Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

Duckworth and her coauthors, to their credit, point out that by studying highly preselected groups, “we have necessarily limited the external validity of our investigation.”

Unquestionably, Yokoi needed narrow specialists. The first true electrical engineer Nintendo hired was Satoru Okada, who said bluntly, “Electronics was not Yokoi’s strong point.” Okada was Yokoi’s codesigner on the Game & Watch and Game Boy. “I handled more of the internal systems of the machine,” he recalled, “with Yokoi handling more of the d

“I was doing so many different sports as a young boy—gymnastics, basketball, football, tennis—and I think, ultimately, everything came together with all those different kinds of sports to enhance my footwork.”

utilitarian spectacles have been swapped for spectacles through which the world is classified by concepts.

Tiger was not merely playing golf. He was engaging in “deliberate practice,” the only kind that counts in the now-ubiquitous ten-thousand-hours rule to expertise. The “rule” represents the idea that the number of accumulated hours of highly specialized training is the sole factor in skill development, no matter the domain.

One study showed that early career specializers jumped out to an earnings lead after college, but that later specializers made up for the head start by finding work that better fit their skills and personalities.

Winston Churchill’s “never give in, never, never, never, never” is an oft-quoted trope. The end of the sentence is always left out: “except to convictions of honor and good sense.”

The trick was expanding the organization’s range by identifying the dominant culture and then diversifying it by pushing in the opposite direction.