THE 7 RULES OF ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE

A practical summary of the latest research on the true nature of

intelligence and learning, behaviors that boost brain function, and
use of specific strategies to improve your odds of success.

By Mark Skoskiewicz, Founder - MyGuru

Contents
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3.
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7.
8.
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10.

Introduction
Rule #1 Adopt a growth oriented, ownership mindset
Rule #2 Build the right skills deliberately
Rule #3 Fuel your body
Rule #4 Understand and embrace stress
Rule #5 Read intentionally
Rule #6 Embrace mental math constantly
Rule #7 Be strategic: set goals, consider alternatives, and make plans
Applying the rules
About the author

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Introduction
Of course, many ingredients make up academic performance. Finding out what those components
are and then which are most important for improving performance is difficult.
John Medina, Brain Rules 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School
Is it impossible to know what truly drives academic performance?
Difficult, yes. Impossible, not really.
Based on the research Ive done on academic performance and the experiences Ive had helping parents
and students directly as a tutor and indirectly as CEO of a tutoring company (not to mention helping
businesses in my former life as a strategy consultant) I believe its possible to get pretty close to
understanding what specific steps most people must take to achieve a high level of performance in
school, at work, and elsewhere.
While it may be true that understanding how to enable your child or yourself to do better in school or
achieve a higher standardized test score is no easy to task, its actually much simpler and less mysterious
than it may seem.
The conventional view is that talent (or natural intelligence) and hard work combine to determine
success in any given area, with talent assumed by many to be more important. But, talent often seems
more or less uncontrollable you have it or you dont.
Yet there is scientific research piling up in a few different areas, supported for me by the case studies I
see from MyGurus students and my own experiences, that there are simple keys that can unlock
drastically better performance, which have little to do with how smart or naturally talented you are.
And, for the record, Im become convinced that the concept of simply being smart or naturally
talented is a fundamentally flawed one.
The key is to understand that your level of intelligence and your skill can be improved and built up over
time with the right mindset, approach, and behaviors. The research suggests you really can control your
own destiny, even become an expert, in academic subjects or other areas of life in which you are
currently average (or worse).

Rule #1 Adopt a growth oriented, ownership mindset

In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply
fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing
them. They also believe that talent alone creates successwithout effort. Theyre wrong.
In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through
dedication and hard workbrains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of
learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had
these qualities.
Dr. Carol Dweck, Stanford psychologist and researcher and author of Mindset: The New Psychology of
Success How We Can Learn to Fulfill Our Potential

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Perhaps the most foundational rule of academic performance, the rule that enables a person to
successfully follow the next 6 rules, is to adopt a growth oriented, ownership mindset, in which you
believe you can learn and improve and take ownership and responsibility for doing so.
Why is the growth mindset important? First, because the research suggests its true, and second,
because adopting this mindset leaves to whole host of behaviors that have been shown to lead to
academic and other types of success, most notably grit and the willingness to stick with things when
the going gets tough. Because people with a fixed mindset tend to think their abilities, personalities,
and intelligence is given at birth, and cant be changed, they may tend to avoid activities at which they
fear theyll fail, since this will expose a lack of ability which of course, cant be changed. This creates a
truly unfortunate cycle. Because the student believes they simply, for example, arent good at math, but
recognizes that it would be nice if they were good at math, they avoid situations in which their poor
math ability will be exposed. They make the choice to avoid raising their hand, for fear of looking dumb.
So, they dont ask questions to clarify their understanding in class. They may even avoid doing their
homework, since its somehow easier mentally to do poorly because you didnt study than to try your
best and fail, thus confirming your belief that you may just not smart. Ultimately, and over time, a
student with a fixed mindset starts to try far less hard, do much less homework, falling farther and
farther behind, until the evidence seems to confirm that yes, other people have it and they dont
when it comes to math (or, insert any other common skill).
People with a growth mindset believe that abilities and talents are built up over time through hard
work, persistence, feedback, and ultimately learning. Theyll ask a question in class in the honest pursuit
of feedback and learning, without being too worried about sounding dumb. They have no fear of being
exposed as lacking math skills, because they believe they can and will just build up their math skills if
they lack them today.
There are a variety of interesting studies which support the importance of the growth vs. fixed mindset
distinction. For example, in one long term study, Dr. Dweck interviewed and analyzed and ultimately
placed 7th grade students into one of two categories: a) those that seemed to have a fixed mindset and
those that seemed to have a growth mindset. At the beginning of the study, both groups had earned an
average grade of 74% in math. Over the course of two academic years, however, the average math
grade of the fixed mindset cohort steadily declined, while the opposite occurred for the growth mindset
group. In sum, a 4% point change in math grades was attributed directly to having a growth vs. fixed
mindset over the course of two academic years (C average vs. C+).

