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> -----Original Message-----
> From: Gene Kim-Eng
>
> There is a difference between knowing how things work and how to do
> things for yourself if you have to, and being able to do them well
> enough for other people to admire you for your ability and be
> willing to
> pay you for it. :)
>
> Gene Kim-Eng
As Malcolm Gladwell summarized in "Outliers", the difference between the two is roughly 10,000 hours of dedicated practice and pursuit of the skill. That is, the one who has the skill enough to be admired for it was probably not actually a "natural" - s/he just had enough talent or interest to keep at that pursuit instead of ten million other things s/he might have chosen to occupy her/his time, and so became a master of that skill... over the course of those 10 thousand hours.
I think that many of us technical writers have not put 10,000 hours of practice-and-study into anything, but we've put (perhaps) thousands of hours into enough things to be good generalists... and to have a good basis on which to pick up the next skill or knowledge.
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