Originally Published 1.12.2014

"Practice makes perfect, but nobody's perfect, so why practice?" -Kurt Cobain

I remember my supervisor in my early career told me that it is good to know a little of everything so that it makes you indispensable at work. A few years later, I realized that it was exactly the opposite of reality. To be valuable, companies look for "experts" and not "generalists". Companies pay high to retain highly technical skilled workers like programmers, project managers, finance experts, and of course, Lean Six Sigma Professionals.

So, how do you become an expert?

One of the most interesting parts of Malcolm Gladwell’s fantastic book Outliers is his discussion of the “10,000-hour rule,” Throughout the publication, Gladwell repeatedly mentions the "10,000-Hour Rule", claiming that the key to success in any field is, to a large extent, a matter of practicing a specific task for a total of around 10,000 hours.

This infographic, created for the blog Zintro by Nowsourcing, takes a closer look at practice and the 10,000-hour rule.

And if you fail on your first few tries, watch this video, which according to Mitch Ditkoff, "Two minutes on what it takes to really do creative work. Inspiring. Truthful. And in your face like a fresh arctic wind off a lake, you've been waiting too long to sail on..."

Start your Lean Six Sigma journey for free!

Take our internationally-recognized White Belt e-Learning with certification anytime:

sixsigmaph.teachable.com/p/lean-six-sigma-white-belt-certification-program