Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers: A Story Of Success

Malcolm Gladwell, the author of Outliers, a novel depicting success, provides different examples of how an individual can achieve success in every chapter of his book to show his audience that success, despite a variety of barriers, is in fact in our control. A very important chapter titled, “Marita's Bargain”, explains the flaws in today’s public school systems. He shows the problems with the solutions to fix them while showing the alternatives to the regular system such as the KIPP Program in New York. The KIPP Program (Knowledge is Power Program) is a new kind of middle school that selects students from less fortunate locations and uses unique teaching strategies to turn them around into fantastic learners. In the chapter, Gladwell is extremely descriptive by using visual words to paint the picture of the South Bronx in New York City. He describes the buildings that were built in the 1960’s as squat and bleak looking. Gladwell had an interest in this subject as it involves success, however he had no prior experiences to produce the piece. Gladwell establishes personal credibility through the use of knowledge, reason, and facts and figures. He comes across very knowledgeable on the subject presenting great data with excellent vocabulary. He is able to do this with no obvious bias as well. Gladwell shows authority because he is well known for writing novels that involve success. His intention is to teach and explain how schools need to change the length of vacation breaks

Prompt: Write an essay that defends or challenges or qualifies Gladwell’s assertion that “if you work hard enough and assert yourself, and you use your mind and imagination, you can shape the world to your desires” (Gladwell 151).

In the novel Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell, he explores the idea of of misunderstandment of relationships among individual talent and opportunities. Gladwell argues this statement by showing that talent is necessary but not the reason to achieve success. I agree with Gladwells statement: The opportunities that are offered creates a straight path to success.

The novel Outliers, aims to investigate the very thing we want for our family, our students, and ourselves. For most of our lives we have believed that with hard work, anyone can achieve success. That had to be the reason that poor immigrants like Andrew Carnegie and college dropouts like Bill Gates achieved unimaginable wealth. Most of us were taught that working harder than anyone else would lead to ultimate success.

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell is a book analyzing the traits and characteristics of the most successful people in human history, hence the title Outliers as it examines those who have stood out dramatically in society. Born in Fareham, Hampshire, England in 1963, Malcolm moved to Ontario, Canada at the age of six and spent his remaining developmental years in the country (Dphiffer). After graduating from Trinity College in Toronto in 1984, Malcolm began work for the Washington Post in 1987 where he stayed until 1996. Since then, Malcolm Gladwell has been a staff writer for The New Yorker, and in addition to Outliers he has also written two more New York Times best-sellers, and is highly regarded in the field of journalism and writing. He has received numerous accolades for his work including being named one of the top 100 most influential people by Time Magazine, along

Outlier is defined as “something that is situated away from or classified differently from a main or related body” or “a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample”, which is the beginning to Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers: The Story of Success. The meaning of outlier itself in relation to success symbolizes those who stand out with exceptional rates of success. The book does not necessarily cover how to become an outlier (in fact it first deams becoming an outlier is nearly impossible) but more which are the factors that have contributed to certain outliers in history on a broad spectrum of hockey players to the beatles to even the founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates.

How does one reach success? In the novel Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, the main perspective of the novel is that success does not come from an individual simply by being lucky. In fact, success roots from our history, the environment we surround ourselves in, our values, and our cultural legacy. Every human being has the option of becoming successful despite a person’s disability, or the background a person comes from. Success is a gift. Gladwell describes what outliers mean to him, “Outliers are people who have been given opportunities and have the strength and presence of mind to seize them” (Gladwell 267). Malcolm Gladwell explained that often people are categorized into different groups of talent. Naturally, the group

In the book, Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell“It is not how much money we make that ultimately makes us happy… it’s whether our work fulfills us” People say money can’t buy happinesses, while some base what they decided to do in life off high pay. Interior Designers create and decorate a comfortable, safe and aesthetically pleasing interior (The Art Career Project). The occupation keeps growing four percent from 2014 to 2024 which is slower than average but is expected to be in demand articulated in The Bureau of Labor Statistics. Also asserts one in four are self-employed. Not only do you need a bachelor's degree but also traits such as communication skills (All Art Schools). Its average pay is within the range of $40000 to $60000.

