Analysis Of Malcolm Gladwell's 'The 10, 000 Hour Rule'

How many hours of someone’s life are necessary to perfect a skill? 300? 5000? Perhaps try 10,000 hours. In this chapter from Outliers, “The 10,000-Hour Rule”, Malcolm Gladwell argues that talent isn’t innate, but takes 10,000 hours to perfect a skill based on opportunity, talent, and practice. Throughout the chapter “The 10,000-Hour Rule”, Malcolm Gladwell effectively relies on logos--evidence from well-known figures and charts that show age similarities--to support his theory that it takes a particular window of time to offer someone the opportunity to practice for 10,000 hours to succeed at a skill. However, Gladwell ineffectively relies on repetition of evidence and failure to

Right away the readers get interested in learning what the then thousand hour rule is about. Gladwell reviews the lives of extremely successful people and how they have had success. There are many ways in which logos are used in Outliers. Gladwell viewed children in Berlin playing the violin and saw that kids having ten thousand hours of practice, were proven to be better at playing the violin, than kids with less than ten thousand hours of practice. He also took a look at Bill gates, which dropped out of college and started a very successful company, called Microsoft. Bill Gates had thousands of hours of practice in programming and other abilities learned through his short years at college. There are no shortcuts at becoming great; everything can only be achieved with lots of practice and hard work.

Gladwell’s 10,000 Hour Rule is also an important element in a success story. Bill Gates, the Beatles, and Joe Flom all spent years practicing their trades. Correspondingly, the 10,000 Hour Rule says that expertise in a subject is a product of 10,000 hours of practice. In order to do well in something one must take one’s time to master it. Essentially, practice makes perfect.

Furthermore, Gladwell’s tone and style of writing throughout Outliers contributes to his arguments’ effectiveness. The manner in which Gladwell tells the stories in relation to each individual claim is brilliant. Not only is the writing tone of the author informative, thoughtful, and compelling, but it is also frequently conversational. Many times in Outliers, Gladwell seems to be speaking directly to his readers. The author achieves this conversational tone primarily by asking questions within his arguments. In The 10,000-Hour Rule chapter, Gladwell applies this tone when he asks, “What’s ten years?” The author is challenging the reader to determine what significance ten years has in relation to success. Unknowingly challenged, the reader searches for an explanation within his or her own thoughts before continuing reading. The author answers his own question, “It [ten years] is roughly how long it takes to put in ten thousand hours of hard practice” (41). Gladwell also uses a conversational style of writing by including a personal touch within the epilogue, A Jamaican Story. “That is the story of my mother’s path to success,” writes the author (272). With this statement, Gladwell is opening up a personal revelation to the reader in a way

The first rhetorical device Gladwell uses in “The 10,000 Hour Rule” is imagery. His attempts at using imagery are not successful because what he proves is “The Matthew Effect,” instead of proving that it takes 10,000 hours, and more than just talent to reach mastery. Gladwell mentions the 75 richest people in the world and points out that 15 of the 75 were born in the same country around the same time. “Almost 20 percent of the names” “come from a single generation in a single country.” These people were able to achieve massive wealth, because “In the 1860s and 1870s, the American economy went through perhaps the greatest transformation in its history. This was when wall street was being built and when Wall Street emerged.”(Pg. 62) Gladwell uses no language to infer that these people practiced for 10,000 hours to achieve mastery of their jobs. Rather he proved that it is the timing, opportunities, and advantages make people successful, and not the amount of time they put in. In the 21st century world, Bill Gates is known as a pioneer in coding, and as a man who has made a lot of money off his career. Gladwell chose Bill Gates to prove his point that he was successful, because he has spent more than 10,000 hours coding, but yet again as the reader, it is quite obvious that the advantages Bill Gates had as a teenager led to his success. “Gates's father

Looking at the insight from historians such as: Roy Rosenzweig, Nick Salvatore, and Lizabeth Cohen, on the history of American labor, we can better understand the issues, challenges, and successes of ordinary Americans during a time when industrial capitalism and corporations took over as the leading principle in American society. The depth of character of immigrants or ordinary Americans to meet the demanding needs of what an industrial society requires is truly amazing. I have reviewed three historical monographs in accordance to their copyright and each describe how persistent ordinary, working class Americans confronted or beat back those demanding needs. The order is as follows: Eight Hours For What We Will by Roy Rosenzweig; Eugene

