Ask HN: 10k hours rule to master anything. Could I switch career when I am 43?
Throughout his book "M. Outliers: The Story of Success.", Gladwell repeatedly refers to the “10 000-hour rule,” asserting that the key to achieving true expertise in any skill is simply a matter of practicing. It could be the greatest practice myth. My american boss founded my company in Viet Nam when he was 55. I admire him a lot. Nonetheless, I am still afraid of switching to other job because time is running out when i am older. A lot of my friends who are technical guys think so. Any advice?
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It doesn't take 10k hours to master something. Nor do you need to master something to have it be your career.
Being an outside to a new thing at your age can bring insights that others can't bring. Use your head, but there are lots of ways you can bring this to your advantage. It is the folks that cross domains that bring the gains.
But you're right that you can switch career and with enough practice (of the dedicated kind) you can indeed acquire proficiency in any skill.
It's appropriately called "There’s no speed limit". A lot of rules from there apply here as well.
It's about a guy who finished college in 2 years, if I remember correctly.
I've written it down on my white-board and remind myself about it everyday.
Thought you might find it useful.
P.S. I'm working on believing in myself and shamelessly plugging my weekly newsletter for remote working parents everywhere - check it out. https://thursdaydigest.com/
Love this quote and it seems fitting here - "Many books believe they know how you should live. But each book disagrees with the next. In “How to Live”, each chapter believes it knows how you should live. And each chapter disagrees with the next."
I switched careers from marketing to software development at 37 yo. It took me 8 months of full-time study (I had the privilege to be able to quit my job to do that) to get my first job as a front-end developer. Now, 5 years later, I think it was the best professional decision I have ever made in my life. I am much happier doing daily work than before and, now, I earn much more than I used to (despite a significant salary cut for my first dev job).
To put in hours, I would say 8 months averaging 7 hours of dedication on week days is about 1232 hours.
And I am no master, far from it. I am a competent, mediocre, regular 1x web developer. Some weeks I am 0.5x, some weeks I am 2x.
If you don’t mind, was it long ago that you made this switch? Was there anything that you’d do differently in retrospect?
The big one I guess: do you feel that not having gone the “traditional” route made it more difficult to find roles in the early days?
Feel free not to answer if too invasive but I’d find any info really helpful.
It was a different moment, not sure if better or worse for junior developers getting a first job. It was before companies were “desperate” to hire software developers, like about a couple of years ago, which made them hire more junior devs. But, it was also before the current hiring market contraction (as a proxy see a post mentioning the low number of posts in Who is Hiring thread). But, it was also before remote work was more common (it was effectively impossible to be hired remotely as a junior back then, now it is just hard). Not sure how all of this balances out.
I wouldn’t do anything different. I still vouch for not paying anything to learn to code. I used freeCodeCamp and it only got better since then. To see how I did it, the blog is a good source.
About not having a traditional background it both hurt and helped me.
I just reread this passage on my blog that I had forgotten:
”People will undervalue you. Chances are not all interviewers will be nice. On a promising application for a cool job, I got a call from the founder. He said something in the lines of "You know, you have to understand that you are competing with a lot of young guys who are coding since they are twelve. You have a lot of catch up to do. You have to expect an intern salary and even so work harder to show you can become a good developer. Because I'm not sure you can." Maybe he was just using some shitty negotiation technique to hire me on a low salary, maybe it was ageism, maybe he thought I was delusional on my aspirations and decided to give me a lecture to be more down to earth. Whether he was stingy, mean or patronizing, it was definitely a place that I wanted distance.”
So it hurted in this case. I also read some discouraging comments here on HN on a thread where I said I want to go from scratch to hired in 4 months. But, it also helped get my first job. I was hired to work a small team that one senior developer that was only 20 years old at the time. He was technically worth of being considered a senior, but had to improve in other areas. They saw me being a 37yo junior developer with a lot of professional experience and good communication skills a good match for him. Also, they valued my diligence and dedication on changing careers. Saw that as evidence that I would be continuously learning. So, my advice is to be able to demonstrate in an interview that previous professional experience will be useful in the new technical job. How do, depends on the background and strengths of each one.
