I'm not a fan of Malcolm Gladwell's earlier books, Blink and Tipping Point. His "insights" tend to be obvious and provide little predictive power (i.e., knowing his theory does nothing to help you plot your way to success). Indeed, the most they provide is rear-view mirror insight into why something might have happened.
Gladwell's new book, Outliers, is no different, but I find it more interesting, perhaps in part because it helps to explain a complex subject in pithy prose. As The Wall Street Journal details in an engaging book review, Outliers identifies the necessary traits of successful people, only two of which do people have any control over. The last? Well, it's a matter of happenstance:
...[S]uccess seems to stem as much from context as from personal attributes. Intrinsic ability appears to be a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for exceptional achievement. It also helps to be born at the right time--the 1830s for titans of industry, the 1950s for computer whizzes--and in the right home environment, with the right cultural heritage. But the elements of success are not all matters of happenstance and talent: Hard work (practicing a skill for at least 10,000 hours) is essential, too, as even Mozart discovered....
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