10,000 Hours

*/by Rick Nason, PhD, CFA
Partner, RSD Solutions Inc./*

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While aimlessly skimming the online sports editorials – procrastinating
from doing real work – I came across a series of articles that rehashed the
nature versus nurture article for athletic success; the old "are champions
made or are they born?" debate. 

It appears that the answer is both.  In this age of professionalism, you
need the proper genes and you need the 10,000 hours of purposeful practice to
succeed.  One article I browsed also made the fact that many parents have
mistakenly zeroed in on the 10,000 hours theory and have had their offspring
focus exclusively on purposeful practice in a single sport so as to achieve
the greatness they desire (presumably by living vicariously through their
kids).  The article cited several studies that showed that kids that
specialized in one sport on average underperformed as they aged, and did
significantly worse in their athletic achievements than those kids who played
a variety of sports early in their sporting careers (such as they are as a 10
year old).

I think there are a couple of lessons here for risk managers.  Currently
there seems to be a focus on concentrated learning and a sole focus to risk
management that is needed to become a successful risk manager.  It is
somewhat analogous to the 10,000 hour theory.  It also is consistent with
the nurture theory of sport greatness.  In other words, great risk managers
can be made if only enough focus, attention and dedication to the profession
is given to the individual. 

I believe the nature versus nurture argument from sports shows us that you
need a natural inclination or talent for the field before you can become an
expert in it.  Also I believe that sports show us that focusing in on one
discipline actually hinders growth and development as they pertain to
mastery. 

Great risk managers are a combination of a natural inclination for the
discipline as well as dedicated study in the discipline.  However to become
a great risk manager you also need to expand your interests well beyond risk
management in order to gain new insights from other fields that can then be
applied to risk.  Becoming a great risk manager is a function of both nature
and nurture.

My skimming the sport editorials may have been procrastination at its worst,
but at least I got a blog idea out of it.


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