I do think my blog has useful advice still in general.
I do think it is a good career change and possible at 42yo, and I would encourage them. The only small caveat is that they need to realize early if they “enjoy” coding. It is important. Few people are capable of committing to the continuous learning demanded to have a good career in software development “only” for the money.
Good luck to them!
Well after a few months, a company made a job offer and I'm very happy. Thank you!
I work in software, a sideways step for me would be to go towards admin / networky stuff, or to start doing BA style work.
Fresh starts are hard only if you have existing commitments.
* The 10000 hour rule is nonsense. There are skills that require very much practice, and a lot of those are unattainable for most people. You could practice 10,000 hours on the violin or playing chess without reaching the lofty heights of Hahn or Magnusson. That does require some kind of "talent".
* Many other skills can be acquired in much less time, certainly if you don't start from scratch. E.g., learning a 2nd programming language takes much less time than the 1st.
* I've been switching jobs all my life; on average after about 5 years. 43 isn't very old to switch, IMO.
* Think about what is important to you: Money? Stability? Job satisfaction? Can you find a new job that gives you what you want and need?
Without commenting on whether the 10k rule was reasonable, you're shifting goalposts. It was never the claim that it only took 10k hours to be the best in the world.
Even if there is some merit to the "rule", the intent behind it is you'll master something in that amount of time. You can become good at something with far less time. You just need to be good to earn a living. I think of all the jobs I've worked and the slackers and incompetence I've seen. I think with some education about a job and decent intelligence most people can put in the effort, learn on the job and become good - if they want to.
10k hours is roughly 5 working years of experience with no nights+weekends extra time so if OP switches careers now, they could be mastering something by the time they're 48. I've seen people switch careers into software, and go from junior to mid level up to senior in that time.
Do it.
However, there is a huge and dynamic middle ground that can be conquered by anyone through nothing but work and dedication.
Nor is the same at a young age, but possibly differenly not the same.
Learning a second programming language isn't really learning a new skill, it's maybe more like learning a new genre of music if you already play the violin well, or learning how to play speed chess once you're already a master.
You should probably read a bit about the "rule" before calling it nonsense.
It's vague, flexible, and refers to attaining mastery in some skill. Nowhere is it implied you'll be a world champion chess player after 10,000 hours.
It says practice will make you better at something. That's hard to dismiss.
https://problogservice.com/2012/03/15/what-malcolm-gladwell-...
The problem is, Gladwell never said you needed 10,000 hours to be an expert, you need 10,000 hours to be a phenom. To be so freakishly awesome, to be such a standout among your peers, that sometimes your first name is enough to tell people who you are: Peyton. Tiger. Venus. Kobe. Oprah.
But in the meantime, here’s what Malcolm Gladwell said about the 10,000 hour rule and being an outlier:
“In fact, by the age of twenty, the elite performers (violinists) had each totaled ten thousand hours of practice.” — p. 38
“The emerging picture from such studies is that ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert—in anything,” writes the neurologist Daniel Levitin. — p. 40
“To become a chess grandmaster also seems to take about ten years. (Only the legendary Bobby Fisher got to that elite level in less than that amount of time: it took him nine years.) And what’s ten years? Well, it’s roughly how long it takes to put in ten thousand hours of hard practice. Ten thousand hours is the magic number of greatness.” — p. 41
You are trying to say that someone claiming 500g being necessary to making bread is hogwash because it doesn't also talk about the salt and water (etc).
I quoted Malcolm Gladwell -- who was the originator of the "10,000 hours" rule (remark?) in popular culture.
Gladwell says you need practice 10,000 hours. In my analogy of the situation, I claim I need 500g of flour.
You complain that there may be other things needed in addition to practice therefore the need for practice is bullshit. This is analogized by "you" saying that the need for other ingredients in bread somehow invalidates that the flour is needed.
The point I'm trying to make is this: Stating that something is necessary but not sufficient, does not invalidate claims about what is necessary. In the quotes, I saw no claim that only 10k hours of practice was required, just that they were necessary.
