Outliers: Is it all about opportunities?
You always wondered why some people are successful and some others not? , you ask yourself if you got enough talent to be one? Or maybe it’s all about money? , these and additional questions can be answered with the book “Outliers” by Malcom Gladwell. He studies and explains the facts that help you to be a victorious and triumphant person. To support his thesis he puts a lot of examples of important people in the actuality, with a lot of fortunes and intelligence.
Outliers are talented persons who have been given opportunities and take advantage of them; this is the principal aspect of the book. There are too many reasons that could take you from an ordinary person to an outlier, like the luck, the environment that you are involved in, the help from your parents, etc. For example the case of Bill Gates, he created the huge and important computer software “Microsoft” and it was just a stroke of luck.
Also he talked about the key of everything, the "10.000-Hour Rule”, based on a study by Anders Ericsson, which is about practicing something specific for almost 10.000 hours, that means 20 hours of work a week for 10 years. One example from the book are “The Beatles”, during performing and practices they spend more than 10.000 hours, that was the key made them so talent and famous.
A lot of people think that if you have a high intellectual level (IQ) you will be successful, and the ones that don’t have it, lose their hope, but Gladwell prooves that this is not true. He gave the example of a guy named Christopher Langan, he had an IQ of 195 but he wasn’t in the right environment, he ended up working as a famer and didn’t took advantage of his intelligence.
In conclusion the book makes you realize, understand and think about how your life is now, and the changes you can apply in your future to do it right and better. If you think your time passed already and you don´t have the chances, maybe you should help your child to be successful when he grows up, and starting with the 10.000 hours of practicing and you will feel grateful.
Also, even if you don´t care about all these things, is an interesting book to read, because you can know life histories about famous and important people.
BY MABEL GOMEZ AND MELANIE SALGUEIRO
jueves, 18 de febrero de 2010
‘Outliers: success for young people’
In Outliers, Malcom Gladwell states that different factors in people’s life do, in fact, make them successful. Through different stories, he comments on things such as being born at the right time and the right place, maturity, economic status and cultural environment and how these affect the way people face life. This being said, he interrelates these with the way people cope with the obstacles they face, finally stating that everyone has, indeed, some power over the success they may conquer throughout their life.
In his book, Gladwell gives us the solid basis that maturity, our environment, effort, practice and opportunities differ between people according on how you make the best of them. Throughout the chapters we find the story that tells how The Beatles’ career and fame started. They rehearsed intensely, making them sound better every time, and because of their dedication and practice, clubs gave them more jobs every time. Here, Gladwell evidences that practice makes perfect.
In other pages, Gladwell supports that time and birthplace matter. Bill Joy, Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, Andy Bechtolsheim, among others, were born in the 1950’s. Economy was balanced; therefore their parents could enroll them in good schools. They came of age in a time when the world was growing and the technology boom was in their favor.
Further along, the story of Chris Langan shows us that the way one relates to others has also something to do with success. Despite his well-earned scholarship in college, he was unable to negotiate the terms of his inconvenient schedule; therefore, eventually having to drop out. This clearly states that the ability one has to deal with others and be, in a manner of speaking, diplomatic is as helpful as any other quality one may have. To express oneself is to be able to take one’s thoughts and ideas and communicate them to the people around.
I believe that we are, in fact, capable of forging our destinies. Indubitably, there are obstacles we will encounter; however, with the proper tools, we can easily face them. Point in fact, Malcom Gladwell is right to state that there are external factors that directly affect one’s development in life. All in all, it is within us to overcome them and be successful.
BY DIEGO BORJAS AND ANA MONTEVERDE
In Outliers, Malcom Gladwell states that different factors in people’s life do, in fact, make them successful. Through different stories, he comments on things such as being born at the right time and the right place, maturity, economic status and cultural environment and how these affect the way people face life. This being said, he interrelates these with the way people cope with the obstacles they face, finally stating that everyone has, indeed, some power over the success they may conquer throughout their life.
In his book, Gladwell gives us the solid basis that maturity, our environment, effort, practice and opportunities differ between people according on how you make the best of them. Throughout the chapters we find the story that tells how The Beatles’ career and fame started. They rehearsed intensely, making them sound better every time, and because of their dedication and practice, clubs gave them more jobs every time. Here, Gladwell evidences that practice makes perfect.
In other pages, Gladwell supports that time and birthplace matter. Bill Joy, Scott McNealy, Vinod Khosla, Andy Bechtolsheim, among others, were born in the 1950’s. Economy was balanced; therefore their parents could enroll them in good schools. They came of age in a time when the world was growing and the technology boom was in their favor.
Further along, the story of Chris Langan shows us that the way one relates to others has also something to do with success. Despite his well-earned scholarship in college, he was unable to negotiate the terms of his inconvenient schedule; therefore, eventually having to drop out. This clearly states that the ability one has to deal with others and be, in a manner of speaking, diplomatic is as helpful as any other quality one may have. To express oneself is to be able to take one’s thoughts and ideas and communicate them to the people around.
