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Outliers
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Outliers (2008) (edit title/settings)

The Story of Success

by Malcolm Gladwell (Author) (edit contributors)

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Description edit see section history

In this stunning new book, Malcolm Gladwell takes us on an intellectual journey through the world of "outliers"--the best and the brightest, the most famous and the most successful. He asks the question: what makes high-achievers different? His answer is that we pay too much attention to what... read more

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

  • - An outlier is someone who takes advantage of their opportunities and who will be successful. (Pranati Puri)
  • - Outliers rarely appear without opportunity and hard work, which gives hope for everyone.
  • - This book states that succesful people rarely succeed without luck and the right circumstances.

Summary edit see section history

In this intellectual book by Malcolm Gladwell, Gladwell analyzes the true stories of success and failure in human society for what they really are, rather than what we take them to be. Going from tales of millionaires and Jewish law firms all the way to Chinese Rice culture and Korean plane... read more

In this intellectual book by Malcolm Gladwell, Gladwell analyzes the true stories of success and failure in human society for what they really are, rather than what we take them to be. Going from tales of millionaires and Jewish law firms all the way to Chinese Rice culture and Korean plane crashes, Gladwell explains the cause and series of events that happened to these people.

He explains how Bill Gates may be "self-made" but he also had many opportunities that most of society doesn't have, like access to a computer within the first few years of their invention. He was the right age at the right time to take advantage of the new technology, spending hours a day at the new computer center at the University of Michigan. Stories like Gates' show how the best and richest of today's society may have had opportunities limited to few. In another chapter, Gladwell talks about the reason that Korean pilots tend to have more plane crashes than that of any other country in the world. He reveals that this is because of a very hierarchical society in which the lower classes tend to not directly address their superiors, in the case of planes, the co-pilot is intimidated by the pilot, and as a result, will not report all information about the safety or condition of the plane, even if it means they may crash soon. They will attempt to relate the information to the pilot, but are not able to say it outright. Obviously with more detail and grace, Gladwell explains success and failure stories like these to the average person in an easy to understand book.

The book is overall incredibly interesting, often explaining questions that many people have. At times, the book can seem a little slow, mainly if the story is not incredibly relevant to the reader. Overall however, I found the story to be a very good book, one of the best non-fiction, analytical novels I have ever read. The main reason I liked the book was that it addressed sports and business success stories. I have always been curious as to how Bill Gates became so wealthy from such a modest background. I have also always wondered how people born earlier in the year tend to do in the real world and sports, and why many people I have played with in youth sports were larger than me (my birthday’s in November). I would recommend this book to all adults, and kids in High School who enjoy analyzing society, and the reason behind events. The story was good to me, but I could see how it would be confusing and boring to others.

One key quote that stuck out to me above all others is “No one- not rock stars, not professional athletes, not software’s billionaires, and not even geniuses- ever makes it alone.” This quote stands out to me above all others, and with support from Gladwell, is proven to be true. It represents the society that we live in, and the nature of humans. We cannot do everything alone, and no matter how many times somebody says they may have made it alone, they’re lying or they haven’t realized who or what helped them. Nobody makes it alone.

