Lessons from Sachin Tendulkar, on How to Achieve Expert Performance at Work

The cricket World Cup this year was fantastic, especially with India winning the finals. When mentioning India and Cricket, one of the first things that comes to mind is Sachin Tendulkar. He is one of the best (if not the best) cricket players of all time and is simply outstanding at what he does.

So what makes Sachin such a success? Was he born with it? Does he have some special abilities which make him great?

As per research at the Florida State University (Professor Anders Ericsson), people who display expert performance (as opposed to normal/regular performance) are not endowed with any inherent characteristics or innate/special talent. In other words, experts are made and not born.

The way to achieve expert status (i.e. performance which is consistently superior to that of peers) is by doing the following:

• Engaging in deliberate practice, which
  • Is not inherently enjoyable
  • Is not play or paid practice
  • Is relevant to the skill being developed
  • Is not simply watching the skill being performed
  • Requires effort and attention from the learner
  • Often involves activities selected by a coach or teacher to facilitate learning

• Concentrating well during the practice, in order to observe/incorporate feedback from the activities and use them to learn new skills and broaden the reach/range of skills
• Spending enough time on practice, in terms of number of days and also hours per day. According to the research, on average, from beginning an activity to the development of expertise, it takes roughly 10 years of proper practice. Also, one commonality among expert performers (compared to non-expert performers) is that they engage in deliberate practice for longer periods than non-expert performers
• Finding good coaches, teachers and mentors

Here are some relevant quotes from/about Sachin Tendulkar:

“When he was young, Tendulkar would practice for hours on end. If he became exhausted, his coach would put a 1 Rupee coin on the top of the wickets, and the bowler who dismissed Tendulkar would get the coin. If Tendulkar passed the whole session without getting dismissed, the coach would give him the coin. Young Sachin got thirteen 1 Rupee coins from his coach and he considers them his most prized possession”

“My father understood exactly how to get the best out of me. He always encouraged me, warned me against taking short cuts and told me to just keep playing, despite the ups and downs”

“My big sister gave me a bat after returning from a trip to Kashmir. It wasn’t the best bat, but it was like a piece of gold to me. I used to imagine myself batting for India, hitting fours and sixes, the people cheering. I used that bat until it broke”

So there you have it. If you want to be great at your work, or improve someone else’s performance, you now have some pointers for doing so. In case you are interested in reading more on the subject, below is a relevant article from the Harvard Business Review.