Beyond 10,000 Hours

The most disruptive business problems rarely start as problems. They typically start as reasonable decisions. A role filled quickly. A conversation everyone leaves feeling good about. A process repeated because it worked before. Everything looks right until months or years later, you’re asking “how did we get here?”

This is usually where experience matters most, being able to recognize the outcome earlier and prevent problems before they begin.

The “10,000-hour rule,” frames expertise as the result of experience accumulated over time. The theory came from research by psychologist K. Anders Ericsson, who studied musicians, athletes, and chess players to understand how high performers developed skills. Years later, Malcolm Gladwell popularized the idea in his best-selling book Outliers: The Story of Success, emphasizing that meaningful expertise develops through sustained time and effort. While the research was focused on individuals, the same principle applies to business.

As a leader of your organization, you probably understand how much experience and talent it takes to run a business. But what if you don’t have 10,000 hours to learn the ins and outs of leadership? Is it even possible to become an expert in all (or even most) aspects of operating a business? When it comes to leading with expertise, the idea isn’t that you have to master every function yourself. It’s that good decisions come from experience, whether it’s yours or someone you trust. When you’re facing something unfamiliar, a few simple questions can help guide the next step.

What’s different about this situation?

Most problems arise when a new challenge is addressed with a familiar, yet irrelevant solution. Taking a moment to notice what’s different helps you avoid making the same mistakes and make better decisions in the long term.

What would I do if this doesn’t work?

You don’t need complete certainty before acting. What matters is noticing early when something isn’t working and adjusting quickly. Small changes now prevent big fixes later.

What happened the last time we did this?

The real lesson from a decision can show up weeks or months later. Taking a moment to look back helps the next decision become easier.

Is there someone with more experience I can run this by?

No one has 10,000 hours of practice in every part of running a business. Sometimes the fastest way to good judgment is leaning on someone who has dedicated experience you don’t yet have.

Since 1969, ALTRES has dedicated more than six million hours to become experts in payroll, HR, benefits administration, and compliance so that thousands of local businesses like yours don’t have to.

For us, our measurement of success is usually behind the scenes; employees are paid accurately and on time, employee issues are addressed before they escalate, and our clients can focus on what they do best.

In the end, our expertise isn’t measured by how often problems are solved. It’s measured by how rarely they have the chance to appear.