"We tell ourselves that skill is the precious resource and effort is the commodity. It’s the other way around. Effort can trump ability—legs, in Saxe’s formulation, can overpower arms—because relentless effort is in fact something rarer than the ability to engage in some finely tuned act of motor coordination."
I would argue that this holds for many endeavors and should be kept in mind when facing daunting situations.
The primary example in the article is that of a team with no skill destroying all of their opponents (some of whom had a lot of skill) through good strategy and effort.
In other words, Gladwell offers a compelling counter-example to the belief that skill is a requirement.
EDIT: All of their oponents save one. They fielded a four person basketball team that day.
He is also saying the same thing that effort can trump skill.
You can get skill from effort, but not the other way around.
I'm well aware of the research that shows that people who believe effort is more important than talent are more successful than those who think the opposite. People like to pretend the research show that the effort-believers are right. That hasn't been shown.
If you control for IQ, the hard workers win. This is not controversial. The recent research was carefully presented to give the impression that it said more than it did.
Despite what effort-believer think, IQ is highly correlated with success.
However, we can apprehend the world rationally and still believe in hard work. I work extremely hard. My IQ isn't going up, but I can control my effort.