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How to Become the Best in the World at Something

322 points by crdrost 7y ago

crdrost 7y ago
One nice thing to share here is that a statistical model for success under such conditions is for there to be a collection of independent random variables that multiply to form your overall success: people who lack any particular one of them, x_1 and x_2 = 1000 but x_3 = 0, see the product x_1 x_2 x_3 = 0, below people who have x_1 = 10, x_2 = 10, x_3 = 10. Taking a logarithm, one gets a sum of independent identically-distributed variables, which then tend to sum to a normal distribution due to the Central Limit Theorem, meaning that success distributions produced by multiplication tend to be log-normal. This was argued by John D. Cook at [1]. Log-normal distributions are interesting because they have a long tail—usually the top people drawn are way, way better than you might have expected; normal populations stick within several standard deviations of the mean but long-tailed ones see remarkable achievers many tens of standard deviations above the mean. This result has been long known for things like wealth and income and other measures of external success. So there is a lot of truth to this idea that, say, if you are a programmer, your time is worse spent on building that extra expertise with things that you are good at, like programming, and better spent on building new expertise with things that you are not good at, like perhaps digital art or negotiation/persuasion or accounting. [1] https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2009/09/29/achievement-is-log-normal/ https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2009/09/29/achievement-is-log...
- wjnc 7y ago
  It's quite a stretch to go from an argument on distributions to an argument on the best marginal use of ones time. Those in the right of the log normal curve have had to learn their skill as well. It's all about trade offs. The regular advice I've learned is to improve your primary skill until you are a professional senior, then expand your skills. And even that then goes against the popular Federer story who started in other sports and whose tennis teaching mother wouldn't teach him!
- nostrademons 7y ago
  This changes with the size of the firm you're part of. It's true for individual pursuits like basketball, drawing comics, or entrepreneurship. But a big corporation gets around a lack of any one critical variable by hiring someone for that variable. So if you're an excellent backend engineer, your time is wasted learning digital art, because somebody else will be making the artwork. Effectively the corporation becomes the organism and you become one specialized organelle in them. You're better off increasing your expertise within that specialty than learning other ones - say by firsthand experience with all the ways distributed systems can fail. The returns to being a top individual producer beat the top returns to being a corporate drones, but the average returns are significantly worse (because the big corporation benefits from being able to swap out individual motivated actors to plug deficiencies rather than having to develop skills itself), so depending on your risk tolerance, this may or may not be a good strategy.
  - adrianmonk 7y ago
    > So if you're an excellent backend engineer, your time is wasted learning digital art, because somebody else will be making the artwork. Tangentially, as a backend engineer, I've had to tell the people who made the digital art that the additional icon they supplied me wasn't quite the same color as the existing ones it was supposed to match and also looked misaligned because it didn't follow the same geometrical conventions. So I wish what you're saying were true, but it isn't necessarily. This being a tangent, I'm not necessarily looking for a moral to the story here, but maybe it's something about having a certain minimum competence in an area so you can be sure you're working effectively with others. (EDIT: What is a backend engineer doing with an icon at all? Sticking the URL where it's hosted into a config file and modifying the logic so that it shows up (or doesn't) as appropriate, then testing that by looking at the UI and seeing art that looks wrong.)
dredmorbius 7y ago
Selling it helps too.
swader999 7y ago
Sport is going this way. There's a growing body of evidence that early specialization produces less champions. Kids are encouraged to participate in other sports well into their teen years. Less burn out, lower injuries and this approach creates more athletes that can be described as "naturals". They have skills and abilities that seem magical and unexpected.
- hanniabu 7y ago
  Some people are actually legit naturals though. There was this one kid I knew that didn't play sports growing up, but if you gave him a basketball in gym class you could nail every 3 pointer. He was asked to come out to compete in an important track meet because he was known to be fast and he ran a 400m hurdles race in 53 seconds with the worst possible form. For reference, in the men's World Championships earlier in the month the winner ran 47.4 with most others finishing before 49. He just didn't care for sports though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Makes me wonder who else is out there with this kind of talent and what kind of records could be broken/made if they tried or had the opportunity.
  - derekp7 7y ago
    You also have the case where natural ability is a hindrance. If the kid is used to not having to work at a particular sport, they will have trouble when they get to a point that they have to involve deliberate practice in order to get beyond their current level (something they never had to do before).
    - hervature 7y ago
      This is illustrated with Billy Beane’s story in Money Ball
    - agumonkey 7y ago
      I was especially curious about this for education. If you explain things too much you may get more good students but they may drop on the first struggle.
qubex 7y ago
And here I was, expecting to read a ‘hypothetical’ plan to assassinate all one’s competition... maybe it’s time to put The Prince down.
- AWildC182 7y ago
  That's how masters (old timers) rowing seems to work. You just wait for whoever is faster to die of old age and if you die first it's not your problem anymore.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    Gail Roper,swimming: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gail_Peters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gail_Peters (I've had the privilege of being beat by someone decades my senior.)
  - fuzzfactor 7y ago
    Start early. Benchmark with the leaders. Be prepared to work as hard as them, and actually do it for enough years to make a difference. Outlive them. This is what you were planning to do when you started early. For a pursuit where skill building is a function of effort over a lifetime. In sports I guess that would be your athletic lifetime.
codingslave 7y ago
I think this is a fallacy, its true that becoming 90th% in a few different fields would render you quite the unicorn. The issue is that its common for there to be very low demand for such an overlap of skill sets. Also, how would you leverage such an overlap? These positions and opportunities do not just appear as you are qualified, the job market is extremely inefficient, and not very good at correctly pricing ability. Whats more, being the best in the world at something generally makes that skill very recognizable to others. You are a standout and ascend extremely quickly. I would argue the true best strategy is to shoot for best in your city or country/world at some nascent niche skill. As an addition, this kind of article is part of a group of articles aimed at seeming to be a "novel" or "clever" approach to life, somehow holding the key to outsmart others. Most likely it a complete waste of your five minutes. Its similar to thinking about the Dunning Kruger effect, a complete waste of time.
- spiderfarmer 7y ago
  I’m a generalist and it works for me in my one man company. In my previous company I hired specialists, not generalists, because the specialists did not suffer from distractions as much as generalists did. They also didn’t question everything a specialist in another area did. It’s also easier to build teams that way.
  - codingslave 7y ago
    True, but is your level of success similar to the level of success of someone who is the best in the world at something?
    - agota 7y ago
