Many people think that because they have spent a few years developing expertise in their field, they will be able to attract clientele in short order. But they soon come to learn that business development is pretty darn hard.

This is not a reflection of their intelligence or work ethic. It is the expected results of devoting thousands of hours in one domain and a few dozen in another. As Malcolm Gladwell famously pointed out in his book, Outliers, it takes at least 10,000 hours to become an expert, and you can’t transfer skills from one domain to the other simply because they are seemingly related.

Remember when Michael Jordan tried his hand at baseball? In case you missed that footnote in sports history, his performance was underwhelming to say the least. You would see similar results if a top NYC chef decided to run a farm just because both activities involve food. The same tends to be true of a lawyer who spends 2000 hours a year practicing law and 200 doing business development, expecting to be equally proficient simply because they have similar characteristics or activity proximity.

The good news is that basic proficiency can be reached in as little as 50 hours and maintained with regular repetition. This applies whether you are learning baseball, farming, or business development. But if you want to generate the results you see from expert rainmakers, you have to develop multiple approaches so you can nimbly adapt to market conditions, new technologies, and a variety of client profiles. That kind of expertise requires a greater investment of time and a willingness to constantly challenge yourself to new heights.

Authored by Darryl Cross