10,000 Hours

Fascinating excerpt from Malcolm Gladwell’s soon-to-be-released Outliers: The Story of Success:

This idea — that excellence at a complex task requires a critical, minimum level of practice — surfaces again and again in studies of expertise. In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is a magic number for true expertise: 10,000 hours.

(Thanks to Tom Davis.)

★ Saturday, 15 November 2008