      That's a good point. However, I think the question is how likely it is that you would be able to become the best in the world at something? I think that people who are the best in the world at something tend to be genetic freaks. Are you one? Probably not. In that case, attempting to become the best in the world might mean setting yourself up for failure, though presumably you would still be more successful than an average person. It's just that there's a massive difference between being in the top 10% and the top 1% in terms of reward.
specialp 7y ago
An aside, but basketball is probably not the best example. A large amount of men 7ft tall or more have played in the NBA. over 17%. So basketball many of them have achieved elite height not skill. http://www.truthaboutit.net/2012/05/true-or-false-half-of-all-7-footers-are-in-the-nba.html http://www.truthaboutit.net/2012/05/true-or-false-half-of-al...
- yters 7y ago
  Spudd Web!
- wolco 7y ago
  About 2800 people in the world are 7 feet tall or taller. 0.000038%. Half are women. 300/400 would be in the age range at anytime. If 10% play basketball. That's only 40.
  - messick 7y ago
    > There are 43 players in the National Basketball Association that are at least seven feet tall. Fourteen of those players are seven-foot-one or taller. https://gooddeedseats.com/tallest-players-of-every-nba-team-heights/ https://gooddeedseats.com/tallest-players-of-every-nba-team-...
    - wolco 7y ago
      Interesting. I wonder how many all-stars vs bottom feeders. Sevenfooters need to rebound/block sometimes shoot but rarely are they the best of the best and suffer from more health issues.
  - JamesBarney 7y ago
    Much less than half would be women.
- pbulises 7y ago
  Author here. That's actually a good point. Thank you!
hamilyon2 7y ago
Actually, getting to 90-th percentile of public speaking and self-presentation make you little bit of celebrity regardless of any other factors.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
coldtea 7y ago
That sounds like a common idea the Dilbert author mentions from time to time. He could draw a little, and he knew about the business world a little, but not many people could combine those things -- and be a business cartoonist.
- markus_zhang 7y ago
  He also started kind of early and managed to keep it going. Starting early is extremely important for...pretty much everything.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    As is keeping it going.
    - markus_zhang 7y ago
      Yes!
- staktrace 7y ago
  The article indeed credits Scott Adams (the Dilbert author) with the term "skill stacking".
AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago
I think there is yet another path: hyper specialization in one ludicrously specific niche no one else cares about or has good reason for not getting into. If you spend 10k hours perfecting something no one else even thought of trying, chances are you'll be the best in the world at it.
- IpV8 7y ago
  It definitely feels good to wake up in the morning and say, "I'm faster than anyone else on this planet at peeling lemons with my toes"
- agota 7y ago
  Can you give a specific example, though? Because generally, no competition means no demand, so while it might be satisfying to be best in the world at something, an obscure skill might not translate into financial success.
  - yters 7y ago
    Become the world's best at counterfeiting an obscure country's currency?
  - im3w1l 7y ago
    If the field you're in has a million people, then split the field into a million pieces (actually this is probably too conservative, maybe go with 100k or even 10k) and pick one to become best at. Since the field is currently successfully employing a million people there must be that many profitable pieces if you slice it correctly.
  - mike00632 7y ago
    In the world of signal processing there are a lot of technical areas that are super important/lucrative but few people have expertise in them. Often it takes not only technical competence but years of experience. To make this example even more specific, maybe you are good at writing fast decoding algorithms for new telecom standards. There is also a lot of now low-hanging fruit in compressed sensing for the mathletes/computer people who know what that's about. Edit: Actually, just learn math if you're looking to get ahead and have an advantage over many people. This advice doesn't make for the best blogpost or YouTube video but it's effective.
markus_zhang 7y ago
Although I agree with the idea, getting good at a jack of trades might be equally difficult (e.g. depending on childhood influences or genetics). If A complements B and someone gets good at A, he/she probably HATES B to the point to avoid it as much as possible.
- agota 7y ago
  Another person in this thread pointed out that "skill stacking" boils down to becoming good at two skills, "X + marketing". I think that's a good example of "Good at A + hates B", say "Good at software engineering + hates marketing". But what are the other "Good at A + hates B" skill combinations?
  - markus_zhang 7y ago
    Good tech skills plus hate human interation. Or vice versa. Some people just have the innate to get good at both. I think if you want you can definitely train very hard to be OK for sth you hate but is it worth it?
    - agota 7y ago
      I think whether it's worth it depends on if the goal you are trying to achieve is worth it. I remember reading about this couple of I believe software engineers who achieved financial independence at I think age 30. If I recall correctly, she didn't have any natural aptitude for software engineering, she struggled to keep up with her classmates, she didn't enjoy her work, etc. Still, she got her degree, got a job, made six figure salary, and retired at 30. From what I understand, for her it was worth it.
      - markus_zhang 7y ago
        I agree 100%. It depends on personal goals. Another thing is we can train skill B by using a method that we enjoy, to remove half of the pain.
mrcoder111 7y ago
This is really incorrect advice in the world of software engineering. At least in FAANG companies and big name startups, no one cares if you read How to Win Friends and Influence people and have "social skills". If you can't pass the engineering interviews, you're fucked.
- gpapilion 7y ago
  This is only true to a point. You have to be in the better half of the technical skill set, but in the higher levels of technical roles leadership skills are stressed more than technical skills. Senior and staff roles stress proposing/completing large projects and working with others to get it done. Its hard to move to these levels without the skills that enable you to work with others.
- yters 7y ago
  Where I work, leadership and people skills are severely lacking amongst programmers, so just a modicum of both makes one stand out pretty easily.
somurzakov 7y ago
looks like market segmentation - finding your niche. find your niche by being top 10% in three areas and you will be top .1% in one niche that is combination of the three
agumonkey 7y ago
Beware of low perskill grade, stacking would just be a new word for 'jack of all trades'
username4567 7y ago
Medium forces a login. Is there a non-Medium link?
- ph0rque 7y ago
  Opening an incognito window (still) works.
- lkbm 7y ago
  I always just click the X in the corner of the popup. Does that only work because I have uBlock Origin, or only on desktop?
- pbulises 7y ago
  https://forge.medium.com/how-to-become-the-best-in-the-world-at-something-f1b658f93428?source=friends_link&sk=88d2ce6a8cdaacd47ae6a754fb96e9b5 https://forge.medium.com/how-to-become-the-best-in-the-world...
mindgam3 7y ago
