Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

The pattern continued for every genre of question. Pressed to make conceptual groupings—akin to the similarities questions on IQ tests—remote villagers reverted to practical narratives based on their direct experience. When psychologists attempted to explain a “which one does not belong” grouping exercise to thirty-nine-year-old Rakmat, they gave h

When Sloboda and a colleague conducted a study with students at a British boarding school that recruited from around the country—admission rested entirely on an audition—they were surprised to find that the students classified as exceptional by the school came from less musically active families compared to less accomplished students, did not start

I dove into work showing that highly credentialed experts can become so narrow-minded that they actually get worse with experience, even while becoming more confident—a dangerous combination. And I was stunned when cognitive psychologists I spoke with led me to an enormous and too often ignored body of work demonstrating that learning itself is bes

Each dark horse had a novel journey, but a common strategy. “Short-term planning,” Ogas told me. “They all practice it, not long-term planning.” Even people who look like consummate long-term visionaries from afar usually looked like short-term planners up close. When Nike cofounder Phil Knight was asked in 2016 about his long-term vision and how h

“However,” they added, “the distribution of effort across different instruments seems important. Those children identified as exceptional by [the school] turn out to be those children who distributed their effort more evenly across three instruments.” The less skilled students tended to spend their time on the first instrument they picked up, as if

Space between practice sessions creates the hardness that enhances learning. One study separated Spanish vocabulary learners into two groups—a group that learned the vocab and then was tested on it the same day, and a second that learned the vocab but was tested on it a month later. Eight years later, with no studying in the interim, the latter gro

At every job he had, Vincent was convinced that if he outworked everyone around him, he would succeed. But then he would fail. His interests whipsawed constantly. Even once he’d set himself on being an artist, he would devote all his energy to one style or medium only to completely disavow it soon thereafter.