Hit a Plateau? 4 Ways to Improve Your Skills
Posted June 8, 2009 in How-To 21 Comments »
As freelancers, we’re often only limited by our imagination, so it can be difficult to see whether we are progressing in our given field. Sure, we can produce some great logo designs or write an article, but we were able to do that a few months ago as well. In order to stand out in a sea of talent, it’s often the case that you need to take your skills to the “next level,” something far easier said than done.
Today I want to look at plateaus in terms of ability, and four tried and tested methods to help you get through them. The journey of mastery is an on-going process, but there are lots of ways to improve our talents along the way.
1 — Slow Down
I’m not sure if this is common across the board, but I can have periods of a few weeks or more when I’m really productive, I’m firing on all cylinders, and everything is going smoothly. Then, for no known reason, I’ll start putting things off, focusing on the easy work so I can skip the hard and checking my email just to feel busy.
Put simply, the dreaded p-word kicks in. Yeah, you know the one…procrastination.
This type of slowing down is usually due to a lack of self-discipline, and not what I’m referring too here. Instead, in order to improve your skills, one effective technique is to stop rushing through your work habitually, and slow down to focus on specific actions.
Once World Champion speed-typist, Albert Tangora, would intentionally type at half his normal speed for a few weeks whenever he hit a plateau. He took time to get the feel for what he was doing, and once he started pushing himself again, he found that he easily broke his previous records.
Improving your skills isn’t always about frantically trying to push your limits further and further. Sometimes it’s good to slow down, really focus on what you are doing and take everything in.
There are lots of ways you can implement this ’slowing down’ into your routine, depending on what you do:
- Chase the smaller, easier clients for a while instead of the big fish
- Write your articles slowly, with more care and attention
- Obsess over your lines of code and really force yourself to think about what you are doing
The aim here is to try to turn-off the auto-pilot and concentrate on specific actions at a slower speed. You may only need to do this for a very short time-frame to notice improved results.
2 — Go Back to Basics
The process we have each used to build our current ability is quite honestly, just a case of trial and error. Our mind stores our successful actions and over time these successes become natural. You can look at driving to see a good example of this. Once you have been driving a car for a while, you don’t need to think about when to use the clutch or change gear, you just know.
One of the reasons we can hit a plateau (or at least feel like we have) is because we have forgotten what it feels like to succeed. We’ve forgotten what it is like to notice our own improvements and achieve things we have never thought possible. We’re often lacking, what scientists call (seriously), the winning feeling.
The winning feeling is simply an emotion we get when we accomplish certain tasks. This is a huge necessity for beginners, but when you’re very advanced in your field, it can be hard to know that you’re improving. It’s often the case that the better we get at something, the more critical we become of our own work; practically eliminating this winning feeling from our realities.
Just for a while, try going back to basics so you can re-live this winning feeling in your chosen field. Write a simple program that you know will do its job, create a website design that doesn’t have any fancy features or write a basic article for a directory that nobody will see. Go back to basics and recall what it is like to prosper.
When you return to your more important tasks, you can start to see how far you really have progressed.
3 — Practice
I know this point is fairly obvious, but obvious just means most are aware of it, not that it is bad. “Practice makes perfect” has to be one of the most common phrases in the English language and for good reason, it’s true.
I recently read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell and while he missed out one very important point, it was packed with fascinating information. One point that really struck a chord with me were all the examples of talented and successful individuals (in their field) who had spent at least 10,000 hours honing their skills. (10,000 hours, by the way, equates to working on your talent: 5 hours per day, 7 days per week, for just less than 5 and a half years).
What really interested me was that when looking at current professionals such as violinists and pianists, there was not one exception to the rule. There was nobody who appeared to have some God-given talent and didn’t need to practice that much; they all had to put an extreme number of hours in to get where they were.
I think that this in itself really shows the power of practice.
4 — Look at Finished Results
I am under no illusion that I still have a long way to go in order to improve my skills as a writer, but I have definitely progressed a lot over the last few years. One thing that I can recall being very closely linked to my improvements as a writer is when I started to read more books.
I read about one book every week and whether I enjoyed the content or not, I always felt that even just looking at different styles of writing helps me to better my own. This doesn’t just have to be an idea that writers can use though, far from it.
If you’re a designer, look at logo design books or CSS galleries. If you write Facebook applications, look at the developer forums to see how people are doing things or try to dissect what is already out there. Whatever field it is that you are in, take time to look at the end results from other talent, and you’ll no doubt be inspired to improve your own.
If you keep doing this you’ll start to begin to define what is good to you versus the type of work you wouldn’t want to produce, and then use those good examples to benefit your own output.
Over to you guys! What methods do you have in place to continually hone your abilities?
About the author: Glen Allsopp writes on the subject of Personal Development at PluginID. His aim is to help you 'Plug into your Identity' and reach your full potential.
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21 Comments
Anthony Lewis
June 8th, 2009 at 10:37 amOne of the best ways to learn is by teaching. Explaining concepts to someone else will make you realize just how little you know about a subject.
Glen Allsopp
June 8th, 2009 at 10:42 amI agree Anthony, and have actually covered that in an article I wrote in the past. I would say that mostly applies to learning things from the very basics, rather than using it to advance from a relatively skilled plateau.