I believe that we are, in fact, capable of forging our destinies. Indubitably, there are obstacles we will encounter; however, with the proper tools, we can easily face them. Point in fact, Malcom Gladwell is right to state that there are external factors that directly affect one’s development in life. All in all, it is within us to overcome them and be successful.
BY DIEGO BORJAS AND ANA MONTEVERDE
HOW TO KNOW IF YOU ARE AN OUTLIER
Every day we hear about people who have attained professional success, but we never stop to think what they’re like and what are the characteristics that make them achieve their goals, this is what Malcolm Gladwell, British writer who graduated from the University of Toronto writes about in his book “Outliers”.
If you were born in a country when its economy and society was stable, and family values and concern for the well educated play an important part, is easy for you to materialize your ideas and socialize with professional people, this is the first step to be an outlier.
An outlier according to Malcolm Gladwell is "something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body”. The outliers are professional people who stand out in any area, but whose success is conditioned by the social, political and economic situation in which the individual is.
If you have the first conditions that depend on the state you are, in the country and the family you were born in, to achieve success you should begin the task of creating a good performance in the field in which you are emphasized. This performance is reflected in the performance of the 10,000 hours of practice, the time required to achieve perfection in any area.
Some of examples are, Steve Jobs, Joseph Pulitzer, Gustavo Dudamel, Joe Flom, which according to Gladwell’s investigations in his book "Outliers", have the characteristics listed above, regardless of being born into wealthy families and high social status.
That's why Malcolm Gladwell in his book invites all those who have the potential to be an outlier to use it, and also invites families to have good communication and motivation for education, because this influences the child's life.
It is important to remember that the opportunities presented to them are not all alike, so the environment in which we find ourselves is crucial to success and we must be able to seize these opportunities.
BY ESTEFANIA RODRIGUEZ AND MARIA RODRIGUEZ
Every day we hear about people who have attained professional success, but we never stop to think what they’re like and what are the characteristics that make them achieve their goals, this is what Malcolm Gladwell, British writer who graduated from the University of Toronto writes about in his book “Outliers”.
If you were born in a country when its economy and society was stable, and family values and concern for the well educated play an important part, is easy for you to materialize your ideas and socialize with professional people, this is the first step to be an outlier.
An outlier according to Malcolm Gladwell is "something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body”. The outliers are professional people who stand out in any area, but whose success is conditioned by the social, political and economic situation in which the individual is.
If you have the first conditions that depend on the state you are, in the country and the family you were born in, to achieve success you should begin the task of creating a good performance in the field in which you are emphasized. This performance is reflected in the performance of the 10,000 hours of practice, the time required to achieve perfection in any area.
Some of examples are, Steve Jobs, Joseph Pulitzer, Gustavo Dudamel, Joe Flom, which according to Gladwell’s investigations in his book "Outliers", have the characteristics listed above, regardless of being born into wealthy families and high social status.
That's why Malcolm Gladwell in his book invites all those who have the potential to be an outlier to use it, and also invites families to have good communication and motivation for education, because this influences the child's life.
It is important to remember that the opportunities presented to them are not all alike, so the environment in which we find ourselves is crucial to success and we must be able to seize these opportunities.
BY ESTEFANIA RODRIGUEZ AND MARIA RODRIGUEZ
"Success in 10,000 hours?
Many of us ever imagined the "born ready" to fit where space provided. The truth is that this is very complex and that the line between reality is very thin. The theory set forth by the Book Outliars Gladwell tells us that only 10,000 hours will get sure success.
In the 90s the psychologist K. Anders Ericsson and his colleagues at the Berlin Music Academy, an interesting study to see what factors distinguish the genius of the music of artists more or less. They separated the students of the German school of elite into three groups: the exceptional, the good and the mediocre.
The research was designed to determine the intensity of study and hours of practice each of which had been presented to evaluate the correlation between commitment and actual performance. All of them had started playing (violin, in this case), almost the same age (five years) and practiced an average of two to three hours per week.
At eight years, however, came the difference: this age best students practiced about six hours per week. At twelve years, the average jumped to eight hours and reached the age of fourteen, sixteen. When he was twenty years old, these students have been devoted to the music of thirty hours per week and had combined ten thousand hours of practice.
An interesting point in the assessment of this issue is that ten thousand hours is a bit of time! No child can reach that mark, if he has strong support from his family. In all aspects of the genius of his life in developing countries need emotional support, financial and motivational.
As for the biography of illustrious success, Gladwell shows how they managed to complete this strenuous journey. Since Bill Gates (cute, huh?) And Bill Joy (who rewrote the UNIX and Java and founded Sun Microsystems) to the Beatles (who in 1960 conducted 12 hours, seven days a week in Hamburg , Germany).
