Malcolm Gladwell's new book David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants is coming out in five weeks but Seth Godin was lucky enough to get a preview copy and already has a review:
More important, by far, is this question: What are we doing to prevent heroism from happening?
It's easy to misunderstand the thesis of Outliers as well as the much-quoted 10,000 hours maxim. The point is that we are ALL capable of doing great work, ALL capable of doing work that matters, ALL capable of heroism. Why then, do some succeed and others never even try?
POVERTY: Again and again we see that poverty is the soul killer. People growing up in poverty are at a huge disadvantage when it comes to things like willpower, cultural awareness and most of all, the confidence to stand up and make a ruckus. Sure, some do. David was a poor goatsherd, after all. But sociologists have no debate about this--a culture that exposes its people to poverty is stealing its future.
STUPIDITY: Yes, stupidity. When you limit the pool, when the only people who get extra hockey coaching are the kids born in three months of the year, you've chosen to waste huge amounts of human potential.
And most of all, CULTURE. Silicon Valley works for the very reason that a broken inner-city fails. Because of cultural expectations. People become heroes when they're surrounded by a culture that allows them to dream it's possible.
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