> You will not be the world’s greatest writer, nor the top chess player, nor the most masterful public speaker. > It’s not about being great at any one thing — you just need to be pretty good at an array of useful skills that, when combined, make you truly one of a kind. As somebody who was the world’s #2 chess player for my age as a kid (okay, not the “top” but close enough) - I’d like to say that the advice in this article is terrible for anyone who wants to reach their full potential. The part I really have a problem with is this: > There will always be someone working harder... [or] someone with greater genetic gifts, or more luck, or both. The only way to get world-class at something is to work your ass off. To have discipline and apply yourself consistently to the practice, day in and day out, for years. And yeah, even if you do that, you still might not be best in the world at that thing. But you know what? The relationship with yourself that you cultivated while mastering that discipline will 100% translate over to any other endeavor you wish to pursue. Similarly, if you always give up on things because you always see there’s someone better than you, that pattern will hinder your ability to excel everywhere. My competitive chess career was pretty brief in the end. I realized that staying at the top would require total dedication and no social life (home schooling etc), and yes, there were other up and coming kids who seemed to be at a level I couldn’t reach. So I gave up the dream of being world chess champion and went to school. But I cannot even express how much the experience of devoting myself to one discipline helped me later on in my life and career. Peak performance in any area ultimately depends on how you deal with challenge, setbacks, and motivation for the grind. Don’t settle for being “pretty good”. Push yourself to be the best you can be, you might be surprised what you learn along the way. [Edit] To the people commenting things like 'I think he is giving "regular" people who arent gifted a path to massive success by being "pretty good" at a few different things': The whole "regular" people argument is BS. I was a "regular" kid who happened to become freakishly devoted to chess, at which point people started labeling me as a "prodigy". But the label is meaningless. Nobody calling me a prodigy saw the thousands of hours I spent playing and practicing. I hate it when people draw arbitrary distinctions like "regular" vs "gifted". It makes the so-called gifted ones out to be freaks, or whatever the opposite of "normal" is, and it is demotivating to all the so-called normal kids who wonder if they could ever achieve greatness.
- matwood 7y ago
Jun8 7y ago
Quick example of skill stacking: You won't be the world's best chess player or boxer, but, hey, being the world champion in chess boxing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_boxing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_boxing)? That may well be within you reach.
- Kaveren 7y ago
  This is gimmicky. Everyone knows they can be the best in the world at some random and obscure task nobody cares about. This sort of thing is a complete waste of your time. Better to focus on improving at one or the other.
Fricken 7y ago
If the goal is to be the best in the world for the sake of being the best in the world at something, just pick something really obscure. I'm the best in the world a tactical boomerang juggling in Breath of the Wild. A gamer with pro-level skills could probably show me up with a few hours practice, but until someone decides to do that, I'm the best.
- sudhirj 7y ago
  I think the goal is to be best in the world at something that society will reward, that will enable you provide it with something it wants that it doesn't know how to get or doesn't know it wants yet. In your case, making entertaining videos of popular games is a pretty profitable niche.
rpmisms 7y ago
It's pretty simple Don't be the first at what you're doing. You need the accomplishments of others to build on. Have competition. You need to have someone else to keep your skills developing. Have a supernatural amount of talent. It takes an amount of innate skill to truly be the best at something. Spend WAY more than 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. A good example is Feliks Zemdegs, the on-and-off Rubik's cube world champion. He's got the above skills, and keeps getting overtaken by various people, but so far, has redefined his skillset every time and risen back to the top, breaking even more barriers.
caiocaiocaio 7y ago
"I'm the best in the world at something. I guess I'll write a Medium article."
- TurkishPoptart 7y ago
  This. I'm pretty annoyed with these Medium articles that keep popping up on this site.
johnobrien1010 7y ago
"The easiest way to be at the top of your field is to choose a very small field." - Simone Giertz, TED Talk, May 14, 2018 https://singjupost.com/why-you-should-make-useless-things-simone-giertz-full-transcript/ https://singjupost.com/why-you-should-make-useless-things-si...
BlameKaneda 7y ago
Two of my greatest loves are tennis and photography. I've been playing tennis for over 20 years (nearly a decade competitively) and I started taking photography seriously about 7 years ago. In both of these fields, especially tennis, I'm comfortable enough where I can teach it to just about anyone. In the first few years of doing both, there were plenty of times where I was intimidated by better people, where I'd ask myself "why can't I be more like X?" At some point, there came a time when I became comfortable enough in my abilities so that I no longer think that way. All in all I think I'm an excellent tennis player and that I take great photos. So what if Alice is a better tennis player than me? So what if Bob takes better photographs? If anything, and this is especially true with photography, whenever I come across a better person I try to take away something from their skills that can use to improve myself.
cdelsolar 7y ago
I'm pretty sure I'm the best person in the world at combined Scrabble and coding.
- raphlinus 7y ago
  Have you met Liam Quin?
jkbonfield 7y ago
I know I'm not the best at anything I do, but when combined the overlap makes a niche for me that has so far worked out well. Pure luck frankly. However that is only because the skills I'm thinking of aren't in themselves hugely common. I'm not mega skilled at them, but the relative rarity of some means the overlap really is quite small - fortunately! It's not going to be good advice if your key skills are, say selling things and being super knowledgable about cars. Oh look, an obvious union but that combination is popular already. So I'd say start by becoming good at a couple niche skills and then see where you end up.
sabujp 7y ago
many managers and directors at tech companies are like this, they have good skill at coding/understanding tech stacks, managing, marketing, writing, speaking, and understanding the business aspects
msluyter 7y ago
This seems to be an elaboration/rediscovery/variant of something Scott Adams[1] said a while ago: https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.html https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/car... Decent advice, imho. [1] Note, this does not constitute an endorsement of Scott's political views.
- pbulises 7y ago
  Yep, I quote him in the article as such! "The solution is skill stacking, a concept popularized by Scott Adams."
  - MacroChip 7y ago
    I loved the article. I'll be sharing it. The visualizations make it much more digestable and inspirational. Also, the link you posted to Adams' blog has a messed up cert or something. I'm on Firefox on Android. I'll reach out to him as well.
graemeo 7y ago
the graphs in this medium post make my head spin, but at least the 2nd one has words describing what the author purportedly means.
- igdr138x 7y ago
  Thank you. They're staggeringly bad. I'm surprised no one else commented.
mertd 7y ago
Interesting way to discover the curse of dimensionality.
hevi_jos 7y ago
It has to be said that Steve Jobs great quality was learning from the best in a given field, what it is called now "modeling". He had as a mentor, when he was kid, f*cking Robert Noyce: http://online.wsj.com/media/NoyceJobs_digits_D_20111007151956.jpg http://online.wsj.com/media/NoyceJobs_digits_D_2011100715195... Noyce himself was a genius on its own. And then Markkula, and then the president of Sony(that launched the Trinitron and walkman), and so on. He learned how to learn.
forgotmypw 7y ago
Why is it acceptable to submit an article which is selectively inaccessible to the majority of users? All I see is: How to Become the Best in the World at Something With skill stacking, you don’t need to be at the top to be extraordinary Tomas Pueyo Oct 17 · 7 min read It’s better to have three okay tools than a single, perfect one. The axe is great at breaking obstacles, but not that useful to jump over pits. The grapple is great to jump over ice or pits, but not amazing for slaying dragons. The only way to win is by having both tools. Illustrations: Tomas Pueyo. CConsider what it takes to become an NBA player. Most of them have been honing their skills on the basketball court practically since infancy. Years of countless practices, camps, and games have helped each player develop a skill set based around shooting… Keep the story going. Sign up for an extra free read. You've completed your member preview for this month, but when you sign up for a free Medium account, you get one more story. Flagged.
- a13n 7y ago
  The article is accessible, but you've chosen not to access it.
