OUTLIERS

Readers of Malcolm Gladwell's previous two books, The Tipping Point and Blink will know that he is a master storyteller, and this book is no different. The key factors of success have been studied for about 100 years, and the process was initiated through Andrew Carnegie, who made all his contacts available to a young journalist, Napoleon Hill, whose book The Law of Success first appeared in 1925, and detailed 16 principles of success resulting from around 15,000 interviews, including leading industrialists, inventors and politicians of the time. Since then, a large literature has developed and there is considerable agreement on the importance of qualities like perseverance, courage and determination.

However, Malcolm Gladwell takes a different tack in this study, asking if people who achieve so much more than others are really more outstanding, or whether there are other important factors to take into consideration. In his first chapter he highlights an anomaly where junior sports teams tend to consist of students born earlier in the year - they are therefore older and more mature. This does not mean that in the long run they will actually be better. He argues that there is more to personal success than individual merit, and that outstanding people are also 'invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn and work hard and make sense of the world in ways that others cannot.' Thus it makes a difference where and when we grew up, and the legacies of previous generations can also shape patterns of achievement. In this connection, Gladwell shows that the richest and most successful Americans of the late 19th century were all born around 1835, and thus had unique opportunities available to them in the 1880s and 1890s. The same applies to a small number of key players in the computer world like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, who were born in or around 1955.

Apart from cultural legacies, outstanding individuals also work harder: Gladwell formulates the 10,000 hour rule and shows how it applies in a variety of fields. Bill Gates spent 10,000 hours programming computers, chess players and musicians have to put in a similar amount of time. One study showed that amateur musicians had clocked up 2,000 hours by the time they were 20, while their professional counterparts steadily increased their practice time every year and reached 10,000 hours by the same age. The Beatles also exemplify the principle with the huge number of performances they undertook in a nightclub in Hamburg.

Part of the process of what Gladwell calls a steady accumulation of advantages is the 'concerted cultivation' of their children practised by middle classes, who invested great deal of time ensuring that they are exposed to a wide variety of opportunities and pursuits. IQ on its own is not enough, but needs to be accompanied by practical intelligence. There is a fascinating chapter following the progressive rise of many Jewish immigrant families who came to the United States in the 1890s. Typically, they arrived with an artisanal skill such as tailoring, which they found a way of making into a small business in the first generation. The second generation continue and expand the business, while the third generation becomes part of the professional class as doctors or lawyers. This is not to minimise the importance of being clever, ambitious and hard-working, but rather to point out the role of 'a predictable and powerful set of circumstances and opportunities.' Individual examples can overstate the case, since the must be other people with similar circumstances and opportunities who do not in fact succeed the same extent.

In another fascinating chapter, Gladwell explains how Asian children have a built-in advantage in learning maths because of their language. In addition, culture plays a significant role as the Chinese are used to putting in a very long hours in the fields. In an innovative educational initiative called the KIPP Academy, students come from challenging backgrounds and perform exceptionally well at maths. They are taught to apply a protocol called SSLANT, which means smile, sit up, listen, ask questions, nod when being spoken to, and track with your eyes. The school has been very successful at closing the achievement gap, and it is interesting to find out that the reading capacity of working-class children goes down during the summer, while that of middle-class children continues to go up as they read during the holidays. So where children learn nothing when school is not in session, which is an interesting argument for shortening holiday periods. Here another cultural factor comes in: the school year in the US is 180 days, while in South Korea is 220 and in Japan 243. This is bound to make a difference, and is one of the factors behind the success of KIPP. Students start early and attend class for 2 days a week during the summer. It will be very interesting to follow this cohort in later life. They acquire at an early age the habit of working hard and effectively. Ultimately, success means taking advantage of the opportunities on offer. This is a provocative and stimulating book which gives the reader a fuller and more nuanced understanding of the circumstances that can enable success.