Ultralearning: Accelerate Your Career, Master Hard Skills and Outsmart the Competition

by Scott H. Young

The last method I’ve found for enhancing directness is to increase the challenge, so that the skill level required is wholly contained within the goal that is set. Tristan de Montebello, when preparing to compete in the World Championship of Public Speaking, pushed to speak at middle schools, giving early versions of his talk. His feeling was that the feedback he received at Toastmasters clubs might be too soft or congratulatory to cut deep at what worked and didn’t work in his speech. Middle school students, in contrast, would be merciless. If a joke he said wasn’t funny or his delivery was boring or cheesy, he would be able to tell immediately from their faces what needed to be reworked. The overkill approach is to put yourself into an environment where the demands are going to be extremely high, so you’re unlikely to miss any important lessons or feedback.