Outliers by Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell is one of the most prominent public intellectuals of our times. The popularity of his books knows no bounds. There is no better proof for it than what you can see in airport bookstores around the world. From Warsaw to Istanbul to Shanghai, his exquisitely readable, perfectly calibrated investigations into popular topics, like success, talent or great ideas, are what meets the eye as you walk in. Gladwell's ability to appeal to a mass audience is quite amazing in the world of modern literature, but it wouldn't be too difficult to assign his work to a category of commuting non-fiction. You can easily read it through on a mid-range flight or a train trip. There's also quite a lot to say about his trademark style, which hovers around the core idea in quite large circles through reportage type narrative only to come to relatively simple, not to say obvious, conclusions. He does have a unique way of connecting the dots you know are there but fail to see the full picture most of the time. Possibly, this is the secret of Gladwell's success.

Outliers is the second title by Gladwell I've read, after the Tipping Point. There's going to be more.

What Gladwell does throughout Outliers is try to answer the question what determines people's chances of success. He wants to know how outstanding individuals, like Bill Gates, came to be. What nurtured their ascendance to the top of their professions? His major premise is that in thinking about achievement most people pay too much attention to innate features, especially talent. We tend to think great people are born great. They're blessed by the gods. They have what it takes from the very beginning. While Gladwell admits that predispositions do play a part, he uncovers a maze of hidden patterns that additionally shape chances of success.

What are these stepping stones to greatness?

1. In hockey or football, Gladwell argues, being born at the start of the year, say in January or February, greatly improves your chances of becoming successful. School classes and sport clubs are recruited on the basis of a birth date. Kids born in January have a few months advantage over kids born later in the same year. At an early age, when physical and emotional development move ahead fast, this can mean a world of difference in strength. This is how January and February kids are spotted by coaches and given preferential treatment that quickly increases their advantage over other kids. This is how arbitary cut-off dates (known as the Matthew Effect) affect chances of success in sport.

2. On the basis of the Beatles, Gladwell introduces the 10,000-hour rule. Their talent exploded for a reason. They were invited to Hamburg to play extremely long and frequent concerts in its insatiable music scene at an early stage of their career. This allowed them to practice, experiment and improvise, building up skill and style. Having played about 10,000 hours together, their performance became proficient and instinctive. They mastered their trade. The greatest Bealtles albums were released around this time. This concept reminds me of Diego Maradona, who described his unstopping appetite for football as a kid in one documentary, including playing at night. This extra effort made him into an even better player.

3. Gladwell also looked into whether IQ has a direct relation to success and concluded that up to a certain point higher intelligence makes a lot of difference. However, when it hits about 120 points, anything more you have is not giving you too much advantage over others. This explains why Mensa geniuses, like Christopher Langan, are not necessarily very successful in professional or private life. They might be increadibly smart but they fail to find practical ways to capitalize on it, especially if they miss other success factors.

Chris Langan - IQ 195, but not terribly successful



4. Another factor Gladwell turns a spotlight on is timing. Bill Gates is a good illustration, with his extraordinary ability to program computers that was met with support of his parents, school and early IT companies. He was born at the right time, with the right set of skills and had the right conditions to grow them from an early age. Gladwell also tells a story of a merger and acquisition lawyer of Jewish descent called Joe Flom, who had the luck to join this practice area when major companies did not bother to invest time and trouble there. When the industry grew in importance in the 1980s, he had a terrific first-mover advantage and used it to secure his success as a M&A specialist. What contributed to his rise? Jewish background that placed emphasis on written word and patience plus the timing of his entry into mergers and acquisitions.

5. Cultural heritage is the last thread in Outliers and possibly the most fascinating in my judgement. I couldn't put down the chapter on the ethnic theory of plane crashes. It reports a well-known case of Korean Air pilots who had a series of fatal accidents in the 1980s. Despite excellent technology, Korean Air belonged to an infamous group of the most dangerous airlines to fly with. When its management hired Americans to investigate why, they discovered that Korean culture placed extreme emphasis on respect for authority. Korea was among countries with the largest power distance. In this culture, people in power were shown massive respect and were not to be disagreed with by subordinates. There was a clear and rigorous hierarchy of communication that made it difficult to criticize superiors directly. In the case of Korean Air, it meant that the flight crew were too shy and restrained to inform the pilot about problems or, even more so, challenge his bad decisions. This led to more instances of human error on the part of tired or mistaken pilots as there were no procedures in place for the rest of the crew to correct things.

The other fascinating story illustrating how culture influences attitudes to success has to do with Chinese work ethic. Formed in rice-growing regions, where work requires determination and dedication, it is best summed up by a Chinese proverb Gladwell uses to open the chapter. "No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich". The Chinese and many other Asians believe steadfastly in the value of hard work and they are ready to focus on it, even at the cost of some inconvenient sacrifices. Gladwell connects this with stellar results of Asian kids in maths, which - as he proves - is as much about innate talent for abstract thinking as it is about taking time and effort to solve problems. Asians are more willing to sit through problems as they trust dilligence will be rewarded.

From the rice paddies of Asia, Gladwell comes back to the US, where he picks up discussions about school attainment gap between social classes. The poor, obviously, do not do nearly as well as the rich. The usual culprit is schools. They are believed to benefit students from richer families. In reality, research shows that school performance is practically the same across different social classes and where they really diverge is during holiday. While richer students have support of parents, financial, intellectual and cultural, while school is off (which is several months in a year), poorer students are left for themselves and make no progress. Worse still - they move backwards.