This problem does not only occurr in aviation. When I was writing my first response, I was mindful of a very old university friend who was a very talented and accomplished musician who was reading for his M.Mus degree at the time. He was also a very accomplished pianist and had been encouraged to attempt to obtain the top piano playing qualification - the L.R.A.M (licensciate of the Royal Academy of Music). As a skilled composer, he was used to doing musical composition things way above the requirements of the theory papers for this qualification, however, being aware of the fact that he could probably do more than his RAM examiners, was having to re-learn the simpler exercises in these fields so that he would be able to satisfy them!
P.P.