Essay On Outliers By Malcolm Gladwell

Merriam-Webster defines success as the attainment of wealth. Society seems to agree behind this standard of success Most people believe success only pertains to money or has to be some grand achievement. However, wealth does not always equate to money. A student could finish a project two weeks prior to a deadline and deem that achievement a success. Success is an ideal measured by the individual. In his book Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell provides a theory of two major components for why the successful are successful: opportunity and legacy.

In the first half of his book, Gladwell introduces opportunity as a key to success. Without being given the chance, one cannot be successful. Gladwell makes examples out of Canadian hockey players. Most professional hockey players in Canada were born between January and March. As children, the players born in those months were seen as more mature than the others. This put the older children in a league with more attention and better coaches, giving them the opportunity to practice harder and longer than those that were not in their league.

In the second half of his book, the idea …show more content…
Gladwell discovered psychological research that linked the type of culture Korea had to the success of its citizens as airplane pilots. Korea has what is called a “low power distance”. This means that the culture takes authority into high account. Korean first and second officers were not as assertive with their suggestions or commands in attempts at keeping their captains benign. This miscommunication, paired with coincidental problems with the airplanes, led to high crash rates among Korean Air. Gladwell also looks at how the history of rice paddies lead to China’s reputation at being good at mathematics. A rice farmer had to have patience and perseverance, something that is beneficial when solving math problems. This ancestral history created a country superb at