Colin Wright
June 8th, 2009 at 10:58 amGreat article, and I also agree with Anthony that teaching someone else a skill is a great way to cover the four aspects of improving your skills that you mentioned above.
It also helps someone else out, and allows you to ‘pay it forward,’ so that hopefully the world will work its way back around and help you out when you need it.
Raymond Selda
June 8th, 2009 at 11:12 amAlways inspirational post Glen. For me I always rephrase “Practice makes perfect” to “Perfect practice makes perfect”.
Thank you for putting 10K hours into perspective. hahaha. Thanks
IvánPérez
June 8th, 2009 at 1:04 pmWhoa! I’ve discovered this site through Glen’s twitter and I’m going to subscribe right now.
Damn good article, mate.
Glen Allsopp
June 8th, 2009 at 1:37 pm@Raymond – Haha, 10,000 hours definitely looks a lot when you put it like that ;)
@Ivan – Hey man, I write here quite regularly as well. Nice to see lots of tweets for the article and thanks for stopping by!
Mitesh Solanki
June 8th, 2009 at 2:40 pmgreat article glen! I enjoyed reading your perspective on practice and agree very much with Anthony…
Cheers!
Sean
June 8th, 2009 at 6:40 pmRe: 10,000 hours the original research on this was done by Ericsson and is very fascinating. The linked article may not be the first published.
Anyhow I’ve been preaching 10,000 hours and practice for years now. My day job is language teacher.
D Bnonn Tennant
June 8th, 2009 at 7:50 pmHowya Glen. As well as teaching, I’d add peer critique. Getting feedback from people in your field is really helpful for improving your abilities because, with strong expertise and a new perspective, they can highlight specific things you need to work on (and specific things you’re already doing well).
For instance, you say that you still have a long way to go in order to improve your skills as a writer. As a writer myself, I can give you a hand by suggesting that you avoid the following sentence structures:
Using a comma like this implies that you’re merely adding an after-thought to the existing sentence, rather than finishing with a break for emphasis. For example, read according to the technical meaning of the comma, the first sentence could be re-written like this and mean the same thing:
Whereas with a proper break, your intended meaning is clear and easy to read:
*hat-tip*
Bnonn
Glen Allsopp
June 8th, 2009 at 8:08 pm@Mitesh – Great stuff
@Sean – Thanks for that link, it’s nice to see you’ve been preaching solid info for a long time. The book itself does mention the exact research pointed out here.
@Bnonn – I’ll put my dignity aside and thank you for your help :) The second example definitely looks better. If you have a link to a good writing course / guide I would love to check i tout. I still haven’t found one that I feel can help me with practical application of its principles.
D Bnonn Tennant
June 8th, 2009 at 8:25 pmGlen, I hope I didn’t come across as insulting. If so my apologies—I was aiming to offer some helpful advice.
I’m afraid I don’t know of any writing courses myself…but what sort of thing are you looking for? Depending on the length you desire, a course like that might be a project I’d be keen to undertake. I’m currently working on getting a freelance design business off the ground, and looking ahead at ways to promote myself while giving back for all the great stuff which others have already put out there. Although my focus is more on design, copywriting is an interest of mine. I’ve noted that although many designers write a great deal (and I’m thankful they do), many of them are also quite poor at it. So an accessible guide which covers some of the common mistakes, along with ways to easily improve one’s writing, might be valuable to many freelancers. I wonder, though, if CopyBlogger doesn’t already provide that sort of thing? If you think there’s a niche there that isn’t filled, I’d definitely consider producing something for other freelancers once I get up and running.
Antonio
June 9th, 2009 at 2:56 amGreat article. Thanks alot!
Catherine Cantieri, Sorted
June 9th, 2009 at 9:54 amGreat article. Reading through it, I realized I’ve applied all these principles to my sport of choice, Muay Thai kickboxing. I tend to “power through” my moves, but sometimes I can tell something’s off. Then, I slow it down, focus on technique, practice moves I’m having trouble with and watch the more advanced belts do the same moves. It feels like the most logical, natural stuff to do with a physical sport, but I think it’s crucial to apply that to mental endeavors as well. Love this post!
Rashmi
June 9th, 2009 at 4:40 pmGreat article!
So true, Colin! Couldn’t have put it any better!
John Paul
June 11th, 2009 at 10:04 amGreat Post, Thanks for the Reminder to Relax and Regroup and go back to back to basics.
PPC For Hire
June 13th, 2009 at 2:29 pmI love the ‘teach others’ comment by @Anthony Lewis! It is so true. When teaching someone you get asked questions you normally wouldn’t consider, it makes you think about the basics again, it makes you work through the ’simple’ problems you long forgot about and it establishes you as the ‘expert’ in the eyes of the student.
I think the last point is one of the most important – I can’t tell you how many jobs I’ve gotten from referrals due to training someone else. People love talking about things they have learned or are currently learning – which can spark intrigue in others who either have a need or want to learn a similar thing. Trianing/mentoring has quickly turned into a revenue stream.
Vu Tran
June 16th, 2009 at 3:46 amI think the going back to basics is a very good way to reevaluate our old skills. Several times I have went back and worked on an old project to criticize at my old programming habits and procedures.
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