78%
76%
74%
72%
70%
Stardng point

Fixed mindset

How to learn more about building a growth, ownership oriented mindset?

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Growth mindset

To learn more about the Growth mindset -

o Visit MindSet works, the company Carol Dweck co-founded
o Read Dr. Dwecks book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success How We Can Learn to
Fulfill Our Potential
To learn more about the Importance of grit and persistence
o How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character
o The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way

Rule #2 Build the right skills deliberately

Its not that Im so smart. I just stick with the questions longer.
Albert Einstein
Perhaps the most important idea in this book, and in the research performed on performance in the last
decade, is that natural talent matters far less than the average person thinks it matters. What matters is
the amount and quality of practice that you do.
Lets see how this rule links to rule #1.
Some people have a fixed mindset, and tend to feel as if they must deal with a level of intelligence or a
suite of personality traits which are unalterable. They tend to avoid difficult activities in which they
might fail, which leads to lower levels of learning over time, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy in which
they really do, for example, have worse than average math skills. But, its not because they just arent
good at math (or English, or Chemistry, or Chess) its because they havent been practicing and
pushing themselves to improve their skills over the course of many years. People with a growth
mindset believe the opposite. They believe they know- that with the right amount and type of
practice in any given area, they will improve, so they enjoy the learning process, and come to even
embrace mistakes, because they know that its through mistakes that they will learn new things.
And, for the growth minded individual, the secret to building skills in any given area is deliberate
practice. Research suggests that Mozart, Albert Einstein, Michael Jordan and the list goes on all
spent thousands of hours engaged in intense, deliberate practice. They created their talent over time.
Research by Anders Ericsson, who basically invented or discovered the notion of deliberate practice,
suggests that most experts, including almost anyone who seems to have incredible natural ability, have
actually spent at least 10,000 hours of deliberate practice working on their craft.
So, for example, he looked at amateur vs. expert pianists. Playing the piano is certainly an area where,
while weve probably all agree hard work matters, wed also say things like shes such a natural or
she has so much potential or shes so talented. But if you squint, youll notice that, on average, by
age 13, an expert pianist has practiced for almost 3,000 hours, while an amateur pianist has practiced
for ~750 hours. Its an obvious point, but 3,000 hours vs. 750 hours of practice is going to make you a
much better pianist. What isnt obvious is that, if you think about it, that suggests that perhaps calling
someone a natural at age 13 doesnt make that much sense at all. Instead, they should be praised
for their focused investment of time and effort to build their skill.

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance


However, hard work (i.e., a large amount of practice) is far from enough. Whats required is a high
quantity and quality of practice to build skill. In fact, a little deliberate practice might be better than a
lot of unfocused but well intentioned hard work.
But, before we address who to practice or study deliberately, lets review this rule again Build the right
skills deliberately. The body of research on deliberate practice shows that it works almost anywhere,
including skills that seem to be highly related to natural ability.
But if were talking about academic performance, what skills are we talking about? Were talking about
all of the skills you need to do well in school, some of the most important of which arent always front
and center in your mind. Here are the big buckets to consider:
Content mastery - facts and concepts you learn in class: math, physics, chemistry, English grammar,
reading comprehension, history, and need to recall on tests etc. All the traditional academic skills tested
on the ACT, SAT, GRE, and GMAT fall into this bucket.
Concentration, focus, memory ability to sit in class, focus on the lesson, and remember what youre
learned
Time management, organization, planning ability to manage a schedule, prioritize tasks, remember
and complete assignments, plan ahead for big projects or tests, etc.
Test taking skills ability to remain calm and focused, recall information, eliminate incorrect answers,
and perform on test day
Interpersonal and communication skills ability to confidently and clearly ask questions in class, work
well with others, communicate your question or point in a small group, etc.

