Outliers- What does it take to succeed?

I just finished Gladwell's third book and I must say that compared to Tipping Point and Blink, this one is the lightest in content and most far fetched in terms of research. Having said that, Gladwell makes even the most mundane idea come alive like no one else I know.
Lets take one idea that is not terribly original- hard work leads to proficiency.
Gladwell doesn't say it that simply. He calls his chapter on this- the 10,000 hour rule and you get hooked.
What is the 10,000 hour rule?
You keep reading and Gladwell brings you in with stories that are carefully chosen to prove his point. He cites studies that have shown that there is a 10 year and/or 10,000 hour rule to reach the stage of "proficiency" in any field. For example, a pianist who practices 3 hours per day, 6 days per week will reach 10,000 hours in roughly 10 years. Put another way, while innate talent is needed, you cant just rely on talent, it needs a lot of hard work to get REALLY good at something.

There are some other ideas that are interesting. For example, he reasons that the seemingly mundane cutoff dates for selection to school teams matters a heck of a lot in determining who would eventually play in the big league. His reason is simple- there is a distinct advantage to have a birthdate as close as possible to the cutoff date. In general, older children are bigger, faster, stronger and smarter than their age group peers. Once they selected early enough because of their performance, they are given the environment to succeed more and hence they do- a variation of the self fulfilling prophecy I guess.

Some other key points- First- IQ is just a threshold - High IQs are not necessarily a good predictor of success. However, there is a threshold where you need to be 'smart enough' to be able to succeed. As Malcolm states in his book, "being successful is about a lot more than IQ."

Second- Generational limitations - Success also depends on when you are born which drives when you reach adulthood. For example, to be born between 1900 and 1911 is demographically unlucky as you would have hit the most devastating events of the 20th century - the Great Depression and WWII - at the wrong times.

Third- Social heritance - According to Gladwell, "Cultural legacies are powerful forces" and they can persist generation after generation long after the social and demographic conditions that created them have passed. Gladwell told about a psychology study conducted by Dov Cohen and Richard Nisbett at the University of Michigan in the early 1990s around the culture of honor and violence. It turns out that there is a difference between young men from the Northern and Southern US respond to insults and which partially explains the higher rates of violence in the South.

Fourth- 7 errors - A typical accident involves 7 consecutive human errors. Gladwell examines airline crashes and it is very rare for a crash to be blamed on equipment, and the typical cause is human error. However, it is not just one human error but a series of small errors that contribute to an eventual catastrophic accident.

These are all interesting vignettes and Gladwell weaves them remarkably well, he is a better storyteller than I have read in recent times and just for that, this book is worth a read- plus you are likely to finish this in one weekend anyway!