- bluetidepro 7y ago
  Non paywall link: https://outline.com/sRfTa9 https://outline.com/sRfTa9 But, FWIW, I do agree with you. Medium is the worst. Thankfully services like Outline are available to get around all that.
- CedarMadness 7y ago
  I've been using an extension to avoid this common annoyance. https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-firefox https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-firefox also for Chrome: https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome
  - forgotmypw 7y ago
    I use neither Chrome nor Firefox, nor am I installing extra software to access a website that doesn't want me.
- 7y ago
logicalmonster 7y ago
I don’t know if Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, was the first person to really write about this concept, but he originally wrote about the concept he called the “talent stack” with the same exact arguments in his books years ago. I think this idea is really important: it’s smart to combine different skills. Additionally, having experience in different domains like economics and design and business and technology and more gives you a lens to see the world through that not everybody has. If you combine a few of these lenses, you’re able to make connections and understand things that most people wouldn’t see.
- the_cat_kittles 7y ago
  in his case, being a writer and a grifter seems to have worked fairly well
the_cat_kittles 7y ago
you know whats more interesting than this kind of vague arm wavy bullshit that offers facile solutions and ignores the fact that not everyone can be good at stuff? hearing from people who are actually very good at something.
spacedog11 7y ago
Author of the article gives one TedX talk, then goes on to proclaim that he's an "expert" at public speaking and ranks himself in the "90" percentile for public speaking. What a joke!
- xigency 7y ago
  Probably over half the population actively dislikes public speaking, so top 10% isn't so hard to reach.
- ken 7y ago
  Fear of public speaking is consistently ranked the #1 fear of the average person. I would absolutely put someone who can do it confidently in the top 10%. That's the point of the article: "A bit of work can quickly get you to the top 10%".
- TurkishPoptart 7y ago
  Yep, I wish this clickbait wasn't posted on HN...
QueridoGuy 7y ago
That’s one of the questions i always wanted to ask the top people such as Bill Gates or someone like Dennis Ritchie. Being the top isn’t something easy, but i feel like people overestimate it quite a lot, to the point that they quit thinking they want to be the best. I can say , the world is much smaller than the concept we draw on our minds. So many stuff that i looked into, especially in the programming world, is simpler than what’s in my mind. The reason why we always think that it’s big and hard thing to achieve is due to how we were taught in schools. We get taught about stuff that on the next grade they say it’s more than we think. Take negative numbers for example, we start knowing that numbers are only positive and nothing such as 2-5 is possible, then we get taught that that idea is wrong. Anyway, we tend to overestimate because of how we used to encounter. If we dedicate ourselves to something, it will pay off. If there is someone that’s world class on something, you shouldn’t focus on becoming him, but focus into further things. We are all alike at the end, it’s our enthusiasm that drive us into pursuing our goals. The only difference between you and the other top 1 is that he had more interest. Basically to put it in simpler words, don’t think that there is a huge gap between you and your understanding of the world and your goal. It’s much less than you think
- Kaveren 7y ago
  > "The only difference between you and the other top 1 is that he had more interest." Wishful thinking. The most important component is genetic ability, which must be enabled by an environment allowing you to put in the required effort (i.e. developed or developing country, food and housing, minimal education). Interest and discipline is a tertiary concern. It's way easier to be interested in something if you have natural aptitude.
esel2k 7y ago
Isn’t it strange that comments on medium are all very positive whereas on HN all are very negative towards this article. What I want to say is that there might be a bias?
- pbulises 7y ago
  Author here. It's the culture of the site. Like Reddit. Much more critical. Also, remember that Medium is the platform where the writer writes. Commentators mean in fact to address the author. That helps for civility.
RivieraKid 7y ago
This seems kind of pointless, most people already are the best in the world at some specific combination of skills - knowledge of local geography, ability to cook a certain set of meals, etc. Anyway, a related thought that I find interesting: Becoming a "polymath" i.e. learning a wide range of topics to reasonable depth requires less effort than most people expect. For example, let's say you want to learn mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and economics. I think that achieving 80% of undergrad knowledge would take much less than 80% of the time that people need to complete an undergrad degree. So let's say it could take a year to acquire a good foundation in each of these topics if you try to optimize the process by focusing on fundamentals and core principles, choosing the best books, etc.
chadcmulligan 7y ago
I'm a fan of tennis, I'm not a very good player though, and never will be - I don't want to play 12 hours a day. I've watched Federer many times and a couple of take aways I've seen from watching him - practice every day, if you're losing, just keep going, the other guy will eventually give up or make a mistake, or you'll lose today, the other guy will eventually give up. I really think this is the only way to be the best at something - do it every day, some days you'll fail, but if you keep going, eventually you'll have so much expertise you'll wake up one day and be the best, or close enough. The trouble is no one really wants to do this, all Federer does is tennis, he must love it, every day he gets up and plays tennis. Most people will stop at good enough though. If Federer played basketball, would he be the best? probably not, so thats the other thing - pick something your body and brain is built for, and do it every day. If there were any short cuts then the best would use them any way and add them to their arsenal, so any short cuts will be short lived. I think PG said something the same about start ups - they don't fail the founders just stop. I think this ties in with why so many start ups are made by rich kids, they can afford not to stop, everyone else has to stop at some point and get a job.
- suyash 7y ago
  I concur, it also reminds me of this famous quote : “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. ” —Aristotle.
  - chadcmulligan 7y ago
    I always find it surprising when so much of what we think and talk about today is the same thing that people thought and talked about a couple of thousand years ago, very little about people has changed.
    - HeyLaughingBoy 7y ago
      See, I would be surprised if it was the other way.
- pbulises 7y ago
markthien 7y ago
most women don't like pornstar as most of them very good at banging only like a machine. women like a man with a stack of skills like good at foreplay, banging, kissing, romantic, playing and etc. this is considered as skill stacking too.
oper8or 7y ago
This should be taken to heart by every technologist, or to be precise, pure technologist. Being pure tech today is about as useful as being a typist during the type-writer era i.e. specialized skill that is in demand, but by itself (with few exceptions) is only secondary to the domain it is applied in. Most so-called "tech" companies are not really tech, but more in (tele)communications, media, advertising, surveillance data businesses. It is easy to see the time when everyone can do technology. This surely happened to typing, it would be ludicrous trying to get a job as a typist today. Same can happen to the pure tech: a) due to technology itself e.g. web-site builders, etc. b) education,- everybody learns to type today, its a bit of a stretch, but maybe everybody can learn to program. Aside from job security argument, the value creation is happening in the domain where business is focused, not necessarily knowledge of technology. Technologists who understand the domain can deliver much more value, and command higher premiums.
mineP 7y ago
Is this why we go to colleges?