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Public speaking ability to get in front of a class or group and influence their thinking by presenting to
them.
Leadership even as a high school student, learning to take a leadership role on a project, in a small
group, or in a larger club or activity, is important
So, how do you practice any of these skills deliberately?
If you are building skills deliberately, you are:

Doing careful research or working with an expert coach, mentor, etc. to understand the full
range of skills required to excel in any given discipline and having those skills explained to you
Displaying a high degree of focus on the task at hand
Deconstructing the skill down to its most basic elements to identify and master the most
fundamental concepts before attempting more difficult skills
Practicing for a large number of total hours (theres a general rule of thumb that says people
that achieve expert status spend 10,000 hours practicing deliberately)
.but in relatively short spurts (a few hours at a time)
Pushing yourself beyond your limits, embracing failure, getting immediate feedback, and
understanding what went wrong and how to fix it and then repeating
Expecting deliberate practice to be draining and difficult to sustain for several hours in a row

If you are practicing deliberately, you are fully engaged, focused on learning, thinking and analyzing how
to perform specific skills. So, as you go about participating in a classroom discussion, completing your
homework, preparing for a standardized test, or any other academic pursuit, the key is to keep the
above principles in mind and try always to apply them. If you are going to spend 60 minutes studying,
you might as well get the most out of those 60 minutes by following deliberate practice principles. One
absolute key is to learn to embrace failure and difficulty, recognizing that struggling is the key to
learning and skill development
How to learn more about implementing deliberate practice principles in your academic life -
The person to originally uncover the power of deliberate practice, and who discovered the 10,000 hour
rule, was a researcher named Anders Ericsson. His book, The Road to Excellence: The Acquisition of
Expert Performance in the Arts and Sciences, Sports, and Games, is a work of academic research, upon
which several highly popular books aimed at a general audience, are based. These books include:

The Genius in all of Us: New Insights into Genetics, Talent, and IQ by David Shenk
The Talent Code: Greatness Isnt Born, Its Grown by Daniel Coyle
Talent is Overrated: What Really Separates World Class Performers from Everyone Else by
Geoffrey Colvin

There are also two interesting books that focus less on the theory behind deliberate practice, and more
on providing practical tips for being more deliberate as you go about building skills:

The Little Book of Talent: 52 Tips for Improving Your Skills by Daniel Coyle
Practice Perfect 42 Rules for Getting Better at Getting Better by Doug Lemov

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

The Practicing Mind: Developing Focus and Discipline in Your Life Master Any Skill Or Challenge
By Learning to Love the Process by Thomas M. Sterner

Daniel Coyle, author of the Talent Code, also maintains an interesting, highly engaging blog which you
can read here.

Rule #3 Fuel your body through exercise, nutrition, and sleep

It turns out that theres lots of documented scientific evidence that the more you exercise, the better
you eat, and the more you sleep (within reason), the better your brain works (i.e., you can reason more
clearly, recall information faster, solve problems faster, etc.).
We wont go into extended detail on the science behind this rule here, but the science is covered in
enjoyable detail in Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School by
John Medina.
In his book, Medina summarizes the issue by saying that current research suggests that exercisers
outperform couch potatoes in tests that measure long-term memory, reasoning, attention, and
problem solving skill. The same is true of fluid intelligence tasks, which test the ability to reason
quickly, think abstractly, and improve off previously learned material in order to solve a new
problem.
The story with nutrition is similar. Eating right and getting the right type and number of nutrients into
your body is literally what gives your brain, heart, and muscles the fuel to perform. Research is
increasingly supportive of the view that nutrition positively influences cognitive performance, but we
wont dive into the details here.
Sleep is a more nuanced story, and perhaps more important. Whereas exercise, for example, can be
thought of as a bit of an indirect link to cognitive performance (i.e., if you are a regular exerciser, your
gain a cognitive benefit, and that benefit doesnt go away if you skip 2-3 days of activity), sleep can be
very direct. If you get 2 hours of sleep, you will have trouble thinking clearly the next day.
When you do not get enough sleep, it can and will directly impact your ability to learn difficult (or not so
difficult), recall information, and problem solve. Outside of school, it can impact your athletic, musical,
or interpersonal skills. The United States center for Disease Control and Prevention considers sleep
health a public health epidemic.
In the book by John Medina, he references a study that has been performed many times in which a very
tricky set of mathematics problem is given to a group of students, and they are prepped in methods they
can use to solve them. They arent told that theres a potentially very easy shortcut way to do the
problems, which is discoverable once you dive in and try to solve them. They are told to take 12 hours
to decompress and figure it out. They werent necessarily working on the problem for 12 hours, just re-
setting, and thinking through options for how to solve it before they really dove back in. One group was
given those 12 hours during the day (i.e., 7AM to 7PM) while the other was given those 12 hours over
night (i.e., 7PM to 7AM. The below chart shows show the percentage of each group that was able to
find the shortcut solution to the problems.

