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20 - The Value of Expertise and Expert Performance: A Review of Evidence from the Military

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2010

By
J. D. Fletcher
Edited by
K. Anders Ericsson
K. Anders Ericsson
Affiliation:
Florida State University
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Summary

Intuitively we seek expertise in all areas of human activity as observers, beneficiaries, and performers. Beyond intuition, however, can we justify the resources we expend in developing expertise and expert performance? This chapter concerns the value of expertise and expert performance in a high stakes area: military operations. It provides some quantitative evidence of this value and its relation to themes that appear to be common to the development of expertise across many areas and are raised in the chapters of this book.

THEMES

This book addresses the development, measurement, and assessment of expertise from many directions and in many contexts. Findings and conclusions from its chapters may be summarized and organized around a number of “themes.” These themes apply to the development, measurement, and assessment of expertise in the military. They help crystallize and focus the ways individuals and groups prepare for the exigencies that inevitably arise in the performance of many activities, including military operations. These themes may be summarized and described, in no particular order, as the following.

Self-Assessment and Self-Directed Learning

Learners at all levels of development are increasingly expected to take responsibility for their professional growth. This trend has been accompanied by an increasing emphasis on techniques, capabilities, and tools that help them become more self-directed and self-assessing.

Type
Chapter
Information
Development of Professional Expertise
Toward Measurement of Expert Performance and Design of Optimal Learning Environments
 , pp. 449 - 469
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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