What is the 10,000 hour rule? Malcom Gladwell uses this rule to help explain that

In many instances, those who are successful are made out to be some sort of separate breed, those who were innately able to perform remarkable feats that others, no matter how hard they tried, simply could not. Through this exhibition, many people view success as an elusive feature that only a select few can obtain. This theory is the main inspiration for Malcolm Gladwell’s exploration of success in Outliers: The Story of Success. In the book, Gladwell analyzes not only those who are successful, such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, J.R. Oppenheimer, and Joe Flom, but what path led them towards becoming exceptionally skilled. This extremely in-depth analysis of successfulness forms Gladwell’s layered theory of what creates success, and his attempt

Is it coincidental that Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Bill Joy and many other multi-millionaires were all born within a span of 3 years? Malcolm Gladwell, the author of Outliers, suspects that there is something more behind this occurrence than just a simple coincidence. He asserts that there is no such thing as a self-made man and success does not come from natural talent, rather it comes from extraordinary opportunities and hidden advantages. In Outliers, Gladwell attempts to debunk the myth that people are successful because of themselves, and not because of other factors. Even Malcolm Gladwell acknowledges that passion and hard work are required to succeed. However, he believes that this passion and time to put in the work would not be possible without the aid of extraordinary opportunities. Gladwell prepares a firm set of logical arguments, including the advantages of birth dates, cultural legacy and family backgrounds, to guarantee that his audience will be convinced of his conviction.

Outliers is a book that studies the factors that contribute to high levels of success. Gladwell examines several success stories ranging from Bill Gates to the Beatles. The book also looks at how cultural differences play a large part in perceived intelligence and rational decision making. Throughout the publication, Gladwell repeatedly mentions the "10,000-Hour Rule." This rules claimes that the key to achieving world class expertise in any skill is a matter of practicing the correct way, for a total of around 10,000

10,000 hours is equivalent to 14 months, 60 weeks, 417 days, and success. Bill Joy, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, is an example of this, as he began programming his sophomore year of high school and continued in the “summers then the day and nights at his first year at Berkeley,” totaling about ten thousand hours (Gladwell 47). Bill Joy played an integral part in the creation of multiple computer programs still used today, and to get to that point he practiced programming. BIll Joy’s dedication to mastering his craft led him to work hard,

Gladwell backs up his theory with examples of many people who are considered experts. Bill Joy, an expert computer programmer and creator of Sun Microsystems, achieved this status through years spent at the computer. Mozart was not considered an expert until he had been composing for ten years. Bill gates, a master of computer programming and inventor of Microsoft, programmed computers as much as possible in the seven years before starting his company. To achieve 10,000 hours, one must work for five hours a day for five years. Gates was well over that by this time. Gladwell brings additional examples in the chapter, and one thing is clear – it takes time to become an expert. It does not happen by coincidence.

While the author, Malcolm Gladwell, does not dispute that hard work in a necessary component, we learn that many factors, lucky breaks, and some coincidences all occur in making high achievers into true outliers. We also learn that many of the richest, most famous, and most successful people in

Essentially, the topics Gladwell covered in this book include are, being at the right place at the right time, the 10,000-hour rule, timing, upbringing, and pursuing a meaningful career. Although all of these have been proven by Gladwell to be a major component of success, I do not agree with the idea of a particular upbringing will determine success. With this idea, Malcolm also includes that

Malcolm Gladwell supports his claim that in cognitively demanding fields there are no naturals, by writing interesting anecdotes that show examples. For example, the article contains an anecdote in talking about how Mozart’s earliest works were not outstanding; his earliest masterwork was created when he was twenty one years old, showing he had already been practicing for ten years and he had to practice to create his masterwork. Gladwell argues that even Mozart was not a natural. According to Gladwell’s article, he shares a story about the Beatles and how they played eight hours every day for two hundred seventy nights over the course of a year and a half. This evidence shows that they practiced long hours, and when they got to the United States they