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

% of Students Answering a Difficult Math Problem Correctly After a 12 Hour Break

Ge[ng 8 hours of sleep tripled the percentage of students

capable of guring out a dicut math problem
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
12 hours during the day

12 hours over night, with 8 hours of

sleep

In sum, to perform at a high level in school, at work, you should be sure to exercise, eat right, and get
enough sleep.
How to learn more
Again, I highly recommend John Medinas book Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at
Work, Home, and School to learn more about the ideas in this chapter. The CDC web-site and National
Sleep Foundation offer ideas and strategies for getting better sleep, and there is a growing body of
research on the link between academic performance and exercise.

Rule #4 Calm your mind: understand and manage stress

Just because you have no major or minor diagnosed mental health disorder, doesnt mean you have a
completely healthy mind. If school, work, sports, or social situations tend to make you nervous and
stressed, your performance suffers.
Youve probably heard that the right amount of stress is a good thing, but too little or too much stress is
a bad thing. The idea is that if you are too care free, you may let important tasks fall through the cracks,
and end up dropping the ball on that big school project. At the same time, if you are extremely nervous
about performing poorly and get really worked up before a big test, you might find yourself having a lot
of trouble concentrating or thinking clearly. Too little stress or too much stress is bad, but the right
amount of stress can lead to clear thinking, appropriate focus, and a generally extremely helpful sense
of calm and confidence that allows you to execute on test day or deliver a great presentation in school
or at work.
But, few of us need more stress. In general, its fair to think of stress as something to reduce or avoid.
.chronic stress also exerts a strong and adverse effect on the brain even altering brain cells, brain
structure, and brain function. Research has shown that unmanaged stress:

Diminishes short, and long-term memory

Inhibits the formation of new memories

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Diminishes the ability to learn new things

Diminishes problem-solving abilities
Diminishes the ability to concentrate

Joshua David OBrien, founder of the Mindfulness Community of Central Pennsylvania

In one study, individuals were placed into two categories: 1) high stress and 2) low stress, and then given
a series of problem solving and memory tests. The low stress group performed 2x better.
Relative Performance on Problem Solving and Memory Test

100
75
50
25
0
Low stress

High stress

So, what can you do to manage stress?

The full answer to the stress management problem is a little odd to some. Healthy eating, appropriate
nutrition, a positive attitude, and constantly maintaining perspective on events in your life are hugely
important factors. However, recognition of the power of the breath, which naturally extends into what
is called practicing mindfulness and sometimes meditating are important underused solutions to
over-stressed lives, particularly in western countries.
The following is borrowed from Joshua David OBrien, founder of the Mindfulness Community of Central
Pennsylvania
Mindfulness Meditation is a practice of being fully and attentively present in the moment. In the same
way one might practice a musical instrument or martial arts form, we practice being mindful and aware
through skillful meditation. In formal practice we use the breath as an object of awareness. We follow
the physical sensations of the breath as it flows in and out of the body. We allow the breath to flow
naturally without controlling it as you would in a breathing exercise.one of the first things we learn
when we try to do this practice is how easily distracted the mind can be. All sorts of thoughts, ideas,
feelings, and sensations call for our attention and we find weve forgotten all about the breath.
Simply practicing mindfulness for 10-15 minutes a day can lead to significant benefits in a relatively
short period of time. And, according to https://www.headspace.com/science, after as few as 11 hours of
accumulated mindfulness practice, the brain changes structurally to improve focus and self-control,
allowing people to stay on tasks longer, reduce anxiety and stress, and more.
To read more about being mindful, consider reading -

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

Get Some Headspace: How Mindfulness Can Change Your Life In Ten Minutes a Day by Andy
Puddicombe
Mindfulness: An Eight Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World by Mark Williams and
Danny Penman

Here is a popular TED talk about the benefits of taking 10 minutes out of your day to be mindful.

