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The Tipping Point September 24, 2005
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Gladwell makes this all this interesting and fun to read through a light but dignified style, and by liberal use of colorful examples and stories. What I think the author's greatest strength is, though, is how he takes things that we all already know or think --like the importance of the social environment or how we always tend to go to the same people for advice on certain things-- and legitimizes them by citing real, scientific studies. The treat for me is that many of these citations come from psychology, which is as you may know an area of no small interest to me.
While it's far from impossible to poke holes in many of Gladwell's claims (e.g., he overemphasizes how teen suicide "Mavens" and "Connectors" provide implicit permission for other kids to kill themselves while ignoring other, more powerful factors), it's a genuinely thought-provoking work. I'm definitely going to pick up his other book, Blink.
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Books
Tags: Book Review, Malcolm Gladwell, Nonfiction
Comments
Posted by Becca on September 26, 2005 4:44 PM:
I haven't read The Tipping Point, but Blink is fabulous.
Posted by Spiff on November 7, 2005 3:48 PM:
Reading Blink now (I read the Tipping Point years ago, when we were setting up Founders' Club and all that fun stuff) ... it's not as good a TTP, but still quite enjoyable and illuminating. My main complaint with it is that it seems to be a big advertisement for itself ... halfway through, Gladwell is still saying, "Thios is one of the many things that Blink is all about," as if he were trying to pitch the book that I'm currently reading to me. Dude -- you got the sale! Give me the content! Definitely some valuable info. in there on the necessity of "gutlevel" decision making in the heat of battle that can easily be extrapolated to cover any sort of high stress environments wherein the time you might take to gather lots and lots of information might cost you a victory in more ways than one (you not only sacrifice a valuable window of opportunity, but you also might be clouding your judgement with loads of irrelevant data).
Posted by Jamie on November 7, 2005 3:54 PM:
I'm reading (actually, listening to) Blink right now, too. Just started today, in fact. I like it quite a bit, but likewise not as much as TTP so far. I think it may be because Blink is hitting on topics (the psychology of judgement and decision-making) which I have a very thorough knowledge of. You might even call me an "expert" if your standards are on the lenient side. Thus, I'm seeing all kinds of deficiencies and qualifications on what he's talking about. Nothing he's said so far has been untrue per se, but he's overselling the significance of it from time to time.
I'm also still not sure I'm ever going to buy into his whole "thin-slicing can be better than rational, data-driven decision-making." More adaptive and more efficient, maybe, but resulting in better decisions over time?