The attainment of excellence
England have just beaten the New Zealand All Blacks in the 2019 World Cup Rugby Union semi-final in Japan. This England side are now one match away from winning the greatest prize in the history of the sport. Their opponents in the final next Saturday will be decided tomorrow between Wales and South Africa respectively.
Immediately after the match, 2003 Rugby World Cup winner Jonny Wilkinson described the England side as "complete". New Zealand All Blacks legend Sean Fitzpatrick said "England were excellent today. Tremendous". The England Rugby coach Eddie Jones characteristically deflected praise and summarised his post-match thoughts by saying "Our collective focus as a squad is on getting better every day".
In addition, four key areas were highlighted by the England captain, coaches and commentators after the match: Talent, Training, Practice and Recovery.
Contextulising Excellence
The pursuit and attainment of excellence is a common goal amongst ambitious, forward-thinking people. The ability to be able to perform a skill at a much higher level than others around you is certainly alluring. Whether the skill area is within business, sport, engineering, science, the arts, technology or other fields, levels of excellence and achievement are greatly admired. Striving for excellence has significantly contributed to advancement within our society.
It seems fairly typical for most people to be happy to settle for very good in our daily lives. There's nothing wrong with that. However, it takes a certain type of person or group of people to pursue excellence to the very highest standards at all cost.
Let take someone like Leonardo Da Vinci as an example. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest artists of all time having painted famous works including The Last Supper and the Mona Lisa. In addition, he is arguably one of the most influential and talented men to have walked the face of the earth. Da Vinci came up with the ideas basis for the helicopter, the tank, solar power, the calculator and a theory of plate tectonics.
Da Vinci once said, "Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason." The fact that this quote seems to go over many people’s heads drives home his level of intelligence and shows what a genius he truly was.
A starting principle, often comes down to a belief in one's innate ability to achieve excellence as the core basis. The next key question once the belief is established: Is one's ability to achieve excellence a product of nature (a unique, natural born talent) or nurture (a learnt, rehearsed practice through experience)?
It is believed that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart composed his first symphony at the age of nine and performed his first opera at the age of twelve. This seems to be vastly beyond the capabilities of most children at these life stages. This may be true. A point to note with Mozart is that he started his 'journey' much earlier than most to become an exceptionally high-level achiever at such an early age. That said, he took the same pathway many other talented people follow.
For sure, Mozart would certainly have had many unique features and characteristics to reach the required levels of excellence. While he and other child prodigies may have certain traits and skills, no one is born into “greatness”. It is achieved over time.
Decades of research suggest that learning is more important than biology for the attainment of extraordinary levels of skill. Child prodigies learn their skills much the same as “ordinary” people do; they just start earlier and work much harder. They are also very often driven to succeed by a determined parent, guardian or other influential figure.
Usain Bolt- the most successful sprinter of all time- was "spotted" by his school cricket coach who noticed Bolt's speed on the cricket field. He strongly urged and encouraged him to try track and field events. He moved into sprinting as a teenager. The rest is history.
Another argument against the nature position is that the pinnacle of excellence for one generation is usually surpassed by later efforts. The four-minute mile was once considered impossible. Roger Bannister managed it in 1952 at the Helsinki Olympics. However, another man actually accomplished the same feat only two months later. In the modern day, beating previously set records happens more frequently than ever.
Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya, earlier this month (October 2019) was recorded to be the first person in the world to run a full 26.2-mile marathon in under two hours. This challenge involved the pursuit of excellence, an exceptional talent, dedicated training, nutrition, teamwork, careful planning and the utilisation of modern technology to achieve. Will this feat be followed or even surpassed by others in years to come? Time will tell.
Today, we see many examples of the escalations of the pinnacle of excellence as common place. Whether in mathematics, sports, medicine and science, engineering and just about any other area of interest you can imagine. The bar is constantly being raised in part thanks to new advancements in science and technology.