322 points by crdrost 7y ago

One nice thing to share here is that a statistical model for success under such conditions is for there to be a collection of independent random variables that multiply to form your overall success: people who lack any particular one of them, x_1 and x_2 = 1000 but x_3 = 0, see the product x_1 x_2 x_3 = 0, below people who have x_1 = 10, x_2 = 10, x_3 = 10. Taking a logarithm, one gets a sum of independent identically-distributed variables, which then tend to sum to a normal distribution due to the Central Limit Theorem, meaning that success distributions produced by multiplication tend to be log-normal. This was argued by John D. Cook at [1]. Log-normal distributions are interesting because they have a long tail—usually the top people drawn are way, way better than you might have expected; normal populations stick within several standard deviations of the mean but long-tailed ones see remarkable achievers many tens of standard deviations above the mean. This result has been long known for things like wealth and income and other measures of external success. So there is a lot of truth to this idea that, say, if you are a programmer, your time is worse spent on building that extra expertise with things that you are good at, like programming, and better spent on building new expertise with things that you are not good at, like perhaps digital art or negotiation/persuasion or accounting. [1] https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2009/09/29/achievement-is-log-normal/ https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2009/09/29/achievement-is-log...

wjnc 7y ago
It's quite a stretch to go from an argument on distributions to an argument on the best marginal use of ones time. Those in the right of the log normal curve have had to learn their skill as well. It's all about trade offs. The regular advice I've learned is to improve your primary skill until you are a professional senior, then expand your skills. And even that then goes against the popular Federer story who started in other sports and whose tennis teaching mother wouldn't teach him!
nostrademons 7y ago
This changes with the size of the firm you're part of. It's true for individual pursuits like basketball, drawing comics, or entrepreneurship. But a big corporation gets around a lack of any one critical variable by hiring someone for that variable. So if you're an excellent backend engineer, your time is wasted learning digital art, because somebody else will be making the artwork. Effectively the corporation becomes the organism and you become one specialized organelle in them. You're better off increasing your expertise within that specialty than learning other ones - say by firsthand experience with all the ways distributed systems can fail. The returns to being a top individual producer beat the top returns to being a corporate drones, but the average returns are significantly worse (because the big corporation benefits from being able to swap out individual motivated actors to plug deficiencies rather than having to develop skills itself), so depending on your risk tolerance, this may or may not be a good strategy.
- adrianmonk 7y ago
  > So if you're an excellent backend engineer, your time is wasted learning digital art, because somebody else will be making the artwork. Tangentially, as a backend engineer, I've had to tell the people who made the digital art that the additional icon they supplied me wasn't quite the same color as the existing ones it was supposed to match and also looked misaligned because it didn't follow the same geometrical conventions. So I wish what you're saying were true, but it isn't necessarily. This being a tangent, I'm not necessarily looking for a moral to the story here, but maybe it's something about having a certain minimum competence in an area so you can be sure you're working effectively with others. (EDIT: What is a backend engineer doing with an icon at all? Sticking the URL where it's hosted into a config file and modifying the logic so that it shows up (or doesn't) as appropriate, then testing that by looking at the UI and seeing art that looks wrong.)

dredmorbius 7y ago

Selling it helps too.

swader999 7y ago

Sport is going this way. There's a growing body of evidence that early specialization produces less champions. Kids are encouraged to participate in other sports well into their teen years. Less burn out, lower injuries and this approach creates more athletes that can be described as "naturals". They have skills and abilities that seem magical and unexpected.

hanniabu 7y ago
Some people are actually legit naturals though. There was this one kid I knew that didn't play sports growing up, but if you gave him a basketball in gym class you could nail every 3 pointer. He was asked to come out to compete in an important track meet because he was known to be fast and he ran a 400m hurdles race in 53 seconds with the worst possible form. For reference, in the men's World Championships earlier in the month the winner ran 47.4 with most others finishing before 49. He just didn't care for sports though ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Makes me wonder who else is out there with this kind of talent and what kind of records could be broken/made if they tried or had the opportunity.
- derekp7 7y ago
  You also have the case where natural ability is a hindrance. If the kid is used to not having to work at a particular sport, they will have trouble when they get to a point that they have to involve deliberate practice in order to get beyond their current level (something they never had to do before).
  - hervature 7y ago
    This is illustrated with Billy Beane’s story in Money Ball
  - agumonkey 7y ago
    I was especially curious about this for education. If you explain things too much you may get more good students but they may drop on the first struggle.

qubex 7y ago

And here I was, expecting to read a ‘hypothetical’ plan to assassinate all one’s competition... maybe it’s time to put The Prince down.

AWildC182 7y ago
That's how masters (old timers) rowing seems to work. You just wait for whoever is faster to die of old age and if you die first it's not your problem anymore.
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  Gail Roper,swimming: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gail_Peters https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gail_Peters (I've had the privilege of being beat by someone decades my senior.)
- fuzzfactor 7y ago
  Start early. Benchmark with the leaders. Be prepared to work as hard as them, and actually do it for enough years to make a difference. Outlive them. This is what you were planning to do when you started early. For a pursuit where skill building is a function of effort over a lifetime. In sports I guess that would be your athletic lifetime.

codingslave 7y ago

I think this is a fallacy, its true that becoming 90th% in a few different fields would render you quite the unicorn. The issue is that its common for there to be very low demand for such an overlap of skill sets. Also, how would you leverage such an overlap? These positions and opportunities do not just appear as you are qualified, the job market is extremely inefficient, and not very good at correctly pricing ability. Whats more, being the best in the world at something generally makes that skill very recognizable to others. You are a standout and ascend extremely quickly. I would argue the true best strategy is to shoot for best in your city or country/world at some nascent niche skill. As an addition, this kind of article is part of a group of articles aimed at seeming to be a "novel" or "clever" approach to life, somehow holding the key to outsmart others. Most likely it a complete waste of your five minutes. Its similar to thinking about the Dunning Kruger effect, a complete waste of time.

spiderfarmer 7y ago
I’m a generalist and it works for me in my one man company. In my previous company I hired specialists, not generalists, because the specialists did not suffer from distractions as much as generalists did. They also didn’t question everything a specialist in another area did. It’s also easier to build teams that way.
- codingslave 7y ago
  True, but is your level of success similar to the level of success of someone who is the best in the world at something?
  - agota 7y ago
    That's a good point. However, I think the question is how likely it is that you would be able to become the best in the world at something? I think that people who are the best in the world at something tend to be genetic freaks. Are you one? Probably not. In that case, attempting to become the best in the world might mean setting yourself up for failure, though presumably you would still be more successful than an average person. It's just that there's a massive difference between being in the top 10% and the top 1% in terms of reward.