Environmental factors also account for much of the opportunities that these icons had access. The stories of the computer wizards accumulate above the coincidences of fate that conspired in his favor. Gates and joy came to be near research centers in major information revolutions occurred.
Their lives are mixed with university labs and companies that form the modern electronic equipment. Their families were capable and interested in supporting them. The personal dedication of each one fed their individual motivations.
The exact moment that such major changes occurred, they were young and energetic. In 1975, when it launched the first affordable mini-computer, which were in their twenties. They and all kind of noise that rocked the Silicon Valley, as Paul Allen, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, Eric Schmidt.
Every rule has its exception, and there are millions of people achieve success without the magic number. There are only 10,000 hours necessary to achieve individual success, it takes confidence, both the family around you as yourself, patience to understand that it is a success to reach the goal, but also a successful attempt, effort not drop by the rocks that stand in all challenges that we get the courage to get the bar higher every day, but above all things love which is vital as it is the real success in life can get.
BY PATRICIA DAOU AND ADRIANA LUGO
Many of us ever imagined the "born ready" to fit where space provided. The truth is that this is very complex and that the line between reality is very thin. The theory set forth by the Book Outliars Gladwell tells us that only 10,000 hours will get sure success.
In the 90s the psychologist K. Anders Ericsson and his colleagues at the Berlin Music Academy, an interesting study to see what factors distinguish the genius of the music of artists more or less. They separated the students of the German school of elite into three groups: the exceptional, the good and the mediocre.
The research was designed to determine the intensity of study and hours of practice each of which had been presented to evaluate the correlation between commitment and actual performance. All of them had started playing (violin, in this case), almost the same age (five years) and practiced an average of two to three hours per week.
At eight years, however, came the difference: this age best students practiced about six hours per week. At twelve years, the average jumped to eight hours and reached the age of fourteen, sixteen. When he was twenty years old, these students have been devoted to the music of thirty hours per week and had combined ten thousand hours of practice.
An interesting point in the assessment of this issue is that ten thousand hours is a bit of time! No child can reach that mark, if he has strong support from his family. In all aspects of the genius of his life in developing countries need emotional support, financial and motivational.
As for the biography of illustrious success, Gladwell shows how they managed to complete this strenuous journey. Since Bill Gates (cute, huh?) And Bill Joy (who rewrote the UNIX and Java and founded Sun Microsystems) to the Beatles (who in 1960 conducted 12 hours, seven days a week in Hamburg , Germany).
Environmental factors also account for much of the opportunities that these icons had access. The stories of the computer wizards accumulate above the coincidences of fate that conspired in his favor. Gates and joy came to be near research centers in major information revolutions occurred.
Their lives are mixed with university labs and companies that form the modern electronic equipment. Their families were capable and interested in supporting them. The personal dedication of each one fed their individual motivations.
The exact moment that such major changes occurred, they were young and energetic. In 1975, when it launched the first affordable mini-computer, which were in their twenties. They and all kind of noise that rocked the Silicon Valley, as Paul Allen, Steve Ballmer, Steve Jobs, Eric Schmidt.
Every rule has its exception, and there are millions of people achieve success without the magic number. There are only 10,000 hours necessary to achieve individual success, it takes confidence, both the family around you as yourself, patience to understand that it is a success to reach the goal, but also a successful attempt, effort not drop by the rocks that stand in all challenges that we get the courage to get the bar higher every day, but above all things love which is vital as it is the real success in life can get.
BY PATRICIA DAOU AND ADRIANA LUGO
An outlier is a person that has come very far because of specific circumstances. The entire book is an analysis of what makes an outlier. According to Gladwell, the reasons that makes an ordinary person an outlier, are a group of circumstances, one of them is the effect that the environment in which a certain person lives has in the individual. Other reasons could be just luck, ten thousand hours of practice of the activity or thing that you want to succeed, etc.
We believe that what Gladwell says is correct based on a few examples that show us this situation, you could be lucky, and be in the right place at the right time like Joseph Pullitzer, he got to meet the people that helped him start his steps in journalism, because he started to play chess with them, this is a truly example of pure luck, coincidence or whatever you want to call it, he certainly was in the right place at the right time.
Another example is Steve Jobs he did not receive any college education, but he was motivated to succeed so he took one class about typography and from then on he worked over ten thousand hours and today he is the president of Apple. Well here are two examples of hard work and dedication.
We consider that those ten thousand hours of practice depends on many things is not necessarily as Gladwell says. You could have the mentioned amount of hours of practice and not be an outlier. Many people have had over ten thousand hours and yes, be good at what they do, but not necessarily the best at it.
