Bologna - What makes an athlete an Olympic champion? What factors make a surgeon a top expert? What allows a craftsman to skillfully execute their work? What underpins a brilliantly passed university exam? For a long time, work psychology, educational sciences, and management have been exploring the factors that lead to high performance in any field. After more than ten years of research, a team led by Filippo Ferrari, a professor in the Department of Business Sciences at the University of Bologna, has identified the factors underlying performance and measured them with an equation that includes a combination of skills, motivation, personal characteristics, and external context. The study, published in the Business Process Management Journal, shows that personal factors account for between 40% and 65% of the final performance outcome, while external factors contribute between 35% and 60%. (9colonne)