Are You Practicing Like Lang Lang?

A couple nights ago in Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco my wife, Tae, and I had the gloriously uplifting experience of listening to a solo recital of Lang Lang, the 26-year-old Chinese pianist and music world phenomenon. It was an awe-inspiring performance by an incredibly skilled artist whose technical ability is unsurpassed and whose dramatic flair and showmanship generates an electric charge in the audience. 

After the performance, we had the opportunity to attend a reception for Lang Lang, and I couldn't resist asking him a few questions about my current obsession, the role of practice in talent development. Part of the conversation went like this:

Jim: When did you start playing the piano?
Lang: At 2 ½ years old.
Jim: How many hours a day did you practice?
Lang: For the first 15 years, 8 hours a day.
Jim: And now?
Lang: 3 hours a day.
Jim: Every day?
Lang: Yes.

Lang's response confirms what I've reported in prior blogs. Research by K. Anders Ericsson and colleagues concludes that it's deliberate practice that produces great performers, not simply their raw talent.

Recently two popular writers have published books that discuss Ericsson's research.  One is by Geoff Colvin — Talent Is Overrated — and the other — Outliers — is from bestselling author, Malcolm Gladwell. Colvin's is the more practical of the two, but Gladwell tells a great story, and he adds some intriguing research on the importance of context. What we learn from them both is that many longstanding assumptions about giftedness and talent are substantially incomplete and can even be unnecessarily limiting.  I urge you to read both books.

A recent blog by Michael McKinney on LeadingBlog also discusses these books, and you'll appreciate his summary of what you can do to apply lessons from the research on expertise to talent development in your organization.  Check it out.

Back to Lang Lang for a moment. His statement that he practiced 8 hours a day for the first 15 years, and now practices 3 hours per day, makes me to curious to know how many hours a day organizational leaders practice their craft.  Whenever I've asked audiences this question in my more recent speeches, the answers I've gotten have been roughly....."Zero."  That is not exactly the route to a great performance, is it?

If leaders don't practice 3 hours per day, can we expect the kind of virtuosity we experience from Lang Lang? Of course not. By his standards, most leaders are amateurs. While it may not be realistic to expect the majority of our leaders to practice as Lang Lang does, I'm convinced we should expect more than zero. What do you think?

Posted by Jim Kouzes

Comments

[Francisco]

Jim, this makes sense - practice makes perfect. But can you give some examples of how leaders can practice

[Alex Guerrero]

Jim, I agree with you. I've always felt that in order to enhance, perfect or exceed your leadership ability you must also take the time to practice it. Francisco asked how? Well, that is part of being a leader, finding the way to do something more efficiently and with better results. I have come across management styles where questions about process improvement are reversed back to the questioner. I understand it is done with the intention of helping the individual find the answer, but there are times when individuals are looking for specific guidance from a leader, not asignments. Sometimes it seems to me that the reason why some leaders answer back with a question, it is because they don't know the answer. Perhaps daily involvment in day to day activities and processes can help a leader understand what really is going on in their department, unit, etc, and be able to provide guidance. This could be one form of how you can practice your leadership skills.

[Wally Bock]

Sorry, Jim. I don't think the question is "Do you practice your craft?" is a helpful question. Managers are practicing their craft every day. Better questions might be "How and how often do you get feedback on your actions?" and "How often do you adjust your next trail based on feedback?"

As for Francisco's question, the answer lies in three things. Be conscious of what you are trying to do and why. Get feedback on your actions, from yourself and anyone else you can get to help? And consciously adjust your behavior based on the feedback.

This doesn't take sophisticated analysis, but it does take effort. People who went through my programs have helped developed simple forms to keep track of how you're doing. But you really don't need anything more than a simple journal to track your feedback.

[Jim Kouzes]

Thanks Francisco, Alex, and Wally for your comments and questions. This discussion of practice, to me at least, is one of the most important dialogues we can be having right now.