Besides of the hours of practice your culture has also an effect on you. Gladwell says that jews has come as far as they have, because they have an unique talent of it. For instance the jews are so hard working because long time ago they were a very conservative culture and they couldn´t go out as much as everyone else, so the only thing to do for them was work, and that characteristic seems to still live on them. For example if you grow up in home of photographers or artists, you will have a tendency for artistic things. The thing with culture is that is that it defines who you are, like the pilots and airplane crashes, your surroundings will define you.
If we take into account this three statements that the author has raise us we probably would have an outlier.
For example imagine a person that has ten thousand hours of practice, comes from a family of doctors and is lucky enough to meet the chief of surgery, that person has the potential to be an outlier. Does it has to be this way? No, it also depends on what the person wants.
Gladwell seems to believe that everything happens because of a reason that not neccesarilly depends on the person. But we believe that in order to become an outlier or just be very good at something the person must really want it and really work for it. Not everything is up to luck it is also about the decisions made by the person.
BY AYMARA DIAZ AND BEATRIZ PELLICER
We believe that what Gladwell says is correct based on a few examples that show us this situation, you could be lucky, and be in the right place at the right time like Joseph Pullitzer, he got to meet the people that helped him start his steps in journalism, because he started to play chess with them, this is a truly example of pure luck, coincidence or whatever you want to call it, he certainly was in the right place at the right time.
Another example is Steve Jobs he did not receive any college education, but he was motivated to succeed so he took one class about typography and from then on he worked over ten thousand hours and today he is the president of Apple. Well here are two examples of hard work and dedication.
We consider that those ten thousand hours of practice depends on many things is not necessarily as Gladwell says. You could have the mentioned amount of hours of practice and not be an outlier. Many people have had over ten thousand hours and yes, be good at what they do, but not necessarily the best at it.
Besides of the hours of practice your culture has also an effect on you. Gladwell says that jews has come as far as they have, because they have an unique talent of it. For instance the jews are so hard working because long time ago they were a very conservative culture and they couldn´t go out as much as everyone else, so the only thing to do for them was work, and that characteristic seems to still live on them. For example if you grow up in home of photographers or artists, you will have a tendency for artistic things. The thing with culture is that is that it defines who you are, like the pilots and airplane crashes, your surroundings will define you.
If we take into account this three statements that the author has raise us we probably would have an outlier.
For example imagine a person that has ten thousand hours of practice, comes from a family of doctors and is lucky enough to meet the chief of surgery, that person has the potential to be an outlier. Does it has to be this way? No, it also depends on what the person wants.
Gladwell seems to believe that everything happens because of a reason that not neccesarilly depends on the person. But we believe that in order to become an outlier or just be very good at something the person must really want it and really work for it. Not everything is up to luck it is also about the decisions made by the person.
BY AYMARA DIAZ AND BEATRIZ PELLICER
Analysis of the theory explicit by Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers
In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell says that a person must not only be smart to succeed, but it must also be lucky enough to have at its disposal a number of opportunities that allow him or her to develop his or hers skills and arise in the right time.
Furthermore, the author explains that innate talent is something real, something existing and not disputed, but you need to know to take it to cultivate its best. This is expressed when he says that after several studies found that many cases of outliers reflected in the book became the best in its class because it met the 10,000 hours of practice, equivalent to 10 years . Such is the case of Canadian hockey players born in the early months of the year who had the opportunity to practice more than other children born in recent months, because the period of election of the players began on 1 January. Thus, those born before, first reached the age required for the election that they were born later and so the former had the advantage of being able to practice more than others.
However, Gladwell argues that besides having sufficient intelligence and an innate talent, it also needs to be able to seize opportunities that arise (as mentioned above) to be constant and persevere and achieve well, be the best in the area where the performance takes place.
Another idea to review the author is the advantage that people with economic power to develop a more productive capacities, for having solved the basic needs, is not obliged to work more than necessary and may well use more time to practice and improve their skills, either to play an instrument, play
sports, etc..
However, this is not true in all cases, as there are people still without belonging to wealthy families, they managed to succeed. People who worked hard to achieve their goals and took every opportunity presented to them on the road.
BY MANUELA DOS SANTOS AND GABRIELA LOPEZ
In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell says that a person must not only be smart to succeed, but it must also be lucky enough to have at its disposal a number of opportunities that allow him or her to develop his or hers skills and arise in the right time.
Furthermore, the author explains that innate talent is something real, something existing and not disputed, but you need to know to take it to cultivate its best. This is expressed when he says that after several studies found that many cases of outliers reflected in the book became the best in its class because it met the 10,000 hours of practice, equivalent to 10 years . Such is the case of Canadian hockey players born in the early months of the year who had the opportunity to practice more than other children born in recent months, because the period of election of the players began on 1 January. Thus, those born before, first reached the age required for the election that they were born later and so the former had the advantage of being able to practice more than others.
However, Gladwell argues that besides having sufficient intelligence and an innate talent, it also needs to be able to seize opportunities that arise (as mentioned above) to be constant and persevere and achieve well, be the best in the area where the performance takes place.
