Outliers: The Story of Success
– Malcolm Gladwell

“Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good.
It’s the thing you do that makes you good.” 

There is a story that is usually told about extremely successful people, a story that focuses on intelligence and ambition. Gladwell argues that the true story of success is very different, and that if we want to understand how some people thrive, we should spend more time looking around them-at such things as their family, their birthplace, or even their birth date. And in revealing that hidden logic, Gladwell presents a fascinating and provocative blueprint for making the most of human potential.

In The Tipping Point Gladwell changed the way we understand the world. In Blink he changed the way we think about thinking. In OUTLIERS he transforms the way we understand success. [From: Gladwell.com]

“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.”

Outliers: The Story of Success is the third non-fiction book written by Malcolm Gladwell and published by Little, Brown and Company on November 18, 2008. In Outliers, Gladwell examines the factors that contribute to high levels of success. To support his thesis, he examines the causes of why the majority of Canadian ice hockey players are born in the first few months of the calendar year, how Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates achieved his extreme wealth, how The Beatles became one of the most successful musical acts in human history, how Joseph Flom built Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom into one of the most successful law firms in the world, how cultural differences play a large part in perceived intelligence and rational decision making, and how two people with exceptional intelligence, Christopher Langan and J. Robert Oppenheimer, end up with such vastly different fortunes. Throughout the publication, Gladwell repeatedly mentions the “10,000-Hour Rule”, claiming that the key to success in any field is, to a large extent, a matter of practicing a specific task for a total of around 10,000 hours.

The publication debuted at number one on the bestseller lists for The New York Times and The Globe and Mail, holding the position on the former for eleven consecutive weeks. Generally well received by critics, Outliers was considered more personal than Gladwell’s other works, and some reviews commented on how much Outliers felt like an autobiography. Reviews praised the connection that Gladwell draws between his own background and the rest of the publication to conclude the book. Reviewers also appreciated the questions posed by Outliers, finding it important to determine how much individual potential is ignored by society. However, the lessons learned were considered anticlimactic and dispiriting. The writing style, deemed easy to understand, was criticized for oversimplifying complex sociological phenomena. [From: Wikipedia.com]

“It’s not how much money we make that ultimately makes us happy between nine and five. It’s whether or not our work fulfills us. Being a teacher is meaningful.” 

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 successful people are like, and too little attention to where they are from: that is, their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing. Along the way he explains the secrets of software billionaires, what it takes to be a great soccer player, why Asians are good at math, and what made the Beatles the greatest rock band.

Brilliant and entertaining, Outliers is a landmark work that will simultaneously delight and illuminate. [From: Amazon.com]

“…If you work hard enough and assert yourself, and use your mind and imagination, you can shape the world to your desires.” 

From Barnes & Noble

What makes the best, the brightest, the most famous, and the most successful excel? The answer to the question, Malcolm Gladwell insists, resides in the culture, family, and upbringing of these high achievers. To demonstrate his point, he delves into the backgrounds of soccer players, mathematicians, software billionaires, and even John, Paul, George, and Ringo. A super stimulating read; a buoyant Barnes & Noble Bestseller, now in paperback and NOOKbook editions. (Sidebar seminar: In statistics, an outlier is an observation numerical distant and unrepresentative of the remaining data.)

David Leonhardt

In the vast world of nonfiction writing, Malcolm Gladwell is as close to a singular talent as exists today…Outliers is a pleasure to read and leaves you mulling over its inventive theories for days afterward.
— New York Times Book Review

Gregory Kirschling

The explosively entertaining Outliers might be Gladwell’s best and most useful work yet…There are both brilliant yarns and life lessons here: Outliers is riveting science, self-help, and entertainment, all in one book.
— Entertainment Weekly

Atlanta Journal Constitution

“No other book I read this year combines such a distinctive prose style with truly thought-provoking content. Gladwell writes with a high degree of dazzle but at the same time remains as clear and direct as even Strunk or White could hope for.”

[Reviews From: Barnesandnoble.com]

“No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.”