, which is essentially what the title says. I agree with it on many fronts that dedicated hard work leads to excellence. However, I do believe that "talent" does exist, and cannot be duplicated simply with hard work. For example, my singing voice is awful. If I dedicated my whole life to singing, it might go from awful to tolerable, or perhaps a bit better, but I'd always be the nitwit on the X Factor who goes on and the judges make a face like they just drank a shot of lemon juice while I'm crooning away. And likewise, I ran spring track in high school, and one year in college. And I've more or less jogged 2-3 times a week for a few miles at 10 min pace since (I'm now 34). However, when I lace up my shoes at a local 5K, I can still crank out 5:45ish miles and soundly beat many people who have cumulatively trained much harder for much longer than I have,even if I haven't run a sub 6 min mile in over a year. Not that I am the best in the world, because I'm not, but that is talent. That is something that most people cannot do if their lives were dedicated to it.
Let's face it that dedicated hard work will produce top results. I agree with that. However, if you take two people, one with a natural aptitude towards something, and another without that aptitude, if both people put in the same exact dedicated hard work, the one with the natural aptitude will always do better. It's just a fact.
So my bottom line review of the book is that it will make you think, and realize that dedicated hard work is what all people do who excel in a particular endeavor. However, it's not fair or accurate to say that we can all be great at anything other than the obvious would preclude us from (a 6'10" person trying to be a gymnast, or a 4'10" person trying to be in the NBA). I think a better title for the book would be "Talent Will Only Get You So Far".
Yet, with that said, it is a book worth reading, as it will make you realize that people who are good at something are good because they have paid dues beyond what the average person is inclined to do.

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O. Halabieh

Deliberate Practice!

Reviewed in the United States on September 11, 2010

Verified Purchase

The main premise of the book is that performing at high levels is not a mere function of innate talent, but the results of years of "deliberate practice". The later is not what most of us consider practice to be, indeed it consists of the following elements: It can be repeated a lot, feedback on results is continuously available, it's highly demanding mentally and it isn't much fun. While this hypothesis may not be earth shattering, its implications and applications in organizations is far reaching. This leads us to rethink the following (as stated by the author):

1- Understand that each person in the organization is not just doing a job, but also being stretched and grown.

2- Find ways to develop leaders within their jobs.

3- Encourage their leaders to be active in their communities.

4- Understand the critical roles of teachers and feedback.

5- Identifying promising performers early.

6- Understand that people development works best through inspiration, not authority.

7- Invest significant time, money, and energy in developing people.

8- Make leadership development part of the culture.

Leading companies are one that have embedded the above understanding as part of their respective corporate cultures. The author not only focuses on the corporate world, but gives examples from a wide variety of fields to support his hypothesis, such as sports, music, chess etc. He goes on to also discuss what drives us to become great and the elements of passion.

What I particularly like about this book, is its one that gets you thinking outside the box, and makes you rethink how successful people in your life and their journey to greatness. This book is a must read for any leader to help him better unleash the talent within their organization. My only critique about this book is that it does not discuss in any depth some of the cases in our every day lives where innate talent has played a big role in helping the respective individuals achieve greatness.

I will end with a quote from the book: "Great performance is not reserverd for a preordained few. It is available to you and to everyone."

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