specialp 7y ago

An aside, but basketball is probably not the best example. A large amount of men 7ft tall or more have played in the NBA. over 17%. So basketball many of them have achieved elite height not skill. http://www.truthaboutit.net/2012/05/true-or-false-half-of-all-7-footers-are-in-the-nba.html http://www.truthaboutit.net/2012/05/true-or-false-half-of-al...

yters 7y ago
Spudd Web!
wolco 7y ago
About 2800 people in the world are 7 feet tall or taller. 0.000038%. Half are women. 300/400 would be in the age range at anytime. If 10% play basketball. That's only 40.
- messick 7y ago
  > There are 43 players in the National Basketball Association that are at least seven feet tall. Fourteen of those players are seven-foot-one or taller. https://gooddeedseats.com/tallest-players-of-every-nba-team-heights/ https://gooddeedseats.com/tallest-players-of-every-nba-team-...
  - wolco 7y ago
    Interesting. I wonder how many all-stars vs bottom feeders. Sevenfooters need to rebound/block sometimes shoot but rarely are they the best of the best and suffer from more health issues.
- JamesBarney 7y ago
  Much less than half would be women.
pbulises 7y ago
Author here. That's actually a good point. Thank you!

hamilyon2 7y ago

Actually, getting to 90-th percentile of public speaking and self-presentation make you little bit of celebrity regardless of any other factors.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

coldtea 7y ago

That sounds like a common idea the Dilbert author mentions from time to time. He could draw a little, and he knew about the business world a little, but not many people could combine those things -- and be a business cartoonist.

markus_zhang 7y ago
He also started kind of early and managed to keep it going. Starting early is extremely important for...pretty much everything.
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  As is keeping it going.
  - markus_zhang 7y ago
    Yes!
staktrace 7y ago
The article indeed credits Scott Adams (the Dilbert author) with the term "skill stacking".

AnIdiotOnTheNet 7y ago

I think there is yet another path: hyper specialization in one ludicrously specific niche no one else cares about or has good reason for not getting into. If you spend 10k hours perfecting something no one else even thought of trying, chances are you'll be the best in the world at it.

IpV8 7y ago
It definitely feels good to wake up in the morning and say, "I'm faster than anyone else on this planet at peeling lemons with my toes"
agota 7y ago
Can you give a specific example, though? Because generally, no competition means no demand, so while it might be satisfying to be best in the world at something, an obscure skill might not translate into financial success.
- yters 7y ago
  Become the world's best at counterfeiting an obscure country's currency?
- im3w1l 7y ago
  If the field you're in has a million people, then split the field into a million pieces (actually this is probably too conservative, maybe go with 100k or even 10k) and pick one to become best at. Since the field is currently successfully employing a million people there must be that many profitable pieces if you slice it correctly.
- mike00632 7y ago
  In the world of signal processing there are a lot of technical areas that are super important/lucrative but few people have expertise in them. Often it takes not only technical competence but years of experience. To make this example even more specific, maybe you are good at writing fast decoding algorithms for new telecom standards. There is also a lot of now low-hanging fruit in compressed sensing for the mathletes/computer people who know what that's about. Edit: Actually, just learn math if you're looking to get ahead and have an advantage over many people. This advice doesn't make for the best blogpost or YouTube video but it's effective.

markus_zhang 7y ago

Although I agree with the idea, getting good at a jack of trades might be equally difficult (e.g. depending on childhood influences or genetics). If A complements B and someone gets good at A, he/she probably HATES B to the point to avoid it as much as possible.

agota 7y ago
Another person in this thread pointed out that "skill stacking" boils down to becoming good at two skills, "X + marketing". I think that's a good example of "Good at A + hates B", say "Good at software engineering + hates marketing". But what are the other "Good at A + hates B" skill combinations?
- markus_zhang 7y ago
  Good tech skills plus hate human interation. Or vice versa. Some people just have the innate to get good at both. I think if you want you can definitely train very hard to be OK for sth you hate but is it worth it?
  - agota 7y ago
    I think whether it's worth it depends on if the goal you are trying to achieve is worth it. I remember reading about this couple of I believe software engineers who achieved financial independence at I think age 30. If I recall correctly, she didn't have any natural aptitude for software engineering, she struggled to keep up with her classmates, she didn't enjoy her work, etc. Still, she got her degree, got a job, made six figure salary, and retired at 30. From what I understand, for her it was worth it.
    - markus_zhang 7y ago
      I agree 100%. It depends on personal goals. Another thing is we can train skill B by using a method that we enjoy, to remove half of the pain.

mrcoder111 7y ago

This is really incorrect advice in the world of software engineering. At least in FAANG companies and big name startups, no one cares if you read How to Win Friends and Influence people and have "social skills". If you can't pass the engineering interviews, you're fucked.

gpapilion 7y ago
This is only true to a point. You have to be in the better half of the technical skill set, but in the higher levels of technical roles leadership skills are stressed more than technical skills. Senior and staff roles stress proposing/completing large projects and working with others to get it done. Its hard to move to these levels without the skills that enable you to work with others.
yters 7y ago
Where I work, leadership and people skills are severely lacking amongst programmers, so just a modicum of both makes one stand out pretty easily.

somurzakov 7y ago

looks like market segmentation - finding your niche. find your niche by being top 10% in three areas and you will be top .1% in one niche that is combination of the three

agumonkey 7y ago

Beware of low perskill grade, stacking would just be a new word for 'jack of all trades'

username4567 7y ago

Medium forces a login. Is there a non-Medium link?

ph0rque 7y ago
Opening an incognito window (still) works.
lkbm 7y ago
I always just click the X in the corner of the popup. Does that only work because I have uBlock Origin, or only on desktop?
pbulises 7y ago
https://forge.medium.com/how-to-become-the-best-in-the-world-at-something-f1b658f93428?source=friends_link&sk=88d2ce6a8cdaacd47ae6a754fb96e9b5 https://forge.medium.com/how-to-become-the-best-in-the-world...