People edit see section history

  • Bill Joy: William Nelson Joy is an American computer scientist who created the Java language and rewrote UNIX. He co-founded Sun Microsystems in 1982.
  • Bill Gates: founder and former CEO of Microsoft.
  • J. Robert Oppenheimer: theoretical physicist and "father of the atomic bomb".
  • Chris Langan: a genius with an IQ of close to 200, Billed by some media sources as "the smartest man in America"
  • Joe Flom: a lawyer and partner in the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom.
  • Maurice Janklow: A lawyer in New York born in 1902. Father of Mort Janklow.
  • Mort Janklow: A lawyer in New York. Son of Maurice Janklow.
  • Alex Williams: A ten-year-old boy from an affluent family. His mother encourages him to be assertive with adults.
  • John Lennon: Musician and singer-songwriter of the English band The Beatles. Profiled in the book along with other members of the band, in relation to their advantage of logging extensive hours of stage performance time prior to achieving substantial fame.
  • Paul McCartney: Musician and singer-songwriter of the English band The Beatles. Profiled in the book along with other members of the band, in relation to their advantage of logging extensive hours of stage performance time prior to achieving substantial fame.
  • Steve Jobs: CEO and co-founder of Apple
  • Joyce Gladwell: writer, therapist and mother of Malcolm Gladwell
  • Graham Gladwell: math professor and father of Malcolm Gladwell
  • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: classical composer who started writing music at age six.
  • Steve Balmer: CEO of Microsoft
  • Maurico Klotz: First officer of Avianca flight 052 from Colombia to NYC Kennedy.
  • Suren Ratwatte: Sri Lankan Airline pilot and instructor
  • Algo: Add a description of this character.
  • Annette Lareau: Fascinating.
  • Alan Schoenfeld
  • Alexander Bickel
  • David Greenberg
  • Dov Cohen: American psychologist. Professor of psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. Co-Author of "Insult, aggression, and the southern culture of honor", Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
  • Ted Friedman
  • Bobby Fischer: an American chess player and the eleventh World Chess Champion. He is widely considered one of the greatest chess players of all time.
  • David Hackett Fischer
  • Ute Fischer
  • Colin Powell: an American statesman and a retired four-star general in the United States Army. He was the 65th United States Secretary of State (2001–2005), serving under President George W. Bush. He was the first African American appointed to that position.
  • Malcolm Brenner
  • Albert Einstein: a German-born theoretical physicist who discovered the theory of general relativity.
  • David Levin
  • Paul Allen: Co-founder of Microsoft
  • Laureano Caviedes: Pilot of Avianca flight 052 from Colombia to NYC Kennedy.
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Quotes edit see section history

  • “When we understand what it really means to be a good pilot-- when we understand how much culture and history and the world outside of the individual matter to professional success-- then we don't have to throw up our hands in despair at an airline where pilots crash planes into the sides of mountains. We have a way to make successes out of the unsucessful. (Pranati Puri)”
  • “What redeemed the life of a rice farmer, however, was the nature of that work. It was a lot like the garment work done by the Jewish immigrants to New York. It was meaningful. First of all, there is a clear relationship in rice farming between effort and reward. The harder you work a rice field, the more it yields. Second, it's complex work. The rice farmer isn't simply planting in the spring and harvesting in the fall. He or she effectively rusn a small business, juggling a family workforce, hedging uncertainty through seed selection, building and managing a sophisticated irrigation system, and coordinating the complicated process of harvesting the first crop while simultaneously preparing the second crop. (Pranati Puri)”
  • “So where does something like practical intelligence come from? We know where analytical intelligence comes from. It's something, at least in part, that's in your genes. Chris Langan started talking at six months. He taught himself to read at three years of age. He was born smart. IQ is a measure, to some degree, of innate ability. But social savvy is knowledge. It's a set of skills that have to be learned. It has to come from somewhere, and the place where we seem to get these kinds of attitudes and skills is from our families. (Pranati Puri)”
  • “Those three things - autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward - are, most people will agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.”
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  • Those three things—autonomy, complexity, and a connection between effort and reward—are, most people agree, the three qualities that work has to have if it is to be satisfying.
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  • Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good. It’s the thing you do that makes you good.
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  • Outliers are those who have been given opportunities—and who have had the strength and presence of mind to seize them.
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  • Success is the result of what sociologists like to call “accumulative advantage.”
    Highlighted by 2030 Kindle customers
  • Success is a function of persistence and doggedness and the willingness to work hard for twenty-two minutes to make sense of something that most people would give up on after thirty seconds.
    Highlighted by 1915 Kindle customers
  • if you work hard enough and assert yourself, and use your mind and imagination, you can shape the world to your desires.
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  • Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning. Once it does, it becomes the kind of thing that makes you grab your wife around the waist and dance a jig.
    Highlighted by 1692 Kindle customers
  • Achievement is talent plus preparation. The problem with this view is that the closer psychologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play.
    Highlighted by 1523 Kindle customers
  • Their research suggestes that once a musician has enough ability to get into a top music school, the thing that distinguishes one performer from another is how hard he or she works. That’s it. And what’s more, the people at the very top don’t work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.
    Highlighted by 1453 Kindle customers
  • The idea that excellence at performing a complex task requires a critical minimum level of practice surfaces again and again in studies of expertise. In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is the magic number for true expertise: ten thousand hours.
    Highlighted by 1246 Kindle customers
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Setting & Locations edit see section history