Another idea to review the author is the advantage that people with economic power to develop a more productive capacities, for having solved the basic needs, is not obliged to work more than necessary and may well use more time to practice and improve their skills, either to play an instrument, play
sports, etc..
However, this is not true in all cases, as there are people still without belonging to wealthy families, they managed to succeed. People who worked hard to achieve their goals and took every opportunity presented to them on the road.
BY MANUELA DOS SANTOS AND GABRIELA LOPEZ
n Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell approaches the subject of success and attempts to de-mystify it; our culture, he says, is full of misconceptions about what makes someone exceptional, that person with remarkable achievements that everyone looks up to and even regards as a superior.
Gladwell explains that being an outlier does not entirely depend on talent, and that successful people aren’t so different from others who did not achieve as much. In fact, innate talent is but a tiny percentage of that on which success is based: there are external factors that have a much bigger influence than we are accustomed to acknowledge.
Opportunity plays an extraordinary part in stories of success. That is the first thing that sets outliers apart from less successful people: their chances, something that they are not responsible for; a casualty. An undeniably precise example is the case of Bill Gates: a child with talent, yes, but also one who studied in one of the few schools in America that had computers at the time, and who became familiar with them from a very young age. Enter something almost as important as innate ability: practice. Gates was sufficiently exposed to computing so that, when he went on to study at a University where he could have free computer time, he had already accumulated a good part of ten thousand hours of experience, the right amount of time it takes to become very good at something.
Practice is encouraged in anyone who wishes to develop a skill. Parents, teachers, coaches, all promote practice amongst children so they can get better at their interests or abilities. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that someone with both opportunity and many hours of experience will be more likely to achieve success than someone as equally talented but with neither of those two elements on their side.
Other factors, very similar to opportunity, also play a role in the life stories of outliers: for instance, being born on the right year or in the right place. A man born in the United States thirty years before the boom of industrialization in the mid-1800s had more chances of starting a factory and then becoming a wealthy entrepreneur than a man with the same drive but born elsewhere, or a few years too early to take advantage of the moment.
Gladwell also explores the controversial subject of Intellectual Quotient. It is only logical to associate success with intelligence; however, it is not the most accurate conclusion. In fact, although IQ does play a role in becoming an outlier, anyone above a certain high score is pretty much on the same level when it comes to being successful at life. Genius does not equal reaching one’s goals. An example is the comparison between Chris Langan -the smartest man in America today- and Robert Oppenheimer, a man with probably as intelligent. Langan’s difficult life and his inability to deal with the authorities and make himself heard and respected contrast strongly with how smoothly Oppenheimer climbed to the top of his career, in spite of also having had problems with his superiors.
The factor that marks the difference between these two highly intelligent men is knowing how to deal, knowing the right things to say, the right moves to make; having a sense of entitlement in front of others to make yourself respected: practical intelligence. That is the one difference, and it stems from the way their parents taught them to behave in society, and that, on the other hand, depends on their socio-economic level: middle to upper-class parents (like Oppenheimer’s) will infuse their children with a greater sense of entitlement than lower-class parents (like Langan’s). Once more, innate talent is subject to an external variable, in this case parenting, influenced -but not determined- by economic position.
Finally, the author introduces the influence of cultural background. People from different countries have different ways to approach authority and even distinct cognitive processes, brought on by their linguistic peculiarities or their cultural work ethic. For example, Asian languages such as Chinese have a simpler way of conceptualizing and pronouncing numbers than others such as English, which makes Asians better disposed for math. In consequence, they are the most likely to be successful at careers that involve numbers, but not because they are more intelligent than non-Asians. Similarly, an American pilot is more likely to successfully make an emergency landing in JFK Airport than a Guatemalan pilot; not because he is better, but because he feels enough entitlement to treat the air-controllers aggressively and get the directions that he wants, whereas the other pilot is from a culture in which there is much more reverence and distance from authority.
The conclusion is simple: many things have a hand in the makings of an outlier. Talent is important, but not enough. People with potential must work hard, knowing who they are and where they come from so they can maximize their cultural or social advantages and make up for their shortcomings. But the role that opportunity plays in success is so remarkable that the biggest lesson extends itself to the very structure of our society: the more chances are given to young people, the more outliers are likely to emerge, and the richer society will become.
BY ELVIRA BLANCO AND SOPHIA KELLER
Gladwell explains that being an outlier does not entirely depend on talent, and that successful people aren’t so different from others who did not achieve as much. In fact, innate talent is but a tiny percentage of that on which success is based: there are external factors that have a much bigger influence than we are accustomed to acknowledge.