Rule #5 Read more - and more intentionally

The amount of free reading done outside of school has consistently been found to relate to growth in
vocabulary, reading comprehension, verbal fluency, etc. Students who read independently become
better readers, score higher on achievement tests in all subject areas, and have greater content
knowledge than those who do not.
Research Journal of the American Association of School Librarians
You can split the effects independent reading into two categories: direct and indirect.
The direct effects are perhaps the most obvious. The more you read, the more information youll
accumulate about a variety of topics. If you read about finance, youll learn finance. If you read history,
youll learn more history. If you arent a great public speaker, obviously reading a public speaking book
can help you improve. In addition, your vocabulary naturally expands, regardless of what youre reading.
Even if you are only reading fiction, youll still learn about people, places, concepts, ideas, etc. that apply
in the real world.
The indirect effects of increased reading are less obvious, but perhaps more important. By reading
more, even more fiction, you naturally will improve your command of the English language (spelling,
grammar, usage, etc.), reading comprehension skills, critical thinking prowess, understanding of cause
and effect, and more. In fact, the benefits of reading independently can be downright surprising.
According to the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges, there is a strong correlation
between independent reading and mathematics achievement. Studies show reading and writing skills
not only lead to general academic success, but are also directly valued by colleges and employers as high
as almost any other factor. At the same time, we see the average 12th grade reading scores declining in
the U.S. between 1992 and 2005.
The most surprising study Ive found was conducted by Dr Alice Sullivan and Matt Brown, who analyzed
the reading behavior of approximately 6,000 young people being followed by the 1970 British Cohort
Study, which is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. According to the Institute of
Education University of Londons review of that report, reading for pleasure was found to be more
important for children's cognitive development between ages 10 and 16 than their parents' level of
education. The combined effect on children's progress of reading books often, going to the library
regularly and reading newspapers at 16 was four times greater than the advantage children gained
from having a parent with a degree.
Interesting, and luckily or unluckily depending on your situation, the reading comprehension skills can
be much more difficult to build quickly. At MyGuru, when were helping students prepare for
standardized tests, we tend to find that, paradoxically, the most stressed out students are those that are

really struggling with the math section of the ACT, SAT, GRE, or GMAT, but those that are truly lacking
basic math skills can be the easiest students to help.
We can teach you how to solve quadratic equations by completing the square if youve forgotten
most of the algebra you learned in high school. We can teach you any math that you once learned and
have now forgotten. We can even teach you a lot of math that you never learned in the first place.
Unfortunately, we cannot re-teach you how to read and comprehendimproving your reading
comprehension skills takes time, persistence, and focused practice.
John Easter - Senior GMAT, GRE, ACT, and SAT tutor for MyGuru (John holds a B.A. in English and B.A. in
Mathematics, Indiana University-Bloomington, and M.A. in Mathematics)
What does it mean to read intentionally?
Youll get the most benefit out of reading more if you do so intentionally. There are actually two
contexts in which to interpret what this means, and it goes back to the direct vs. indirect distinction we
made above. First, you are reading intentionally if you know you arent great at managing your schedule
and being organized, and so you buy a book about personal productivity, making to-do lists, using
calendar tools, etc. However, you are also reading intentionally if you know that, in 3, 6, 12, 24, or 48
months youll be taking a standardized test with a verbal component. So, with that in mind, you
consistently choose to read the New York Times, the Economist, or other types of non-fiction and
analyze the perspective, logic, and evidence provided in what you are reading.

Rule #6 Embrace mental math throughout everyday life

Every standardized test youll have to take has a mathematics component: the ACT, SAT, GRE, GMAT,
etc. Of course, in high school and college, there are almost always core math classes everyone must
take. And even if youre the quintessential English person, and as a result desire to become to an
English teacher and forget about math forever, most states require that you pass a basic skills test, and
that has a mathematics section. MyGuru has seen its fair share of highly stressed out prospective
teachers who are having trouble passing the mathematics portion of Illinois Test of Basic Skills for
prospective teachers.
So, in the broadest sense, if you desire to improve your academic performance, achieve higher grades
and test scores, and get admitted into better high school, colleges, universities, and graduate schools,
the more advanced your math skills, the better. Thats probably obvious.
Beyond school, as youre making small purchases and considering the attractiveness of two different
coupons, considering a large financial decision, or any number of other daily tasks, its impossible to get
away from mathematics.
I have always considered myself OK at mathematics, in the sense that Ive done every well in math
courses and OK on standardized tests, but have never felt comfortable in real-life, working with
numbers to calculate a tip or the price per square foot of a condo (for example). Thats just me. But,
Ive worked to get more comfortable.
It turns out that one easy way to build your overall math skill set is simply to embrace mental math skills
in everyday life. Very interesting scientific research has been done which shows that, in fact, employing

