One of the most interesting aspects of the book is a discussion of a principle referred to as the "Ten Year Rule." Young aspirants and film students who think that their talent will be enough to carry them to instant success should think again. In fact, as Colvin shows, greatness in any endeavor is typically achieved only after the aspirant has engaged in about ten years of very intense practice and skill-honing.
On the other hand, if you've been working hard at your craft for eight or ten years, and have little to show for it, take heart. Success may be just around the corner:
The evidence is strikingly consistent. A study of seventy six composers from many historical periods looked at when they produced their first notable works or masterworks, designations that were based on the number of recordings available. The researcher, Professor John K. Hayes of Carnegie Mellon University identified more than five hundred works. As Professor Robert W. Weisberg of Temple University summarized the findings: "Of these works, only three were composed before year ten of the composer's career, and those three works were composed in years eight and nine." During those first ten or so years, these creators weren't creating much of anything that the outside world noticed. Professor Hayes termed the long and absolutely typical preparatory period "ten years of silence," which seemed to be required before anything worthwhile could be produced.
In a similar study of 131 painters, he found the same pattern. The preparation period was shorter—six years—but still substantial and seemingly impossible to defy, even for supposed prodigies like Picasso. A study of sixty-six poets found a few who produced notable works in less than ten years, but none who managed it in less than five; fifty five of the sixty six needed ten years or more.
These findings remind us strongly of the ten year rule that researchers have found when they study outstanding performers in any domain. Other researchers, who weren't necessarily looking for evidence of this rule, have found it anyway. Professor Howard Gardner of Harvard wrote a book length study [Creating Minds) of seven of the greatest innovators of the early twentieth century: Albert Einstein, T. S. Eliot, Sigmund Freud, Mahatma Gandhi, Martha Graham, Pablo Picasso, and Igor Stravinsky. A more diverse group of subjects would be hard to imagine, and Gardner did not set out to prove or disprove anything about the amount of work required tor their achievements. But in summing up, he wrote, "I have been struck throughout this study by the operation of the ten year rule. Should one begin at age four, like Picasso, one can be a master by the teenage years; composers like Stravinsky and dancers like Graham, who did not begin their creative endeavors until later adolescence, did not hit their stride until their late twenties."
Not even the Beatles could escape the requirements of deep and broad preparation before producing important innovations. Professor Weisberg of Temple has studied the group's career and found that they spent thousands of hours performing together—sessions that closely matched the description of deliberate practice—before the world ever heard of them. In the early days they performed very few of their own songs, and those songs were undistinguished; we would never have known about them if they hadn't been dug up long after the group became successful. The group's first number 1 hit was "Please Please Me" (1963), written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney after they had been working together for five and a half years. One could certainly debate what kind of creative achievement that song represented; successful as it was, it was by no means a significant innovation in popular music. That had to wait until the group's so-called middle period, when they produced their albums Rubber Soul, Revolver, and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Those albums, consisting entirely of original music, transformed the domain. By the time of Sgt. Pepper, Lennon and McCartney had been working together—extremely hard—for ten years.
As for what exactly is going on during those long periods of preparation, it looks a lot like the acquisition of domain knowledge that takes place during deliberate practice. It is certainly intensive and deep immersion in the domain, frequently under the direction of a teacher, but even when not, the innovator seems driven to learn as much as possible about the domain, to improve, to drive himself or herself beyond personal limits and eventually beyond the limits of the field. Gardner looked back on the stories of the seven great innovators he studied and saw so many common themes that he combined them into a story of a composite character, whom he dubbed Exemplary Creator, or E.C. At some point in adolescence or early adult life, "E.C. has already invested a decade of work in the mastery of the domain and is near the forefront; she has little in addition to learn from her family and from local experts, and she feels a quickened impulse to test herself against the other leading young people in the domain." As a result, "E.C. ventures toward the city that is seen as a center of vital activities for her domain."
The distinction between talent and skill-honing, as well as the time involved, also reminds me of something that Will Smith once said in an interview:
"Talent you have naturally. Skill is only developed by hours and hours and hours of beating on your craft."For video of this interview, along with clips from many others containing Smith's insights, check out the following:
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