There is no doubt that most managers are "practicing their craft every day," as Wally points out. They are out there working hard 8, 10, 12, and even more hours doing their best. So, my question may have been poorly phrased. What I am asking is "How frequently do you 'deliberately practice' the craft of leading?" That's because the daily execution of our managerial responsibilities—what some might refer to as "practicing the craft" —and the kind of "deliberate practice" that K. Anders Ericsson, and other researchers on expertise, refer to, are not the same thing. When we're talking about "practice," we need to distinguish between the two, and I appreciate the need to be clearer about this distinction.

When I asked Lang Lang about his practice routine, he wasn't talking about the performances he gives in front of an audience. He was talking about the time backstage or in the studio working alone, or with a teacher, learning a new piece or intentionally working to improve how he plays a piece he already knows. This is what we're talking about when we say "deliberate practice." (See my November 12 blog for more information about the elements of deliberate practice.)

Francisco asked for an example of what a leader would do to deliberately practice, and I will be writing a blog specifically about that next week. But let me offer one illustration of how leaders can bring this discipline into their daily routine.

Let's say I get feedback that I am not listening attentively to others and that I'd be much more effective if I'd do a better job at really paying attention to what people are saying. How, then, can I "deliberately practice" listening without, say, having to add another 2 to 3 hours onto my work day? What can I do to intentionally improve my listening skills using a designed learning activity while I am at work? Here are a few thoughts.

For the next week I can:

1. Devote 30 minutes of a regular daily meeting to practicing my listening skills.
2. Set a goal to receive feedback from the meeting attendees that they experienced me as listening to them so well that I could accurately paraphrase what they said before I said something myself.
3. Use the technique of "active listening"—a structured way of responding that requires me to briefly restate the key points of the speaker and to check with the speaker to make sure I am hearing her/him accurately before I respond.
4. Stay focused and use this technique for the entire 30 minutes. While it might feel a little awkward, the point is to stick with the routine until it becomes automatic.
5. Engage a coach from HR, OD, or even another line manager who is accomplished in this skill and ask her/him to observe me in the meeting. After the meeting, s/he can give me feedback and tips on listening. I could also videotape myself during the meeting for replay in the feedback session.

There are many, many other ways I can bring "deliberate practice" into the workplace. This is just one example of how we can take a routine activity we all engage in at work — a meeting — and turn it into a "practice field" for leadership.

As Alex points out, the best leaders are the best learners. They are curious about what is going on around them, always seeking to better understand how things work, how they are leading, and how they can improve their own behavior and the functioning of the organizations. A learning mindset is critical to becoming the best in any field.

Thanks again for commenting, and I hope we hear from more of you.

[Ola Aiyegbayo]

Hello Jim, great blog post.
Benjamin Disraeli said “the secret of success is for a man to be ready for his time when it comes”. I believe that deliberate practice gets leaders ready for such leadership opportunities when they come their way. Lang Lang’s mastery definitely follows the passion – practice (deliberate) – performance cycle and the 10 year or 10000 hour mastery rule which Gladwell talks about in his Outliers book. You might be interested in the Colvin’s 2006 Fortune article (if you haven’t yet read it) which led to the Talent is Overrated book.

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2006/10/30/8391794/index.htm

[Jim Kouzes]

Thanks, Ola, for the link to Geoff Colvin's piece in FORTUNE. Geoff says that article stimulated more reader comments than anything else he had written, and it was that reaction that motivated him to write his book, Talent is Overrated. Malcolm Gladwell has performed a valuable service in popularizing the 10,000 hour rule, and we should also pay homage to the late Herb Simon, of Carnegie Melon, for his pioneering research in the 1960s that informed a lot of the early work on talent development, and to K. Anders Ericsson, professor of psychology at Florida State University, for his investigations of expertise in a wide range of fields. There's a link below to an interesting 2006 article in The Scientific American on "The Expert Mind," in which the author states, "The preponderance of psychological evidence indicates that experts are made, not born." Check it out.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-expert-mind&print=true

[Ola Aiyegbayo]

