Skills and problem-solving are deeply related. The basics of most skills are mechanical and knowledge-based, with some generalization creeping in on your 3rd or 4th skill in terms of how to learn and seeing non-obvious crossover. Intermediate (say, after the first 500 to a few thousand hours) use of skills requires application of problem-solving within the basic capabilities of that skill. Again, you get good practice within a skill, and better across a few skills. Advanced application in many skills is MOSTLY problem-solving. How to apply your well-indexed-and-integrated knowledge to novel situations, and how to combine that knowledge across domains.
I don’t know of any shortcuts, though—it takes those thousands of hours to get enough knowledge and basic techniques embedded in your brain that you can intuit what avenues to more deeply explore in new applications.
There is a huge amount of human variance—some people pick up some domains ludicrously easily. This is a blessing and a curse, as it causes great frustration when they hit a domain that they have to really work at. Others have to work at everything, and never get their Nobel, but still contribute a whole lot of less-transformational “just work” within the domains they work at.
Skills and problem-solving are deeply related. The basics of most skills are mechanical and knowledge-based, with some generalization creeping in on your 3rd or 4th skill in terms of how to learn and seeing non-obvious crossover. Intermediate (say, after the first 500 to a few thousand hours) use of skills requires application of problem-solving within the basic capabilities of that skill. Again, you get good practice within a skill, and better across a few skills. Advanced application in many skills is MOSTLY problem-solving. How to apply your well-indexed-and-integrated knowledge to novel situations, and how to combine that knowledge across domains.
I don’t know of any shortcuts, though—it takes those thousands of hours to get enough knowledge and basic techniques embedded in your brain that you can intuit what avenues to more deeply explore in new applications.
There is a huge amount of human variance—some people pick up some domains ludicrously easily. This is a blessing and a curse, as it causes great frustration when they hit a domain that they have to really work at. Others have to work at everything, and never get their Nobel, but still contribute a whole lot of less-transformational “just work” within the domains they work at.