The science of skill acquisition has been the focus of a number of recent studies and books. As it turns out, we are born with very few, if any, natural talents and skills. Excellence is borne not of any particular innate ability, but of practice. In other words, you can be good at whatever you want.
Talent is not taught, it's a natural ability to see or do something in a certain way. But skill is something that we have become good at and love doing but have been taught. It's taken hours, days, weeks, months, years to master. It's something that you get better at over time and that you desire to do and master.
Both. Some people are born with greater potential, but without hard work and practising their talent will come to nothing. Music is a good example, with some evidence of genetic differences. For example, a study of 500 twins found that 80 per cent of tone deafness is inherited.
Talent is a product of both genetics and the environment, and while genes may predispose one to natural gifts, the cultivation of talent takes place in accordance with the individual's environment and early childhood experiences.
The term talent refers to an inborn and the special ability of a person to do something. A skill is an expertise, which is acquired by the person by learning. Talent is God gifted ability, whereas Skill is an ability in which you put your time and efforts to develop.
As adults, many of us feel we know what we're good (and not so good) at. But the truth is we all have hidden talents—the skills we possess that we never knew we had. We're just not always so adept at identifying what they are.
In fact, talented people are always eager to learn new things, new ways of being and doing. They possess focus and a commitment to learning and to a cause, whether personal, professional, or societal. They desire to improve, always, not only themselves but also anyone with whom they interact.
As it turns out, we are born with very few, if any, natural talents and skills. Excellence is borne not of any particular innate ability, but of practice. In other words, you can be good at whatever you want. Whatever you want—therein lies the rub.
Collaboration and Competition. Coyle notes that another contributor to talent epicenters is continuously-present challenge. Often, groups of exceptionally talented individuals are found in environments where they are constantly exposed to each other's talent, so they both collaborate and compete with one another.
This bodes with the actual definition of natural talent: “an innate or inborn gift for a specific activity, either allowing one to demonstrate some immediate skill without practice, or to gain skill rapidly with minimal practice.”
Many coaching experts and psychologists believe that it takes a minimum of 10,000 hours of practice to master a skill. That's right. 10,000 hours! The theoretical “gift" of being naturally good at something is merely a myth, because what really develops talent is practice.
The ability to sing isn't necessarily something you're born with. You can be born with the right genetics and physiological features that put you at a better vocal disposition to become a singer, but that doesn't mean singing is innate. You have to learn how to use this vocal apparatus to be able to sing.
Talents Are Inherited / Gifts Are Received
Natural talents are those abilities inherited from one's parents and nurtured in the context of one's family. We all know people who are talented and come from a long line of family members who share the same talent (consider, for example, the Matthews family in the NFL).
All of our talents—not just some of them—come from God. That's why He deserves the praise, not us! James 1:17 (NKJV) says, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.”
Neuroscience: Talent is for whole brain thinkers. Skills reside in the mutinous left hemisphere.
Many human characteristics including things that might be called talent have a high statistical probability of being inherited from our parents and ancestors. When the pre DNA definition of gene is used, then it is pretty easy to think about a sort of non-specific genetic explanation for them.
Talent is intelligence with effort. Many talented people spend a great deal of time honing their intellect until it becomes an apparently effortless endeavor on their part. Such ability is looked upon as a gift when it is actually the dint of great effort to harness their intelligence until it responds upon command.
Talent is the natural aptitude to gain a specific skill or set of skills. Unlike skill, talent is a set of innate abilities, and is considered unteachable—but even talented people have to practice their skills!
Gifted children are born with natural abilities well above the average for their age. If your child is gifted, you might notice these natural abilities in the way they're learning and developing. Children can be gifted in any area of ability, and they can also be gifted in more than one area.
Talent development isn't just about formal training. It can also include on-the-job learning, mentorship programs, coaching, e-learning, self-learning, and more. Involve managers in the process and create directories of learning resources. These should be readily available to your employees.
One of the important goals of talent development is to increase performance across an organization. By helping employees gain skills and experience in a personalized way, companies ensure higher capability levels and better performance and raise the bar for the entire workforce.
Assess your personality objectively and write down all the things you were passionate about once. Perhaps you forgot about some things that you liked to do, so doing them again will bring out some of the joy from the past. Open your mind to try new things and test them so you can see where you can show off your skills.
Gifted means having exceptional talent or natural ability. Talented means having a natural aptitude or skill for something.
It is clear through the points above that both talent and skill go hand in hand. A skill can be easily learned through dedication and hard work. One can learn to do a skill however, if this task is done without talent, your task will not be unique and as a result, you will continue to live in mediocrity.