Opportunity plays an extraordinary part in stories of success. That is the first thing that sets outliers apart from less successful people: their chances, something that they are not responsible for; a casualty. An undeniably precise example is the case of Bill Gates: a child with talent, yes, but also one who studied in one of the few schools in America that had computers at the time, and who became familiar with them from a very young age. Enter something almost as important as innate ability: practice. Gates was sufficiently exposed to computing so that, when he went on to study at a University where he could have free computer time, he had already accumulated a good part of ten thousand hours of experience, the right amount of time it takes to become very good at something.
Practice is encouraged in anyone who wishes to develop a skill. Parents, teachers, coaches, all promote practice amongst children so they can get better at their interests or abilities. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that someone with both opportunity and many hours of experience will be more likely to achieve success than someone as equally talented but with neither of those two elements on their side.
Other factors, very similar to opportunity, also play a role in the life stories of outliers: for instance, being born on the right year or in the right place. A man born in the United States thirty years before the boom of industrialization in the mid-1800s had more chances of starting a factory and then becoming a wealthy entrepreneur than a man with the same drive but born elsewhere, or a few years too early to take advantage of the moment.
Gladwell also explores the controversial subject of Intellectual Quotient. It is only logical to associate success with intelligence; however, it is not the most accurate conclusion. In fact, although IQ does play a role in becoming an outlier, anyone above a certain high score is pretty much on the same level when it comes to being successful at life. Genius does not equal reaching one’s goals. An example is the comparison between Chris Langan -the smartest man in America today- and Robert Oppenheimer, a man with probably as intelligent. Langan’s difficult life and his inability to deal with the authorities and make himself heard and respected contrast strongly with how smoothly Oppenheimer climbed to the top of his career, in spite of also having had problems with his superiors.
The factor that marks the difference between these two highly intelligent men is knowing how to deal, knowing the right things to say, the right moves to make; having a sense of entitlement in front of others to make yourself respected: practical intelligence. That is the one difference, and it stems from the way their parents taught them to behave in society, and that, on the other hand, depends on their socio-economic level: middle to upper-class parents (like Oppenheimer’s) will infuse their children with a greater sense of entitlement than lower-class parents (like Langan’s). Once more, innate talent is subject to an external variable, in this case parenting, influenced -but not determined- by economic position.
Finally, the author introduces the influence of cultural background. People from different countries have different ways to approach authority and even distinct cognitive processes, brought on by their linguistic peculiarities or their cultural work ethic. For example, Asian languages such as Chinese have a simpler way of conceptualizing and pronouncing numbers than others such as English, which makes Asians better disposed for math. In consequence, they are the most likely to be successful at careers that involve numbers, but not because they are more intelligent than non-Asians. Similarly, an American pilot is more likely to successfully make an emergency landing in JFK Airport than a Guatemalan pilot; not because he is better, but because he feels enough entitlement to treat the air-controllers aggressively and get the directions that he wants, whereas the other pilot is from a culture in which there is much more reverence and distance from authority.
The conclusion is simple: many things have a hand in the makings of an outlier. Talent is important, but not enough. People with potential must work hard, knowing who they are and where they come from so they can maximize their cultural or social advantages and make up for their shortcomings. But the role that opportunity plays in success is so remarkable that the biggest lesson extends itself to the very structure of our society: the more chances are given to young people, the more outliers are likely to emerge, and the richer society will become.
BY ELVIRA BLANCO AND SOPHIA KELLER
The Way of Achieving Success
Over the days in history, the human being search to excel among others, doing a work of his likes and capabilities. But it was noticed some particular cases that made one person someone outstanding. Who are they? How they did it? Are these people more special than those who surround them? Here is Malcolm Gladwell, a journalist, writer and sociologist who introduced the word “Outliers”. But, what is an “outlier”? Gladwell defines it in his book as “something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body”. He added a second description: “a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the other of the sample”. In simpler terms, an outlier is a person who excels among others in something specific. Is someone who achieved success in whatever it does. In order to understand the truly concept of an outlier person, some different points of information given by Gladwell are going to been explained. Some are about the creation and appearance of this kind of people.
The first effect that helps a person arise in life is their time and place they were born. This is an aspect given to someone since by its existence. One emerged person had received a good education, and had grown up in a country were economy and society were in optimal status. In addition, the familiar environment were the person develops is very important. Gladwell denotes this in a social study realized in high class and low class people. The ones in high class talked constantly whit their children, teaching them how to reflect, negotiate and communicate with others. The ones who belonged to the low class didn’t have enough time to interact with theur children, apart from their lack of interest in this aspect. The results told children from this class bred themselves, because their parents, in some cases, had to work to survive.
Gladwell rises one important thing, something he called “The 10.000 Hour Rule”; some kind of rule that sets a person can’t be professional on something, unless it has been carried out at least 10.000 hours. One good example could be a pianist, who started playing at the age of four. Over the years, dedicating time and effort to the instrument, manages to obtain the required 10.000 hours of practice at the age of 20. this is what it makes a pianist a professional one.
