Book Reveiw: Outliers

 I just finished the book "Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell.  This was an interesting little read.  The essential thesis is that people who are "Outliers" are created by a number of forces beyond the persons own hard work and determination.  He make this point using a lot of different stories to explain lots of other factors that can determine who become the most successful.  

For instance, one of the first things he talks about is how a disproportionate number of professional Hockey Player have birthdays in January and February.  This is because when kids start training in hockey the cutoff for starting is at the end of te year, so kids how are born in January are 11 months older than those born in December.  That is a pretty big different for kids who start when they are three.  So, those kids who are the all-stars when they are 3 get put into the better hockey teams and get into better hockey training programs.  Thus they are more likely to be successful than those who are born later in the yaer. 

It also talk a lot about how the community you are born into and the culture that you are raised in has a big impact on future success.  Ilike these ideas and feel that a lot of them ring true. Of course you need to be hard working in motivated and talented to be a success, but there are also other things at work that you cannot easily control. 

Another discussion that I like is the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to master anything.  If you don't have 10,000 hours to spend doing a particular thing, (or you don't want to spend 10,000 hours doing someting), you are not going to become a master.  I wondered for myself, "Have I"  or "Will I spend 10,000 hours doing something", maybe not, that is a lot of time. Or a better question is "What do I want to do for 10,000 hours?" This book he has A LOT of examples where it took that much time to be good. 

Overall, I though the book was well done.  It is on par with other Malcom Gladwell I have read.  Well written and intereting stories.