The 10,000 Hour Rule

Personal Development

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What does it take someone to become an expert or a master performer in any given field? Malcolm Gladwell, the author of the popular book Outliers, says it requires 10,000 hours of practice. This concept is based largely on the research of Anders Ericsson that approximately 10,000 hours is the magic number of greatness. To use another of Gladwell’s popular terms, 10,000 hours is the “Tipping- Point” of greatness. 10,000 hours is approximately 417 days. If you devote 3 hours per day it would be approximately 3333 days or a little over 9 years.

This number has been debated widely by many scientists and other experts. Some argue that there is no magic number for greatness. They say some people may require much less than 10,000 hours and some may require over 25,000 hours for achieving the same level of perfection. Now, regardless of whether this is the exact magic number or not what is basically to be understood is one cannot achieve perfection without putting in several thousands of hours of effort.