Outliers by Malcom Gladwell

[Darrell]

What makes a winner? Is it luck? Is it dedication? Or is success perhaps a mere function of IQ points, a nurturing society, or lots of cash in family savings accounts? In Outliers, author Malcom Gladwell attemps to disabuse us of the notion that those who are very successful are really self-made people. In fact, in his view, tricks of time, chance, parentage, and culture have every bit as much to do with a person’s ability to succeed as pure gumption and dedication.

Through the book Gladwell uses the stories of various successes and failures to paint a picture of what makes a person likely to be an “outlier” — someone who stands out as an extraordinary human being.

From Canadian hockey players we learn that some success is the trick of when a person is born. Kids born in January are 10 years and 11 months old when they compete for spots in the junior hockey leagues. Boys born in December are 10 years and 1 month old. That 10 month gap is enough at that age to guarantee that those who are born in January will perform better, enter better leagues, get better coaching, and get more time on the ice. No matter how skilled a child may be, simply biology dictates that his chances are very, very slim if he’s born in the wrong month.

This trick of dates also plays out in the year that a person is born. For example, all the Silicone Valley greats of the 1980′s were born in either 1955 or late 1954. They had to be exactly the right age to hit the cutting edge of computer technology. To early and they would have chosen other fields such as biology or engineering. To late and others would have passed them by in being the first to innovate in the field. Timing, it seems, is very important.

From Bill Gates and the Beatles we learn that it takes about 10,000 hours of practice in any discipline to become a master. Whether it is 10,000 hours of instrument practice, computer programming, language study, or chess playing once a threshold of basic skill is passed the number of hours put in is one of the largest differentiators between who goes on to greatness and who remains in mediocrity.

From two geniuses with amazing IQ points we learn that merely being smart doesn’t guarantee one a place in the history hall of fame. One super genius (J. Robert Oppenheimer) goes on to work on the Manhattan Project. The other (Chris Langan) becomes a bouncer in a bar. Gladwell opines that the skills each man learned from his parents and community about how to get along with people and how to bargain to reach a goal is what made the difference in the two stories. Children of the middle and upper classes are much more willing to negotiate with authority figures while those of lower classes may fume but will often not try to bargain. These soft skills of human interaction are also of great importance.

From the feuds of Kentucky and the crashes on Korean airlines we learn that the rules of culture can often determine how a person will handle the situations that dictate their success. In honor-based societies for example the unwillingness to challenge a higher-ranking member and the equal unwillingness to back down from an affront to one’s honor combine into deadly situations whether in shooting wars over slight offenses or airline crashes caused by a co-pilot hesitating to countermand his superior.

From the Jewish tailors of New York we learn that having a culture of meaningful work will result in the success of one’s progeny. The first generation of people were poor Jewish tailors. Many of their children were businessmen in the garment industry. Their children were doctors, lawyers, and statesmen.

From the rice fields of Asia, Gladwell draws the conclusion that Asian children are better in math because their culture teaches them patience, precision, and endurance. And on and on the story goes.

He ends with the illustration of his own mother, born into a poor family in Jamaica, being given an advantage because of her lighter skin color, educated parents, and ability to get loans to go to a college in the UK. In his view, her own hard work is only secondary to the fact that she was afforded opportunities that others could not have had.

In all of this, Gladwell’s conclusion is that no Outlier is really all that special in and of himself. Every person is the product of their time, place, culture, influences, and opportunities. If Bill Gates had not had access to a computer terminal at his high school in an era when most college professors didn’t have access to one, then he would never have become a software billionaire. On the other hand, if dozens of children had had access to the same opportunities afforded to some ‘geniuses’ we may have had a dozen Einsteins or a dozen Mozarts instead of just one.

In addition to his penchant for stating the obvious as it is something extraordinary, there are a few basic problems with Gladwell’s theory.

For one, success is often a zero sum game. No matter how talented two chess grandmasters may be, one of them is going to win a tournament and get his name in the record books and the other is going to lose. They may both have put in the magic 10,00 hours of practice, both gotten hugs from their mother and good advice from their father. It still only possible for one of them to win.

Furthermore, there are huge chunks of the anecdotal stories missing. Bill Gates did not spring from his 10,000 hours of programming right into being a billionaire. There were a few shenanigans that were slightly less than squeaky clean in meantime. Sometimes one person gets to be the outlier and the other doesn’t simply because one is willing to fight dirtier than the other. That thought doesn’t even seem to occur to Gladwell.

Also missing is any idea that some of these “right place, right time” happening may have a Divine fingerprint. Success is formulaic in Gladwell’s mind, not connected to anything greater scheme or higher meaning. In the end it appears that his haste to drag the outliers back under the bell curve robs him of the ability to see in the stories a greater Force at work.

[Scorpio]

(01-10-2011 09:38 PM)Darrell Wrote:  that it takes about 10,000 hours of practice in any discipline to become a master.

If so then I would like to think that I am well on my way to being a "master" of SFL.

This does sound like an interesting read. I will have to put it on my list. I have often thought about things like this, especially when someone successful says "just follow your dreams they will come true". Yeah I don't think so. There are definitely other factors at work, some possibly as outlined in the book and some possibly attributed to circumstances beyond one's control. Call it fate or Divine intervention.

[Smith]

Also, it would appear that once you have all the "tools" of advantage, the person's character decides how the tools will be used. In the film Back to School, the character played by Rodney Dangerfield was sitting in a business class and the instructor was giving the assignment of "building" a business from the ground up...the instructor was playing by the book (intellect) to achieve success while Dangerfield's character saw success obtained by payoffs and greasing the system (family experience). So, both men had "tools" of sorts, but the all encompassing factor was character.

[Jenni]

Loved ths book.
http://frenchizal.blogspot.com/2010/12/outliers.html

[Beaker]

I enjoyed his other books, also. I'm looking forward to another Malcom Gladwell fix. It shouldn't be long.

[Darrell]

I've read this one and Blink.

I haven't read any of the others.

[Shoes]

The Tipping Point was a MUST READ!! How little thing affect BIG change. pretty wild stuff.