Good news. Extensive research has disproven the notion that you need a high IQ to achieve expert performance. In fact, there is absolutely no correlation between intelligence and success in a particular field (of course, it can’t hurt). Last year, in a great article from the 2007 summer edition of the Harvard Business Review entitled The Making of an Expert, K. Anders Ericsson, Michael J. Prietula, and Edward T. Cokely laid out three principles of outstanding performance. I’ll talk about these three things over the next week, any try to find some good examples of them in use.

Part One – Practice can make perfect, if you know what you’re doing…

The notion that “practice makes perfect” has been beaten into our heads since kindergarten, however evidence points out there aren’t many of us who are practicing properly. When most people practice, they focus on things they already know. This doesn’t actually make you better at anything new; it simply reinforces something you can already do. In addition to the practice required to maintain a current skill set, practicing must be deliberate; with a focus on things you can’t do well, or can’t do at all. A striking transgression of this principle from my own life immediately comes to mind.

When I was younger I used to play the guitar a lot, having weekly lessons with a teacher. Between classes I would have a certain number of pages and exercises out of a book that I needed to cover. During this time there was a lot of growth in my development as a guitarist. However in grade eight, an accident left my hand in a cast for a few months, and when I got better I didn’t resume the classes. It was around that time that my growth stagnated. From then on, whenever I picked up the guitar, I would work my way through a repertoire of the six or seven popular songs I could play well (I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve played Led Zeppelin’s Over the Hills and Far Away). After about 20 minutes I would put the guitar down, only to repeat the same process a few weeks later. I would never bother to learn a new song, resulting in a waning interest and ultimate retirement of the hobby.

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Last December I found myself in the Cancun International Airport with three hours to kill, so I bought a GQ Magazine with Kayne West on the cover and sat on the grass, flipping to the cover story. Although the people that influence me the most are typically found in Philosophy (Soren Kierkegaard, Alan Watts) and Finance (Warren Buffett, John Mack), I’m interested in Kayne West for a number of reasons. First, he has an uncanny ability to pick up on a musical trend, popularize and dominate it (think RZA’s sped up soul samples of the late 90’s or the current electro fever). Second, how he often comes across as arrogant and narcissistic, yet likeable. There was a quote from this interview with GQ that stuck with me:

“…I just listen to other types of music to get influences. I just don’t listen to rap. I don’t need to. I do it too good. Why not study shit you don’t do good?”

How often do we cook the same three or four dishes we know well instead of branching out into new culinary territory? Or run to the same spot on the paint to take that same 10 foot jumper? Or in the office, going through some inefficient process in Microsoft Excel, not taking the 10 minutes to learn how to write a macro or learn some shortcuts? Taking the time to push yourself to practice and study things you can’t do will go a long way.