Although it is worth noting the case of “geniuses”. Is it true that a high intellectual level can help a person excel, but said person has to know how to use this great intellectual level. Here is were enters the previous approaches: appropriate birth time and place and “The 10.000 Hour Rule” of practice. But it also outstands other things that makes one person achieve success. As it was said before, the person with great intellectual level has to know how to use it in its benefit. Let’s take Chris Langan, for example. A guy with a very high IQ level. Langan was born in a very poor home. His mother died and his father didn’t take care of him and his brothers. Langan managed to get a scholarship in a university, and as it’s characteristic in all geniuses, he was bored in class. He tried to tell this to his teacher, who didn’t understand what Langan was really telling him. If Langan had known how to express his problem, he could had succeeded in excel. If Langan had grown up in an stable home, with parents who teached him how to express himself, the teacher had understand him, and Langan could had achieved success. A high IQ level is not the only important thing, but also have a social and emotional intelligence sufficiently developed, so the person can handle itself in society.
Gladwell introduces in his book “The Three Lessons of Joe Flom”, a lawyer who raised three aspects that allowed one person achieve whatever they want. The first one is “The Importance of Being Jewish”, which tells an anecdote about Jews who migrated to America. They worked with dedication, managing to emerge in the American economy during the World War. He continued explaining that thanks to this hard workers, their children had received good education, achieving college degrees, such as lawyers, architects and doctors.
Then, there is the second lesson: “The Demographic Luck”, which has a lot to do with the things told before about the important thing of being born in the right time and place. And finally, there is the third lesson: “The Garnment Industry and Meaningful World”, where Flom says the essential search of a work that pleases a person, a work they could manage, and that gives them enough earnings to survive.
Gladwell mention something very important: cultural heritage. This is a powerful thing that affects society, because is culture the one thing that marks the nature of a group of people, their acting, speaking, dressing and the way they socialize with other people.
There’s something that Gladwell didn’t point very clearly, but rather transmits it through “The Three Lessons of Joe Flom”, and is the capacity of one person to search whatever it wants, the fact of trying achieving success through its own effort and dedication. And here is what Gladwell says: an outlier doesn’t have to bee a person with a high IQ level or a high amount of money. An outlier is the result of a social phenomenon that is represented by a lot of social factors, such as birth time and place, their capability of express themselves, and the dedication that gives their quest for success.
BY VIVIANA JIMENEZ AND VANIA LIBEROFF
Over the days in history, the human being search to excel among others, doing a work of his likes and capabilities. But it was noticed some particular cases that made one person someone outstanding. Who are they? How they did it? Are these people more special than those who surround them? Here is Malcolm Gladwell, a journalist, writer and sociologist who introduced the word “Outliers”. But, what is an “outlier”? Gladwell defines it in his book as “something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body”. He added a second description: “a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the other of the sample”. In simpler terms, an outlier is a person who excels among others in something specific. Is someone who achieved success in whatever it does. In order to understand the truly concept of an outlier person, some different points of information given by Gladwell are going to been explained. Some are about the creation and appearance of this kind of people.
The first effect that helps a person arise in life is their time and place they were born. This is an aspect given to someone since by its existence. One emerged person had received a good education, and had grown up in a country were economy and society were in optimal status. In addition, the familiar environment were the person develops is very important. Gladwell denotes this in a social study realized in high class and low class people. The ones in high class talked constantly whit their children, teaching them how to reflect, negotiate and communicate with others. The ones who belonged to the low class didn’t have enough time to interact with theur children, apart from their lack of interest in this aspect. The results told children from this class bred themselves, because their parents, in some cases, had to work to survive.
Gladwell rises one important thing, something he called “The 10.000 Hour Rule”; some kind of rule that sets a person can’t be professional on something, unless it has been carried out at least 10.000 hours. One good example could be a pianist, who started playing at the age of four. Over the years, dedicating time and effort to the instrument, manages to obtain the required 10.000 hours of practice at the age of 20. this is what it makes a pianist a professional one.
Although it is worth noting the case of “geniuses”. Is it true that a high intellectual level can help a person excel, but said person has to know how to use this great intellectual level. Here is were enters the previous approaches: appropriate birth time and place and “The 10.000 Hour Rule” of practice. But it also outstands other things that makes one person achieve success. As it was said before, the person with great intellectual level has to know how to use it in its benefit. Let’s take Chris Langan, for example. A guy with a very high IQ level. Langan was born in a very poor home. His mother died and his father didn’t take care of him and his brothers. Langan managed to get a scholarship in a university, and as it’s characteristic in all geniuses, he was bored in class. He tried to tell this to his teacher, who didn’t understand what Langan was really telling him. If Langan had known how to express his problem, he could had succeeded in excel. If Langan had grown up in an stable home, with parents who teached him how to express himself, the teacher had understand him, and Langan could had achieved success. A high IQ level is not the only important thing, but also have a social and emotional intelligence sufficiently developed, so the person can handle itself in society.