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

mental math skills when completing simple arithmetic engages the brain in such a way that it is more
likely and/or easier to build more advanced mathematics skills over time. Put more simply, every time
you decide to add 12+66 or calculate 20% of 35 in your head instead of plopping the data into a
calculator, you are increasing your chances of understanding more complex mathematics and ultimately
scoring higher on standardized math tests in the future.
These data reveal that the relative engagement of brain mechanisms associated with procedural
versus memory-based calculation of single-digit arithmetic problems is related to high school level
mathematical competence, highlighting the fundamental role that mental arithmetic fluency plays in
the acquisition of higher-level mathematical competence.
Why Mental Arithmetic Counts: Brain Activation during Single Digit Arithmetic Predicts High School
Math Scores
Gavin R. Price,1 Michle M. M. Mazzocco,2,3 and Daniel Ansari, The Journal of Neuroscience, January
2nd, 2013
What could this mean? Instead of shying away from calculating the tip at a restaurant, or figuring out
exactly how much youll save by using that 15% coupon, choose to consistently engage and do this type
of math in your head. If youre looking at a clock, pick two numbers, and then add, subtract, multiply,
and divide them. Do this type of thing once a day for 30 days, and youll be surprised how much more
comfortable with numbers you become. You are slowly building your math skills, paving the way for
more advanced skills and general comfort and confidence with math.

Rule #7 Be strategic: set goals, gather facts, consider alternatives, and make
plans
Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs; it's about deliberately choosing to be different.
Michael Porter, renowned Harvard Business School professor
Weve discussed 6 rules so far, but there is a lot of information and many implied choices underlying
each of them. Youd probably like to make some decisions that help you build your skills in various areas
to perform better in school or at work, or even in your personal life. Youre willing to invest the time to
make yourself smarter and more successful. But, the key to being able to actually accomplish these
broad objectives is to be strategic, which as Michael Porter points out, is all about making choices in the
presence of trade-offs.
I think training in strategic thinking could be the glue that is missing for many students trying to improve
performance at school. By thinking strategically and following a structured process for reaching specific
goals, you are far more likely to actually succeed.
This chapter, our final rule #7, is all about bringing powerful principles of strategy development to the
process of improving an individual students academic performance. As I research and read about what
truly drives academic performance, Ive begun to realize this notion of employing strategies is extremely
underrepresented in the research on academic performance. However, Heidi Grant Halvorson, who is
the Associate Director of the Motivation Science Center at the Columbia Business School, in her book
Nine Things Successful People do differently does address head on the topic of employing strategies to

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

reach goals, but more in the context of adult professionals looking for ways to success in their careers or
personal lives. That said, all of the principles in her book can of course be applied to students navigating
their academic career.
Lets talk a little bit about the strategy development process in general (at least the process I followed
when working with clients as a business strategy consultant).
Basic strategy development involves four steps: 1) set a goal, 2) gather facts about how to reach that
goal 3) consider alternatives (i.e., different sets of choices) for getting to that goal and 4) make specific
plans and assign accountabilities and rewards.
Without using too much unnecessary business jargon, lets walk briefly through the process a business
might follow and point out whats critical to get right when youre developing a strategy to reach your
academic or personal goals.
A. Setting goals
First, business must have specific goals, and fewer is better than more. For example, if you are the CEO
and you have one goal double profits in three years every decision you make can be linked back to
that goal. Im not saying having this one particular goal is appropriate, but surely it would make
decision-making throughout the company clear. Another aspect of this goal is that its specific. After
three years, the CEO of this business will either have doubled profits, or not. He or she will know if the
goal was met without a doubt.
But, if your goals as the CEO are to improve profits for the owners, treat employees well, serve your
community, and delight customers, as you might imagine, you really have no idea whether to close that
plant there are too many competing objectives to consider.
Here is an excellent, short blog article about goal setting as applied to individuals personal and career
decisions.
B. Gathering facts
Businesses pride themselves on being fact-based. They track the moves of competitors, conduct
research on their customers preferences, and analyze their internal financial data for interesting trends
in sales, etc. They then use all of this information to make decisions. Basically any reasonably run
business does these things. The practice of fact gathering is something students need to be doing more
often and better. Ask a high school student what it takes to get into an Ivy League school, and theyll
probably say a perfect SAT score, perfect grades, a resume chock full of activities, and the probability is
extremely low. It is just so competitive. But is this general sentiment true? Well, yes, getting into an Ivy
League school is hard.
But, here are some facts.
The average admission rate at the 8 Ivy League schools in 2013, under regular admission timing, is 9%. If
you can develop an average Ivy League quality application only (i.e., test score, GPA, activities, etc. of
the average applicant, not the average admitted student), and you apply to all 8 Ivy League schools, your
chances of getting denied are 91% * 91% * 91% * 91% * 91% * 91% * 91% * 91% = 47%. In other words,
the facts actually suggest you have a greater than 50% probability of getting admitted if you can pull

