Tuesday, June 9, 2009

On the Outliers and special P.S., for Malcolm Gladwell


Hello world!
Today I will share with you my take away from Malcolm’s Gladwell recent book, Outliers. Typing my thoughts into MS Office word document, while listening to the song “Let it be” through iTunes. YES, The Beatles, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates - all of them legends “outliers” in their fields.

How did they make it?


Official abstract from the Malcolm’s book states following:

o The people who become really good at something put in 10,000 hours of practice.
o Genius alone is not enough. You must pair it with practical intelligence.
o Intelligence is a threshold: You need to be sufficiently smart to succeed.
o Family background shapes practical intelligence and strongly influences success.
o Your regional, cultural and ethnic backgrounds affect how you respond to conflict and crisis, and how you communicate.This impact continues long after you have moved away from such roots.
o If you identify the cultural factors that govern success in a particular area, you can teach them to more people.

Selection of my notes:

Brilliant imaginative work to win Nobel prize requires creativity. High IQ ain’t enough. Beyond threshold without imagination we won’t succeed. Practical intelligence is essential.

Robert Sternberg defines practical inteligence as:
”Knowing what to say to whom, knowing when to say it and knowing how to say it for maximum effect.”


There are 2 ways how people raise their children:
o Heavily involved in the free time activities of their kids
o Separating adult life from children’s life – “accomplishment of natural growth”

Success is function of persistence and willingness to work hard for 22minutes to make sense of something that most people would give up on after 30 seconds.

Success is grounded in a web of advantages and inheritances, some deserved, some not, some earned, some just plain lucky – but all critical to making them who they are.

Outliers are those who has been given opportunities and who have had the strength and presence of mind to seize them.


Happy seizing Folks!

Live your own success story with every breath you take.


P.S.: Malcolm, please assure correction on the page 26,....”Czechoslovakian soccer team of the year 2007”…
Czechoslovakia doesn’t exist since 1st Jan 1993, when 2 independent countries Slovakia and Czech republic were established. Thanks in advance, for all readers.

Cheers from sunny Slovakia.
Life IS super cool!
;)