mindgam3 7y ago

> You will not be the world’s greatest writer, nor the top chess player, nor the most masterful public speaker. > It’s not about being great at any one thing — you just need to be pretty good at an array of useful skills that, when combined, make you truly one of a kind. As somebody who was the world’s #2 chess player for my age as a kid (okay, not the “top” but close enough) - I’d like to say that the advice in this article is terrible for anyone who wants to reach their full potential. The part I really have a problem with is this: > There will always be someone working harder... [or] someone with greater genetic gifts, or more luck, or both. The only way to get world-class at something is to work your ass off. To have discipline and apply yourself consistently to the practice, day in and day out, for years. And yeah, even if you do that, you still might not be best in the world at that thing. But you know what? The relationship with yourself that you cultivated while mastering that discipline will 100% translate over to any other endeavor you wish to pursue. Similarly, if you always give up on things because you always see there’s someone better than you, that pattern will hinder your ability to excel everywhere. My competitive chess career was pretty brief in the end. I realized that staying at the top would require total dedication and no social life (home schooling etc), and yes, there were other up and coming kids who seemed to be at a level I couldn’t reach. So I gave up the dream of being world chess champion and went to school. But I cannot even express how much the experience of devoting myself to one discipline helped me later on in my life and career. Peak performance in any area ultimately depends on how you deal with challenge, setbacks, and motivation for the grind. Don’t settle for being “pretty good”. Push yourself to be the best you can be, you might be surprised what you learn along the way. [Edit] To the people commenting things like 'I think he is giving "regular" people who arent gifted a path to massive success by being "pretty good" at a few different things': The whole "regular" people argument is BS. I was a "regular" kid who happened to become freakishly devoted to chess, at which point people started labeling me as a "prodigy". But the label is meaningless. Nobody calling me a prodigy saw the thousands of hours I spent playing and practicing. I hate it when people draw arbitrary distinctions like "regular" vs "gifted". It makes the so-called gifted ones out to be freaks, or whatever the opposite of "normal" is, and it is demotivating to all the so-called normal kids who wonder if they could ever achieve greatness.

matwood 7y ago

Jun8 7y ago

Quick example of skill stacking: You won't be the world's best chess player or boxer, but, hey, being the world champion in chess boxing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_boxing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_boxing)? That may well be within you reach.

Kaveren 7y ago
This is gimmicky. Everyone knows they can be the best in the world at some random and obscure task nobody cares about. This sort of thing is a complete waste of your time. Better to focus on improving at one or the other.

Fricken 7y ago

If the goal is to be the best in the world for the sake of being the best in the world at something, just pick something really obscure. I'm the best in the world a tactical boomerang juggling in Breath of the Wild. A gamer with pro-level skills could probably show me up with a few hours practice, but until someone decides to do that, I'm the best.

sudhirj 7y ago
I think the goal is to be best in the world at something that society will reward, that will enable you provide it with something it wants that it doesn't know how to get or doesn't know it wants yet. In your case, making entertaining videos of popular games is a pretty profitable niche.

rpmisms 7y ago

It's pretty simple Don't be the first at what you're doing. You need the accomplishments of others to build on. Have competition. You need to have someone else to keep your skills developing. Have a supernatural amount of talent. It takes an amount of innate skill to truly be the best at something. Spend WAY more than 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. A good example is Feliks Zemdegs, the on-and-off Rubik's cube world champion. He's got the above skills, and keeps getting overtaken by various people, but so far, has redefined his skillset every time and risen back to the top, breaking even more barriers.

caiocaiocaio 7y ago

"I'm the best in the world at something. I guess I'll write a Medium article."

TurkishPoptart 7y ago
This. I'm pretty annoyed with these Medium articles that keep popping up on this site.

johnobrien1010 7y ago

"The easiest way to be at the top of your field is to choose a very small field." - Simone Giertz, TED Talk, May 14, 2018 https://singjupost.com/why-you-should-make-useless-things-simone-giertz-full-transcript/ https://singjupost.com/why-you-should-make-useless-things-si...

BlameKaneda 7y ago

Two of my greatest loves are tennis and photography. I've been playing tennis for over 20 years (nearly a decade competitively) and I started taking photography seriously about 7 years ago. In both of these fields, especially tennis, I'm comfortable enough where I can teach it to just about anyone. In the first few years of doing both, there were plenty of times where I was intimidated by better people, where I'd ask myself "why can't I be more like X?" At some point, there came a time when I became comfortable enough in my abilities so that I no longer think that way. All in all I think I'm an excellent tennis player and that I take great photos. So what if Alice is a better tennis player than me? So what if Bob takes better photographs? If anything, and this is especially true with photography, whenever I come across a better person I try to take away something from their skills that can use to improve myself.

cdelsolar 7y ago

I'm pretty sure I'm the best person in the world at combined Scrabble and coding.

raphlinus 7y ago
Have you met Liam Quin?

jkbonfield 7y ago

I know I'm not the best at anything I do, but when combined the overlap makes a niche for me that has so far worked out well. Pure luck frankly. However that is only because the skills I'm thinking of aren't in themselves hugely common. I'm not mega skilled at them, but the relative rarity of some means the overlap really is quite small - fortunately! It's not going to be good advice if your key skills are, say selling things and being super knowledgable about cars. Oh look, an obvious union but that combination is popular already. So I'd say start by becoming good at a couple niche skills and then see where you end up.

sabujp 7y ago

many managers and directors at tech companies are like this, they have good skill at coding/understanding tech stacks, managing, marketing, writing, speaking, and understanding the business aspects

msluyter 7y ago

This seems to be an elaboration/rediscovery/variant of something Scott Adams[1] said a while ago: https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/career-advice.html https://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/07/car... Decent advice, imho. [1] Note, this does not constitute an endorsement of Scott's political views.

pbulises 7y ago
Yep, I quote him in the article as such! "The solution is skill stacking, a concept popularized by Scott Adams."
- MacroChip 7y ago
  I loved the article. I'll be sharing it. The visualizations make it much more digestable and inspirational. Also, the link you posted to Adams' blog has a messed up cert or something. I'm on Firefox on Android. I'll reach out to him as well.

graemeo 7y ago

the graphs in this medium post make my head spin, but at least the 2nd one has words describing what the author purportedly means.

igdr138x 7y ago
Thank you. They're staggeringly bad. I'm surprised no one else commented.

mertd 7y ago

Interesting way to discover the curse of dimensionality.

hevi_jos 7y ago

It has to be said that Steve Jobs great quality was learning from the best in a given field, what it is called now "modeling". He had as a mentor, when he was kid, f*cking Robert Noyce: http://online.wsj.com/media/NoyceJobs_digits_D_20111007151956.jpg http://online.wsj.com/media/NoyceJobs_digits_D_2011100715195... Noyce himself was a genius on its own. And then Markkula, and then the president of Sony(that launched the Trinitron and walkman), and so on. He learned how to learn.

forgotmypw 7y ago

Why is it acceptable to submit an article which is selectively inaccessible to the majority of users? All I see is: How to Become the Best in the World at Something With skill stacking, you don’t need to be at the top to be extraordinary Tomas Pueyo Oct 17 · 7 min read It’s better to have three okay tools than a single, perfect one. The axe is great at breaking obstacles, but not that useful to jump over pits. The grapple is great to jump over ice or pits, but not amazing for slaying dragons. The only way to win is by having both tools. Illustrations: Tomas Pueyo. CConsider what it takes to become an NBA player. Most of them have been honing their skills on the basketball court practically since infancy. Years of countless practices, camps, and games have helped each player develop a skill set based around shooting… Keep the story going. Sign up for an extra free read. You've completed your member preview for this month, but when you sign up for a free Medium account, you get one more story. Flagged.