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

together an average Ivy League quality application and you apply to every school. Those seem like
pretty good odds to me.
Now, of course, the average Ivy League application/resume (i.e., the GPA, the classes taken, the test
scores, the activities, etc.) itself is strong and not easy to develop, but its within reach for many high
school students to work towards an average Ivy League quality application and resume. Once that
happens, the probabilities suggest you actually can get admitted, not that your chances are incredibly
slim.
C. Consider Alternatives
Ive consistently been surprised about the extent to which large business dont effectively use
alternatives when developing strategies. All too often, an opportunity arises (i.e., to develop a new
product, enter a new country, or buy another company), and facts are gathered to determine whether
to do it, or not. Thats it. Using alternatives releases the pressure of this binary decision, and tends to
lead to even better options. The best alternative should then be chosen after being evaluated against
criteria that everyone agrees on.
D. Make plans
Business tend to also do a very good job of making plans and assigning accountabilities. If the agreed
alternatives is in fact to buy a company, there are many, many things that need to happen. Who is going
to build a financial model to determine how much to pay? Who is going to organize the integration of
the two facilities, etc.? The specific steps are typically written down, with accountabilities assigned to
specific people.
Students, and people in general, tend not to make specific plans in this way. We tend to be along for
the ride, following the instructions given to us by teachers, guidance counselors, bosses, etc. But, if we
have a goal, and weve gathered information about how to reach it, and considered some different ways
to get there, we can and should write out the specific lists of activities and steps we need to take, and
hold ourselves accountable for meeting specific deadlines. Be proactive, take ownership, and create a
plan.
An Example of Bad Strategy - My Personal Story of Applying to College
In high school, I was very into competitive ice hockey, but I recognized the chances of a college
scholarship werent super high. I also maintained a separate goal of getting into a highly selective school
like Northwestern University. I realized the importance of taking difficult classes, so I took about 6 AP
classes, and in most cases was in the hardest class offered in any given subject (but not in all cases). I
also knew activities were important to colleges, so I was a three sport athlete, and was also a writer for
the school paper. Based on pre-tests given in middle school, I knew I was also very good at standardized
tests. Those pre-tests suggested that Id probably get a very good ACT score. Of course I realized grades
were important, but armed with my class load and activities and test score potential, my goal was to get
As and Bs.
I wasnt offered a college hockey scholarship, and while I more or less met all of my other goals, the
overall results of my college application process were extremely poor. Although I mostly got As and Bs, I
also got a few Cs, and my GPA ended up being in the top third of my class by the time college

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

applications were due. I believe I had a 4.2 out of 5.0. I thought the GPA itself was fine, but was
surprised to find that 33% of my classmates had a higher GPA. My ACT score ended up being high, but it
wasnt off the charts. The college letters started to roll in: top choice, Northwestern University denied,
second choice, University of Wisconsin-Madison denied, third choice, University of Illinois (my state
school) denied. My fourth choice, Indiana University ended up being a great fit for me. And though I
was accepted, I was not admitted directly into the business program, and I wasnt admitted to the
University Honors program either. All in all, I considered my entire high school academic career to be a
pretty large let down.
How and why did this happen?
My goals werent clear enough, I didnt gather enough facts about what I actually needed to be doing,
and I didnt have a specific plan that lead me towards my goals.
What I had failed to realize was that my approach to academics in high school completely lacked a
strategy. For example, the first step would be to determine and write down my target schools during
my freshman year set the goal. I knew I wanted to go to a good school, but I didnt think hard about
specific schools early on in the process. After setting the goal, I could have gathered a few facts about
what it takes to get in to those schools. I would have easily learned that yes, my ACT score was strong
if I scored as the pre-test suggested, that element of my application would be solid. But, I would have
learned that my plan for my GPA, to get As and Bs, was not aggressive enough. I would have seen that
at Illinois and Wisconsin, you need to be, roughly, in the top 10-20% of your class, and at Northwestern,
in the top 5-10% of your class or better. I also would have seen that my class load, i.e., the pretty high
level of difficulty of my classes, mattered a lot for admission to Northwestern University, but much less
for Illinois or Wisconsin.
In sum, and in business this is something thats discussed a lot when it comes to setting strategy, I was
stuck in the middle. My overall high school resume felt good OK to good GPA, very good test scores,
lots of activities, etc. But, it wasnt differentiated enough to make me a very good candidate for any of
the school I ended up wanting to go to when application time arrived. The results were thus not great. I
was a good student overall, but not an especially strong applicant for the particular schools I wanted to
go to.
Had I built this fact-base after my first semester freshman year, I would have realized that I was already
falling off the path to getting into my 1st, 2nd, or 3rd choice school. I could have created alternatives to
boost my GPA, create some leadership experiences, and incorporate a little community service into my
resume. Then, I could have made some specific action plans to turn things around.
An Example of Good Strategy - My Personal Story of Applying to Graduate Business Schools
Soon after arriving at Indiana University, I established a longer term goal of getting into a top 10 ranked
graduate business school. In particular, I had my eye on the Kellogg School of Management at
Northwestern University, since I had just been denied admission there as an undergraduate applicant.
Given those goals, I knew coming as close to straight As in college as possible was important, which I
was almost able to accomplish. I knew business schools valued interesting and analytically inclined
backgrounds, so I put together a schedule that allowed me to graduate early with a degree in finance
while also earning minors in Philosophy and History, because some classes were double listed and

