Book Review: Outliers — The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell

I ordered this book after Amazon kept continuously suggesting me to read this book for months. I trust Amazon Recommendation, I believe they have got enough data of me to understand my taste. “Never Judge a Book by it’s cover”, I know but still, a book with clean and intuitive cover design makes it more appealing to the readers. Aesthetics apart, this book has made my jaw drop several times. The book may have been written two decades earlier, but even today seems very fascinating. This book didn’t feel like any other traditional self-help book or a success stories. This is different in a way, that Malcolm Gladwell explains what other’s have forgotten to tell.
In our course of time, we have come across this term several times either through a friend, movie or an activist — “Rich gets richer, Poor gets Poorer”. This is a loose adaptation of “The Matthew Effect”.

For to every one who has will more be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.
— Matthew 25:29, RSV.

How exactly does this work? How does some people achieve more, while other doesn’t even get the opportunity. The fascinating analysis of American Football(Rugby) team gave me a new way to look at the system. Most of the American Football players are born in the first 5 months of a Calender year. Coincidence? I bet not. I don’t want to spoil the fun, Read the book to know more.
How many people acknowledge luck for part of their success? Most of the success stories circulating in our societies talk about a hard-working protagonist, working day-in and day-out tirelessly and finally he reaches zeal. This might seem very motivating, but can hard-work alone help us reach the position we yearn for? There is some-bit of luck involved, right opportunities must come-in at right times, when the opportunity comes we must be concious to grab hold of it. I’m quoting an example from the book, consider you are in a prison, and the prison guard has forgotten to lock the door. It’s an opportunity for you to escape, but what if you were asleep? You need a bit of luck too.
Similar to Hardwork, Luck alone cannot help us attain success, we need to strike a perfect balance of both Hard-Work and Luck. Luck might bring us opportunities, but Hard-work helps us be equipped to make use of it. 10,000 Hour rule seems very convincing to me, it demands hard-work and commitment to be an expert in a field or a skill.
Our decisions and characters are greatly influenced by who we are, our history, whom are we with, where are we from(yes, it matters too), where did we grow and several other factors which we might easily ignore. Do you think Bill-Gates would have been the Bill-Gates today if he wasn’t born in Seattle and studied at Lakeside School? Lakeside school was one of the earliest schools to buy a Computer for the Students(Computers those days were really really expensive, and worked on time sharing basis). When Lakeside school ran out of funds, he was able to sneak into college nearby in his neighbourhood to experiment on the computer. What if he wasn’t born in Seattle, and didn’t study in Lakeside school? Timing matters the most.
There are several other revealing studies in this book, why Asians are good at Math, How Jewish Lawyers in America became most wanted lawyers, How a man who poisoned his own teacher went on to become the inventor of Atom bomb and several other studies.

I really loved the book — Outliers, I would rate it 4/5. Do read and share your comments.