So what does it take to successfully attain levels of excellence? Wide ranging research in this area reveals a number of common trends.
As stated, it is widely believed attaining a level of superior skill at anything is learned. The question then shifts to, how does one learn at an exceptionally high level?
Knowledge
The first element is the acquisition of a large knowledge base in the area of expertise. Experts and high performers invariably have a level of curiosity and the drive to know even the smallest details of their specific domain. Once they have the knowledge set, they can then tap into well-organised cognitive schemas that allows for performance that can appear intuitive or innate.
Commitment
Next up is a high level of commitment. Those who attain excellence are absolutely determined to continually improve, and therefore persevere when things get tough. In this sense, the knowledge and specific expertise required to develop excellence at a skill is unique only to those who have the necessary level of commitment.
Practice
Finally, there is practice, and lots of it. Malcolm Gladwell popularised the research that shows it takes an average of 10,000 hours of practice to achieve excellence. Regardless of the actual number of hours, top performers begin practicing earlier, practice more often, and practice more consistently than others.
Taken together, these three aspects form not just practice, but engaged practice. This means a form of sustained practice that is focused, planned and concentrated with a great deal of effort. Laser-focused, precise attention is given to what you’re doing correctly and incorrectly during every moment of practice.
This is difficult to achieve if you’re lacking in knowledge, commitment, time, effort and consistency. But there’s another crucial element that is also absolutely essential. Something more subtle that is frequently overlooked...
Key Asset Is The Individual
If you’re trying to become a top-level performer in an athletic sense, naturally you’ll have to be in peak physical shape. You must be mindful of your fitness levels, nutrition intake and properly balance training with appropriate levels of rest.
But this is also just as important, even if your pursuit of excellence is musical, entrepreneurial or academic. Several studies in this field have linked higher mental performance with elevated levels of fitness. So, it stands to reason that you may fail to achieve the pinnacle of your chosen skill if you are not otherwise your best self.
Pursuing excellence is a form of 'essentialism'. This basically means eliminating all that is unessential from your life so you can deliberately and purposefully apply focus and practice on what you decide is essential.
It is easy to forget that the best asset we have for making a contribution to the world is ourselves. If we underinvest in ourselves- namely our minds, our bodies, and our spirits, we damage the very tool we need to make our highest contribution. One of the most common ways people- especially ambitious, successful people- damage this asset is due to a lack of sleep. People can be blind-sided into overlooking the importance of sleep, rest and recuperation during the ultimate pursuit for greatness.
This argument is logical and compelling. According to a 2006 Harvard Business Review article sleep deprivation is described as a 'performance killer'. A US study a year earlier uncovered sleep-deprived employees were showing up to work with the equivalent mental capacity of someone who was technically drunk. Just about every system in our body is severely impacted when we don’t get enough sleep over extended periods of time.
So, with that in mind, let's re-explore the time commitment of engaged practice that has been suggested as required to achieve excellence.
In his 2008 book 'Outliers', Malcolm Gladwell revealed research to suggest there was a "10,000 Hour Rule" to achieve excellence or complete professionalism. He referenced K. Anders Ericsson’s examination of premier violinists with the single most important factor for superior performance being a sufficient amount of engaged practice.
Interestingly, the second most important factor from the same study was identified as sleep. The highest performing violinists slept an average of 8 hours a day, which is about one hour longer than the average person in western society. There was a significant drop off in performance from the highest level performers compared to those who had less than 5 hours sleep a day over a sustained 30 day period.
It might seem easier to focus on clocking up the 10,000 hours at a skill you intrinsically want to become a top performer at in the pursuit excellence. That said, this needs to be engaged practice to refine the activity to ensure it is being conducted accurately and effectively.
Furthermore, it is not about overdoing a task to the detriment of your sleep during this lengthy process. Rest and recovery are two crucial factors which can easily be overlooked when focusing on a determined goal.
To conclude, it's important to preserve the asset that one day will exemplify that excellence.