Book Report Segment #2

We have all heard the saying “practice makes perfect,” in the next segment of the Outliers (http://www.amazon.com/Outliers-Story-Success-Malcolm-Gladwell/dp/0316017922) Malcolm Gladwell demonstrates how important practice is to achieving success. The 10,000 hour rule, as he discusses, is the expert’s number to achieve true expertise within a field. If like myself, you find It hard to fathom practicing something for this amount of time, it would ultimately amount to around 10 years for someone to achieve this level. If any of you have reached this level of practicing a certain subject, then well congratulations to you, because you are no doubt an expert in that topic. Anyways, Malcolm’s prime example for this rule is Bill Joy, Java creator.

As a young boy, Bill was always seeking knowledge and answers to his many questions. He was very bright, no doubt (he received a perfect score on the math section of the SAT). It was the opportunities he was presented with, however that made all of the difference in his success. The key to Bill’s development was his attendance at the University of Michigan. At the time of his arrival, the institution was one of the first in the world to switch to a time-sharing computer system. This new system allowed him to spend many hours working at the computer (more than on his classes), instead of waiting for a turn with the operator and computer cards. It was because of this opportunity that he was able to practice more code than anyone else at this time, and was therefore proficient (with 10,00 hours or practice) by his second year.

When I think about anything I have ever tried to achieve, I know that I have never come close to reaching the 10,000 hour mark. I haven’t even stuck with the same hobby for 10 years. As a kid I was always trying new things, not sticking with the same sports and clubs. It is even discussed in the Outliers how it is almost impossible to reach this level on your own by the time you are a young adult. You need parents to encourage you to keep practicing and support you. Being a part of a mid-sized family, I know my parents did not have the time to make sure I was practicing every day, let alone helping me achieve the 10,000 hours. They were busy enough trying to get us kids to eat, clean, and do school work. Also, you cannot be poor or from a poor family. Even as a middle class family I had to get a job in high school to pay for things myself. Between a job and school work there was no time for me to practice something every day with a high concentration. Finally, most of us need to be presented with a special program or opportunity to achieve our 10,000 hours. Well if I was ever presented with something like this, than it was certainly a missed opportunity.

I think that the moral to this segment is that even though you may be smart, it is your practice and dedication to something that really makes you great. And it is hard to achieve this level of greatness on your own. You can’t just look at a person and tell whether they will go far in life. You need to know their situation to judge their chances for being and outlier. And what sets them apart from the rest of us “is not their extraordinary talent, but extraordinary opportunities.”