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First Sentence edit see section history

Roseto Valfortore lies one hundred miles southeast of Rome in the Apennine foothills of the Italian province of Foggia.

Table of Contents edit see section history

Introduction: The Roseto Mystery

Part One: Opportunity
Chapter 1: The Matthew Effect
Chapter 2: The 10,000-Hour Rule
Chapter 3: The Trouble with Geniuses, Part 1
Chapter 4: The Trouble with Geniuses, Part 2
Chapter 5: Three Lessons from Joel Flom

Part Two: Legacy
Chapter 6: Harlan, Kentucky
Chapter 7: The Ethnic Theory of Plane Crashes
Chapter 8: Rice Paddies and Math Tests
Chapter 9: Marita's Bargain

Epilogue: A Jamaican Story
Notes
Acknowledgements

Glossary edit see section history

  • Matthew Effect: The phenomenon in which the rich get richer and the poor get poorer is dubbed "accumulative advantage" by Gladwell, while sociologist Robert K. Merton calls it "the Matthew Effect", after a verse in the Gospel of Matthew: "For unto everyone that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance. But from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." --Matthew 25:29.
  • Terman's Termites: A group of genius school-children studied by Lewis Madison Terman. His study surprisingly showed that intellect is not a good indicator of future success.
  • uncertainty avoidance: Describe this term.
  • accumulative advantage
  • outliers
  • achievement gap

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

  • The 10,000-hour rule: If you do something for 10,000 hours, you will proficient enough to be called a master.

Series & Lists edit see section history

This is book 5 of 20 in New York Times Bestsellers - Paperback Nonfiction (Current). (authoritative list)

Preceded by Unlikely Friendships, and followed by The New Jim Crow.

This book is in New York Times Bestsellers (Current). (authoritative list)

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

  1. Malcolm Gladwell (Author) - Gladwell is a writer for The New Yorker.

Other Contributors:

  1. Allison J. Warner (Cover Artist)
  2. Brooke Williams (Photographer) - Author photograph

First Edition edit see section history

Original Language: English
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Country: United States
Publication Date: November 18, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-316-01792-3
Page Count: 304

Classification edit see section history

  • Library of Congress: BF637.S8 G533 2008
  • Dewey: 302

Notes for Parents edit see section history

Reading Level: Adults

There are some things to keep in mind for children such as the 10,000 hour rule. It's helpful to remember that when your child is practicing the violin. Another question for parents: do you let your kids conclude that they are simply not able in mathematics when it may be that they give up trying to understand too soon?What is the role of parents in the education of a child? Is education primarily the responsibility of a school or of the parents? What can parents do if they feel schools do not do enough?

Links to Supplemental Material edit see section history

  • Outliers on Gladwell.com: Information about the book from Malcolm Gladwell's official website.
  • Wikipedia: Learn more about Outliers on Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

More Books Like This edit see section history

   
  • Talent Is Overrated
  • The Talent Code
  • Blink
  • The Tipping Point
  • Freakonomics
  • Super Freakonomics

Books That Influenced This Book edit see section history

   
  • The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance

Books Cited by This Book edit see section history

   
  • Genius Explained
  • Accidental Millionaire: The Rise and Fall of Steve Jobs at Apple Computer

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