You are saying: 10Kh of practice + tutoring costs + (implicitly) not having other responsibilities to block the learning either directly via work or whatnot or indirectly via emotional stress.
That 10Kh is in your equation, but isn't the only part of the equation. That is it's necessary but not sufficient.
I actually think even more radically - career, or success in general, is not necessarily a matter of mastery, and thinking in terms of technical skills, may lead to failure, because the requirements for success may be other ones.
In particular, successfully founding a company may require many qualities (and acts) that have nothing to do with technical skills, rather, with human ones.
I'm not familiar with your boss, but it's possible that they just found a market need, and dedicated themselves to solving it, even with mediocre skills, but with the right human skillset (creative ideas, understanding of the market, orientation to get things done, effectively communicating, and a myriad of other things).
There are certain fields where technical accomplishments is the main drive (Doom ;)), but in such cases, the answer whether that's possible or not is very obvious.
I stress: it may seem paradoxical, but a strictly technical vision can be counterproductive even in a technical field.
In many places people have started over four or five times, not once. And by the way you don't need 10k hours or be a master-anything to have a viable career in a field, just enough experience to get a foot in the door.
To answer your question: it depends on your specific context. At 43, you could theoretically still gain the required qualifications for most careers and work for ~ 20 years (ex. you'd be 67/68 after 4 years spent earning a new degree + 20 years working). The more relevant consideration is will you actually be able to do that as a working 43-year-old with normal responsibilities?
Another question you seem to allude to is "will ageism be a limiting factor?" That answer is also context-dependent. At a lot of trendy companies mentioned here on HN, I'd suspect that it would be. That said, those companies are only a fraction of the job market and I'm not sure more "boring" companies would be as concerned with age as with your skills. Outside of tech and some competitive (+ conservative) industries like finance or consulting, I don't think it would be as big of a deal.
Though his 10k hours for mastery of skillset thesis has been disproven- in the context that there does seem to be "talent" that cannot be "practiced"- I believe it myself and have observed substantial learning at older ages. However, for yourself I would question whether learning the skills is really what is required or are expectations and social components the more difficult obstacle to overcome.
Good luck.
Just imagine playing guitar from the beginning until you reach 10000 h of physical practice. Just say.. 10h a day ..that would mean 3 years of extensive training. You for sure will be a Master after that.
Or, just assume everyday 1h of practicing. That's 10000 days.. something like 30 years..
So this rule doesn't mean you can't be a Master if you didn't invest 10k h of practicing, but rather, no matter what you do,if you do it for 3 +x years, you sure will be a Master at that.
Bullshit truth!
Go for it, if it's something you can enjoy.
Go for it, if you can use your aforequainted knowledge.
Go for it, if you see some chances for being able to say "it enables me to work more for myself and less for one another".
Go for it, if your life needs a complete change.
But keep in mind, that you may need to lower your spendings. If you can't lower your spendings for some reason - then, think twice about switching careers. It's up to you, whether you can cope with possibly lower income.
Keep us informed:)
This is the most important things regardless of 10kh and how someone gets there. If someone doesn't enjoy what they are doing, they won't practice and they won't get better.
But first, figure out if this is something you would like doing. Take a course like e.g. this https://www.coursera.org/learn/python for a month (you can audit it for free) and see if you actually like programming. If you do, carry on.
A) What does being a master really means to me? Others respect? Peer recognition? Work autonomy? B) Am I willing to change careers knowing I will never be a master in it? C) Does the trade-off of changing from a career that I master to a career that I will never master worth it?
In your question there's already an implied NO, do not change, because being a master seems important to you.
Regarding mastery, it's always difficult to achieve it, starting at 20 years old or starting at 50 years old. Most people don't achieve it, they just feel comfortable after a while.
The better I get at programming, the further I feel to be from the 'mastery' (whatever it is).
Ericsson describes "deliberate practice". That is, to become an expert you must "work on high specific tasks assigned to overcome weaknesses, and you would have your performance monitored carefully for further improvement" [2]
[1] https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1993-40718-001
[2] https://www.ysamphy.com/anders-ericsson-deliberate-practice/