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Routine vs. Adaptive Expertise
- Alexey Krivitsky
- 7 days ago
- 6 min read
For decades, we have rewarded deep specialization.
A radiologist reads scans. A frontend developer writes UI code. A paralegal prepares contracts. These roles were seen as focused, professional, and trustworthy. We encouraged our kids to get an education that makes them experts—the go-to person for one well-defined kind of work.
The times are changing. In the environments shaped by rapid change and growing uncertainty, success depends on more than executing well-learned domain and well-practiced tasks. Professionals are increasingly expected to learn as they go, apply knowledge in unfamiliar contexts, and respond when standard solutions no longer fit.
This is new in practice for most of us, but the theoretical distinction is not. In the 1980s, cognitive researchers Giyoo Hatano and Kayoko Inagaki introduced a useful concept to describe this phenomenon: routine expertise versus adaptive expertise.
Routine expertise is the ability to perform known tasks efficiently and accurately by applying established procedures. Routine experts excel in stable conditions. They produce reliable, high-quality outcomes—as long as the situation remains familiar.
Adaptive expertise goes further. Adaptive experts can extend, recombine, or reinvent their skills when conditions change. They handle novelty without freezing. They learn while acting.
The COVID-19 pandemic made this distinction painfully visible. Health professions educators around the world were forced to abandon standard training models almost overnight. One post-pandemic study showed that adaptive expertise did not correlate with age or years of experience. Instead, it emerged as a distinct capability that had to be deliberately developed. Those scoring higher in adaptive expertise also performed better during periods of disruption, while seniority alone offered little protection from disruption.
As it turns out, work experience does not automatically result in adaptive expertise.
Adaptive expertise is a different kind of mastery—one built through continuous learning, exposure to variation, and the embrace of new challenges. In other words: purposefully and with broader mandates.
After the pandemic, the professionals who had demonstrated their surprising adaptive expertise were able to return to business as usual. But are there domains where such behavior is not a crisis response, but the daily norm?