Gladwell introduces in his book “The Three Lessons of Joe Flom”, a lawyer who raised three aspects that allowed one person achieve whatever they want. The first one is “The Importance of Being Jewish”, which tells an anecdote about Jews who migrated to America. They worked with dedication, managing to emerge in the American economy during the World War. He continued explaining that thanks to this hard workers, their children had received good education, achieving college degrees, such as lawyers, architects and doctors.
Then, there is the second lesson: “The Demographic Luck”, which has a lot to do with the things told before about the important thing of being born in the right time and place. And finally, there is the third lesson: “The Garnment Industry and Meaningful World”, where Flom says the essential search of a work that pleases a person, a work they could manage, and that gives them enough earnings to survive.
Gladwell mention something very important: cultural heritage. This is a powerful thing that affects society, because is culture the one thing that marks the nature of a group of people, their acting, speaking, dressing and the way they socialize with other people.
There’s something that Gladwell didn’t point very clearly, but rather transmits it through “The Three Lessons of Joe Flom”, and is the capacity of one person to search whatever it wants, the fact of trying achieving success through its own effort and dedication. And here is what Gladwell says: an outlier doesn’t have to bee a person with a high IQ level or a high amount of money. An outlier is the result of a social phenomenon that is represented by a lot of social factors, such as birth time and place, their capability of express themselves, and the dedication that gives their quest for success.
BY VIVIANA JIMENEZ AND VANIA LIBEROFF
Book Analysis
Why is it that some people get to succeed in accomplishing their life goals and are able to exceed theirs and everyone else’s expectations? Is it because they are smarter than the rest? Is it because they are more talented? The answer to these questions lies within the definition of a certain group of people that Malcolm Gladwell calls “Outliers”.
In this book Gladwell presents a series of cases of people who are successful in life, and others who should have been but weren’t. He brings all these cases together and puts them into perspective using examples of sociological data to draw different scientific conclusions that can help us understand the different characteristics that determine an outlier.
In order to be capable of understanding what made these people become outliers first we need to be able to understand success, and what led these outliers to it.
Gladwell describes success as something that is neither random nor deliberate but as something that is determined by a series of circumstances and opportunities that a person can use to his or her advantage. In the different examples and cases we find as we read the book, we can notice that there are a lot of aspects that can determine success: where you were born, who your parents were, how much money you had, your religion, your education, etc. Even the tiniest feature, like for instance the year you were born, can determine if you can reach success. So, we have all these circumstances, and if these circumstances exist or are arranged in a specific way, they can lead you to success.
The other element that stands in a person’s road to success is one of utmost importance: opportunity. When living under these circumstances, opportunity appears, and the most important part of achieving success is how you are able to take advantage of these opportunities, and have the strength and presence of mind to seize them. It’s like the ever-famous “Carpe Diem”, seize the day, take advantage of what you are given, and use it.
Malcolm Gladwell uses several examples of how opportunity and advantage lead some people to success, like Bill Gates and all the computer access he had since such an early age, or Bill Joy and the number of computer hours he managed to log in the University of Michigan. These two and more characters are used to describe the way possibilities and chance lie before some of us in a favorable manner.
So we have discovered the first big part of the secret. To become an outlier and grow to be someone successful, you must take advantage of all the opportunities that life bestows upon you. Now, is there another part to this mystery? Is it just circumstance and opportunity? Is there something else?
The other key element in becoming successful is practice, yes, lots and lots of practice. Gladwell introduces us to what he calls “The 10.000 hour rule”. This rule was discovered by Anders Ericsson in the early 1990’s in the Berlin Music Academy, he correlated achievement and hours of practice and drew results that showed the level of skill based on the time accumulated in practice. Basically, the rule consists in accumulating approximately 10.000 hours of deliberate practice to completely master a skill. Malcolm Gladwell claims that greatness requires enormous time, using the source of The Beatles’ musical talents as a savvy example.
The Beatles performed live in Hamburg, Germany over 1,200 times from 1960 to 1964, amassing more than 10,000 hours of playing time, therefore meeting the 10,000-Hour Rule. Gladwell asserts that all of the time The Beatles spent performing shaped their talent, “so by the time they returned to England from Hamburg, Germany, “they sounded like no one else”. It was the making of them.
So, at least 10.000 hours of practice, practice, and more practice are what truly make you more skillful within your environment. And using those skills you’ve mastered when taking advantage of the opportunities life gives you is the greatest way to achieve success.
Thus we can agree that according to this book, an outlier is simply a man or a woman who has been able to accumulate around 10.000 hours of practice and has put those hours to good use within a specific setting where a series of opportunities arise.
BY ANDRES POLANCO AND ELIZABETH REY
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