Thanks, Jim, for the Scientific Mind link. Interesting read. Though research show that experts are made not born, they still need opportunities to be made.
Napoleon Bonaparte stated that “Ability is nothing without opportunity” and I will have to agree with him. For example Lang Lang is fortunate to have a musician father, Guo- ren Lang, who spotted his talent early and encouraged his son to develop his ability by entering him in the right competitions which led to other opportunities.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/features/lang-lang-virtuoso-pianist-or-flashy-showman-881188.html

Other examples include Tiger Woods’ dad: Earl Woods, Lewis Hamilton’s dad: Anthony Hamilton, Andy Murray’s mom: Judy Murray, Venus & Serena Williams’ dad: Richard Williams, Beyonce’s dad: Matthew Knowles. I think the world is robbed of great talents who never fulfil their potential not because they lack the ability but the opportunities to develop it. This is a reason why I feel mentors are crucial in the lives of leaders because they provide the necessary feedback required for their development.

Jim, I will like to hear your view on this.

Ola

[Jim Kouzes]

Ola, thanks for sharing your observations about the role that family, particularly parents, and mentors play in the development of expertise. The research clearly supports your point. Back in 1985 Chicago University Professor Benjamin Bloom published the influential book, "Developing Talent in Young People." He wrote about his study of 120 elite performers who had won international competitions across a wide range of fields including music, art, sports, math and the sciences. No innate traits, such as IQ, differentiated these individuals —except for height and body size in selected sports. But one thing that was in common among these world-class performers was a supportive family and devoted teachers.

Close to home, our family has our own example. Nicholas, my stepson, is a NCAA Division 1 tennis player at UC Davis. For a dozen years he's benefitted from multiple coaches and an extraordinarily supportive mother. She drove him to all his practices and matches, sacrificed holidays for national tournaments, and arranged her work schedule around his tennis and school. He wouldn't be where he is today if it hadn't been for his mom. Additionally, his daily practice, weekly clinics, and one-on-one coaching were essential to his developing into the collegiate player that he is.

The lesson for development of young talent is quite clear and irrefutable. It's extremely difficult, if not impossible, to become world class without a supportive home and community environment.

What are the implications of this for the workplace? One implication might be that to develop leaders we should start young. That would certainly be wonderful. Youth organizations, school programs, religious and community groups can all be places where leadership can be nurtured.

But, if our new recruits haven't had that chance before coming to work, does it mean there's no hope for them? Absolutely not. While I don't believe that there's a fast track to excellence—it's going to take around 10,000 hours and 10 years no matter when you start—if we provide emerging leaders with mentoring, coaching and training early in their careers we stand a lot better chance of developing exceptional leaders than if we wait until they become middle managers. And, if you're a young employee with a desire to become a better leader but don't work in an organization with a formal program, then take the initiative to find a mentor and coach. Many experienced and accomplished leaders would be just delighted to have you as their apprentice.

[Mary Healey]

I corrected my e-mail above. Thank you.
Love your topics!

[Greg Basham]

I am always mindful of David McClelland's 3 Needs Theory when it comes to selecting and developing leaders along with instilling in managers that their job is the accomplishment of the organization's objectives through others.

This latter idea was driven home to me by a senior executive who I reported to in his last years before retirement. Prior to working for him, I took pride - as a young manager - in being a working manager and personally took on a full share of the projects in the department. He made it clear that I was being evaluated for leading not doing what he felt that those I was to lead should be doing. It was an invaluable lesson and served me well when I reached the executive levels of that same large insurance company.

If we are to develop leaders in our organizations, we need to ensure that they possess the right balance in the need for power (influence), achievement and affiliation. For some high achievers this means a strengthening of the need to influence and that it seems can only be achieved through practice, sound mentoring and a personal commitment to learning.

[Eileen]

hay how can i get in contact with lang lang? i really want to ask him more suff about his practies techniques.

[Be A Successful Entrepreneur]

Great Stuff But I have to support the saying of PERFECT Practice makes perfect... Perfect Practice also creates mastery- we belive the most important leadership and success trait.

Yo Can See My Blog Post On Leadership and Mastery Here -http://www.beasuccessfulentrepreneur.com/leadership-an-entrepreneurs-path-to-mastery/

Continued Success
Glenn
"You Can Build a Business That Serves Your Life"