Book Review - Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

I recently finished reading Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell, and I found it to be one of the most fascinating books I've read in a long time. It is all about what it takes to be a success.

And if you think you know what that is, you would probably be wrong. For example, to be a successful hockey player, you need to be born in the right month. Want to be a successful rock musician? Practice 10,000 hours. Want to be a billionaire software geek? Practice 10,000 hours.

If you were born between 1952 and 1958, you have an outstanding chance of becoming very wealthy. Want to avoid plane crashes? Make sure that your pilot is not from one of the five countries that Gladwell lists. He goes into great detail, written in an interesting way, why all these correlations (and a lot of other correlations) are true. He even discusses what many consider to be the politically incorrect topic of why Asians do well in math.

If you are looking to find out about the fascinating causes or triggers of success, pick up a copy of Outliers: The Story of Success.

Comments

[Mad Hedge F...:]

I attended a lecture by New Yorker Magazine columnist Malcolm Gladwell last night, author of The Tipping Point, Blink, and Outliers, and probably the most prolific publisher of original, consensus challenging ideas today. Half English and half Jamaican, the preeminent challenger of clichés and stereotypes was himself a cliché and a stereotype, wearing the standard issue New York intellectual’s blazer, pressed shirt, blue jeans, and loafers, to compliment his gaunt face and conspicuous afro. His latest book challenges the myth of meritocracy, that luck is a bigger factor in success than privilege or education, that in fact all meritocracies are rigged. Bill Gates built Microsoft not by being brilliant, but by having the good fortune to be raised by a family who could send him to one of the few Seattle high schools that then had a computer program. The Beatles made it only because they practiced probably more than any other group in history. The falling crime rate since the seventies was not the result of a series of get tough measures, but the removal of lead from gasoline in 1973. Successful hockey players are almost exclusively born during the first three months of the year, enabling them to beat the crap out of younger, smaller competitors in their junior years. It is cheaper to deal with the homeless than ignore them, because of the massive drain they create on the public health system. He cited the infamous example of the drunk “Million dollar Murray” who single handedly drained Reno’s emergency rooms. All in all, a night well invested.

Jul 08 01:49 PM

[BookVim:]

It is indeed a book worth checking out. As you mention, Malcolm Gladwell touches on politically incorrect topics with aseptic approach of data and rational conclusions.

There is a mixture of determinism (when you were born, what was your background, what opportunities were offered to you) with merit (10,000 hours of hard work as a pre-requisite for being ultra-successful) than is outlined throughout the book. But even the latter seems to be determined by the values you were ingrained with from your parents.

The danger of judging once the story is over is that it takes out the factor that reality is created in the present moment. Everything can be explained backwards, but it's only once it's finish that it makes sense logically. Even quantum leaps in thought can only be explained rationally (connecting the dots) after the act of creation has taken place.

It is well written and gives a fresh look at a subject that much needed it.

I

Jul 13 06:25 PM