a13n 7y ago
The article is accessible, but you've chosen not to access it.
bluetidepro 7y ago
Non paywall link: https://outline.com/sRfTa9 https://outline.com/sRfTa9 But, FWIW, I do agree with you. Medium is the worst. Thankfully services like Outline are available to get around all that.
CedarMadness 7y ago
I've been using an extension to avoid this common annoyance. https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-firefox https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-firefox also for Chrome: https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome https://github.com/iamadamdev/bypass-paywalls-chrome
- forgotmypw 7y ago
  I use neither Chrome nor Firefox, nor am I installing extra software to access a website that doesn't want me.
7y ago

logicalmonster 7y ago

I don’t know if Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, was the first person to really write about this concept, but he originally wrote about the concept he called the “talent stack” with the same exact arguments in his books years ago. I think this idea is really important: it’s smart to combine different skills. Additionally, having experience in different domains like economics and design and business and technology and more gives you a lens to see the world through that not everybody has. If you combine a few of these lenses, you’re able to make connections and understand things that most people wouldn’t see.

the_cat_kittles 7y ago
in his case, being a writer and a grifter seems to have worked fairly well

the_cat_kittles 7y ago

you know whats more interesting than this kind of vague arm wavy bullshit that offers facile solutions and ignores the fact that not everyone can be good at stuff? hearing from people who are actually very good at something.

spacedog11 7y ago

Author of the article gives one TedX talk, then goes on to proclaim that he's an "expert" at public speaking and ranks himself in the "90" percentile for public speaking. What a joke!

xigency 7y ago
Probably over half the population actively dislikes public speaking, so top 10% isn't so hard to reach.
ken 7y ago
Fear of public speaking is consistently ranked the #1 fear of the average person. I would absolutely put someone who can do it confidently in the top 10%. That's the point of the article: "A bit of work can quickly get you to the top 10%".
TurkishPoptart 7y ago
Yep, I wish this clickbait wasn't posted on HN...

QueridoGuy 7y ago

That’s one of the questions i always wanted to ask the top people such as Bill Gates or someone like Dennis Ritchie. Being the top isn’t something easy, but i feel like people overestimate it quite a lot, to the point that they quit thinking they want to be the best. I can say , the world is much smaller than the concept we draw on our minds. So many stuff that i looked into, especially in the programming world, is simpler than what’s in my mind. The reason why we always think that it’s big and hard thing to achieve is due to how we were taught in schools. We get taught about stuff that on the next grade they say it’s more than we think. Take negative numbers for example, we start knowing that numbers are only positive and nothing such as 2-5 is possible, then we get taught that that idea is wrong. Anyway, we tend to overestimate because of how we used to encounter. If we dedicate ourselves to something, it will pay off. If there is someone that’s world class on something, you shouldn’t focus on becoming him, but focus into further things. We are all alike at the end, it’s our enthusiasm that drive us into pursuing our goals. The only difference between you and the other top 1 is that he had more interest. Basically to put it in simpler words, don’t think that there is a huge gap between you and your understanding of the world and your goal. It’s much less than you think

Kaveren 7y ago
> "The only difference between you and the other top 1 is that he had more interest." Wishful thinking. The most important component is genetic ability, which must be enabled by an environment allowing you to put in the required effort (i.e. developed or developing country, food and housing, minimal education). Interest and discipline is a tertiary concern. It's way easier to be interested in something if you have natural aptitude.

esel2k 7y ago

Isn’t it strange that comments on medium are all very positive whereas on HN all are very negative towards this article. What I want to say is that there might be a bias?

pbulises 7y ago
Author here. It's the culture of the site. Like Reddit. Much more critical. Also, remember that Medium is the platform where the writer writes. Commentators mean in fact to address the author. That helps for civility.

RivieraKid 7y ago

This seems kind of pointless, most people already are the best in the world at some specific combination of skills - knowledge of local geography, ability to cook a certain set of meals, etc. Anyway, a related thought that I find interesting: Becoming a "polymath" i.e. learning a wide range of topics to reasonable depth requires less effort than most people expect. For example, let's say you want to learn mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and economics. I think that achieving 80% of undergrad knowledge would take much less than 80% of the time that people need to complete an undergrad degree. So let's say it could take a year to acquire a good foundation in each of these topics if you try to optimize the process by focusing on fundamentals and core principles, choosing the best books, etc.

chadcmulligan 7y ago

I'm a fan of tennis, I'm not a very good player though, and never will be - I don't want to play 12 hours a day. I've watched Federer many times and a couple of take aways I've seen from watching him - practice every day, if you're losing, just keep going, the other guy will eventually give up or make a mistake, or you'll lose today, the other guy will eventually give up. I really think this is the only way to be the best at something - do it every day, some days you'll fail, but if you keep going, eventually you'll have so much expertise you'll wake up one day and be the best, or close enough. The trouble is no one really wants to do this, all Federer does is tennis, he must love it, every day he gets up and plays tennis. Most people will stop at good enough though. If Federer played basketball, would he be the best? probably not, so thats the other thing - pick something your body and brain is built for, and do it every day. If there were any short cuts then the best would use them any way and add them to their arsenal, so any short cuts will be short lived. I think PG said something the same about start ups - they don't fail the founders just stop. I think this ties in with why so many start ups are made by rich kids, they can afford not to stop, everyone else has to stop at some point and get a job.

suyash 7y ago
I concur, it also reminds me of this famous quote : “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. ” —Aristotle.
- chadcmulligan 7y ago
  I always find it surprising when so much of what we think and talk about today is the same thing that people thought and talked about a couple of thousand years ago, very little about people has changed.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 7y ago
    See, I would be surprised if it was the other way.
pbulises 7y ago

markthien 7y ago

most women don't like pornstar as most of them very good at banging only like a machine. women like a man with a stack of skills like good at foreplay, banging, kissing, romantic, playing and etc. this is considered as skill stacking too.

oper8or 7y ago

This should be taken to heart by every technologist, or to be precise, pure technologist. Being pure tech today is about as useful as being a typist during the type-writer era i.e. specialized skill that is in demand, but by itself (with few exceptions) is only secondary to the domain it is applied in. Most so-called "tech" companies are not really tech, but more in (tele)communications, media, advertising, surveillance data businesses. It is easy to see the time when everyone can do technology. This surely happened to typing, it would be ludicrous trying to get a job as a typist today. Same can happen to the pure tech: a) due to technology itself e.g. web-site builders, etc. b) education,- everybody learns to type today, its a bit of a stretch, but maybe everybody can learn to program. Aside from job security argument, the value creation is happening in the domain where business is focused, not necessarily knowledge of technology. Technologists who understand the domain can deliver much more value, and command higher premiums.

mineP 7y ago

Is this why we go to colleges?