I skimmed by
this in the past thinking it was stating the obvious but after reading
this Amazon Review, apparently it's either understated or people just want to ignore the obvious.
Ahh, easy, yes, everyone wants it easy and that my friends is a key point of the books topic. Talent is neither overrated or easy to acquire, in fact, as this book and Erricson state, its actually a very, very brutal road. On another note, people are getting confused about the title "talent is overrated". I suspect because it puts alot of people at ease that haven't really got anywhere - talent, that its well, overrated. That title is an attention getter because absolutely nothing could be further from the truth. All these authors Colvin, Gladwell and Ericsson are saying is that talent is not genetic, well it may be in a small part genetic, that it is won through deliberate practice, world class coaching and great families. You take out anyone of those ingredients and its like your dinner tonight, you've got a great steak but your eating it raw because you've forgot about another ingredient, a stove to cook it on - not a great proposition.And just a note that the article I refer to is in the Harvard Business Review and that journal is not a scientific journal but rather for business practitioners. Very easy to read, extremely well written.