In the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, he uses repetitive story plots to challenge the minds of America’s today and Americas’ tomorrow. It excels the limitations of what the reader was questioning what made someone so intellectual for instants, Bill Joy or where they came from, Joe Flom. The compelling story Gladwell was telling of who are Outliers; the turning point for Gladwell was when he gave his opinion instead of someone else’s story.

In his book, Outliers: The Story of Success, Malcolm Gladwell examines the reason why some people are anomalously more successful than others. One would normally think that success is achieved through intelligence, however Gladwell squashes that notion. Throughout his book, one sees that relying on only intelligence can sometimes be detrimental to one’s success, especially in chapters three and four, where one man (who possessed an extremely high IQ) was forced to drop out of college due to a lack of money and social skills. Gladwell argues that, while these outliers can seem to be more successful due to mere intelligence and skill, in reality, they have achieved it through a highly interlinked mix of background, practice habits, and legacy.

“Marita’s Bargain” is an excerpt from Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers: The Story of Success.” The book examines success and why some people achieve it and others do not. In this section, Gladwell focuses on the KIPP Academy, a school in the South Bronx that overcomes the difficulties and the harsh socioeconomic factors present in the location. Throughout the story, Gladwell uses an easy, to the point style, some expert quotes, Tables and a scientific approach, to argue for a change in the current education system.

In the book Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell attempts to prove that success is based on more factors than the general public believes. While hard work is important to the prospering of the very successful, the sheer circumstances presented to those individuals gave them a far greater chance of success than their peers. Through the use of statistical analysis, very well organized writing, and many quoted authority figures, Gladwell exemplifies his phenomenon very clearly with little ambiguity.

In chapter seven and chapter eight of Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell effectively claims that acknowledging cultural legacies betters the chance of success. In chapter seven of Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell entices readers on the topic of plane crashes in the aviation world, while commendably and credibly synthesizing the controversy around the question of how and why plane crashes occur.  When illustrating the terrible crash of Korean Airlines Flight 801 in 1997, Gladwell intricately describes the language, words, actions, and psychology of the pilots and crew members associated with the plane crash to better the authenticity of his claim.  Combining these ideas, Gladwell forms a theory that arguably proves to be true

In Outliers, focusing on outliers, defined by Gladwell as people who do not fit into our normal understanding of achievement, Outliers deals with exceptional people, especially those who are smart, rich, and successful, and those who operate at the extreme outer edge of what is statistically possible. Malcolm Gladwell interviews Bill Gates and focuses on the opportunities given to him throughout his lifetime that have led to his success. A common theme that appears throughout Outliers is the "10,000-Hour Rule", based on a study by Anders Ericsson. If you become clearer about what you focused on from the ages of 13 to 18, you will become clearer about where to focus your wealth creation efforts.

Every book as a meaning for being written, and every teacher has a specific purpose for a book to be read by their class. Each book presented to this class provided a multitude of life lessons to take from them. These books are Choosing Powerful Words, Outliers, and How to Win Friends and Influence People. Each book was assigned for a given purpose whether it be to teach the class the eloquence of words, how to use those words to influence others, or just being successful in life. Choosing Powerful Words was written by Ronald Carpenter and is a source for tips about speaking and using your words to better present your message to others. In his book, he states that two ways to do this are emphasis and metaphor. In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell provides examples of successful people who’s achievements ‘fall outside normal experience”. In this he explains the ten thousand hour rule as well as the Matthew Effect. The final book for reading is How to Win Friends and Influence People, written by Dale Carnegie. Originally published during the depression, Carnegie gives tips for being a leader as well as techniques in handling people. Two key components of this are to not criticize, condemn, or complain. One aspect of being a leader is to praise every and the slightest of improvements. Each of these components of each book are important and can be related to parts of every person’s life in some manner.