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

counted toward multiple degrees (i.e., I gathered some facts about how classes count for various majors
and minors). A little research revealed that true leadership, not just participation in a lot of clubs, was
highly valued by all types of employers and graduate business programs, so I made it a point to become
the president of the strategy consulting club, thus demonstrating leadership and a commitment to a
specific career.
After some networking and support from a helpful uncle helped me land an internship with a small
strategy consulting firm a year before most students were typically landing internships, I secured a full-
time job in consulting that created lots of great work experiences, career progression, and, again,
leadership opportunity, all highly valued by top graduate business programs. But, as I continued to
gather facts about how to get into business school, I looked at my resume and compared it to what I was
reading on the web-sites of top business schools, I realized I was missing any significant community
service.
As I thought about that, I considered a few alternatives. I could go volunteer at a soup kitchen, or
homeless shelter or something along those lines. But, selfishly, that didnt seem all that appealing. I
also felt top business schools might actually see through a short term effort like that. I had other ideas
that were similar. But soon another option became clear why not become a youth hockey coach? This
was something I knew a lot about, enjoyed, and which would likely demonstrate some interest in giving
back to the community. I still had enough time to reach out to various people that might help me
become a hockey coach, and so thats exactly what I did.
Fast forward 18 months, and Im sitting in large lecture hall during orientation, after being accepted to
Northwestern Universitys MBA program, and the director of admissions is giving a speech, making us all
realize how special and lucky we are, and how high the expectations are that well graduate and do
great things, etc. At the end of his speech, he starts reading out the example of accomplishments of
some of the people in the room. I hear him say one of your new classmates coached the Glenview Stars
Bantam Gold team to a 2nd place finish in the 2008 league championship.
The goal was getting a top business school, the facts suggested community service was important, being
a hockey coach was an attractive alternative for me, and I made a plan to become one. Getting into top
business school programs is a very competitive and random process. You need to have all the elements
of the application that are expected (i.e., GPA, GMAT score, etc.), a clear story, and usually something
about your experiences or application that is interesting enough to catch someones eye. Something
tells me my strategic decision to become a hockey coach played an important role in my ultimate
acceptance to business school.

Summary
Lets summarize by saying your job, as the owner of your education or career and the person
responsible for your performance, is to adopt a growth mindset and realize that youll improve over
time, steadily, with focused effort. Treat rules #1 and #7 as your performance bookends. They are
critical. Your mindset affects your approach to academics and your career in subtle but important ways
(rule #1), and even just a little dose of strategic thinking can improve your performance dramatically,
because few other people think strategically (rule #7). Of course, none of the rules should be ignored,
but based on your particular goals, some of them will be more important to you. Your task is to develop
your own personalized system for following these rules, with specific plans for reaching specific goals.

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance

About the Author

Mark Skoskiewicz graduated from Indiana University with a B.S. in Business Administration, majoring in
Finance with minors in History and Philosophy. While at IU, he was an economics tutor. After five years
of experience helping some of the worlds largest corporations target new customer segments, design
new business models, and consider major acquisitions as a strategy consultant (primarily with Marakon),
he pursued his MBA at Northwestern University. While earning his MBA, he founded MyGuru, a
boutique tutoring and test prep firm, which now has operations in Chicago, New York, Boston, San
Francisco, and several other cities throughout the U.S. MyGuru facilitates connections between
students and some of the most experienced, academically accomplished, generally impressive and
effective tutors in these cities. Over time, hes become increasingly passionate about researching how
individuals can take ownership over their education and career, and use specific strategies to improve
their performance.

The 7 Rules of Academic Performance