Critique of Malcolm Gladwell\'s Works

Communications -- "How to be a Success" by Malcolm Gladwell

"How to Be a Success" is a Maclean's journal article by Malcolm Gladwell stating that expert command of any field requires natural ability, outside help but chiefly unusually hard work for a great deal of hours over an especially long time. Though the successful examples mentioned in Gladwell's article all have talent, they are "outliers" -- exceptional people who all worked very hard on their special fields from their childhoods and spent at least 10,000 hours developing their skills. In fact, their long periods of very hard work over many years seem to be more important than having natural talent because the brain takes that much practice to incorporate all the skills needed to "master" a field. Achieving 10,000 hours of practice requires help, such as approval, encouragement and enough financial support from parents, special programs that make it possible for a child to practice the skill for unusually long periods, and being born early enough in the year to meet requirements for special programs. In sum, Gladwell's article says the formula for success in a specific field is talent, help but most importantly at least 10,000 hours of very hard work in that field.

2. Analysis

Gladwell's article uses several techniques to convince the reader of his argument, including but not limited to the organizational pattern of his article, the support for his argument and his logical appeals. His pattern of organization describes well-known examples of success backed up by research studies. His supports for his argument are the specifics of famously successful lives and studies focused on the effects of various amounts of time devoted to practice. He also makes logical appeals by showing how the figure of 10,000 hours repeatedly appears in famous examples and studies. Though these are not Gladwell's only techniques, these combine for a superficially convincing article.

The article's organization catches the reader's attention by using with famous example of success: Bill Joy, who rewrote UNIX and Java and created much of the software that makes internet access possible (Gladwell, 2008, p. 59); the Beatles, a musical group that is legendary (Gladwell, 2008, p. 60); and Bill Gates, the co-founder of Microsoft (Gladwell, 2008, p. 61). These three "outliers" all had talent, started in their fields in childhood, spent an unusually great deal of time working on their fields, and had rare opportunities to practice for literally thousands of hours. Interspersed in these stories are studies showing that "10,000" seems to be the "magical" number of practice hours that makes a "master" in his/her field (Gladwell, 2008, p. 60). For example, in the middle of Bill Joy's story, Gladwell inserts the study finding that violinists at Berlin's Academy of Music's violinists were divided into "elite" performers who had practiced 10,000 hours, good performers who practiced 8,000 hours and "future music teachers" (relatively poor performers) who practiced 4,000 hours (Gladwell, 2008, p. 59). The combination of biographical facts of well-known successes and strong support from studies makes Gladwell's article interesting, easily readable and convincing until the reader actually thinks about Gladwell's arguments.

Gladwell's use of logic by repetition is also obvious in the article. Gladwell poses the "10,000-hour" figure for a master's devotion to practice. He repeatedly shows how that figure is mentioned in the stories of "outlier" successes. For example, Bill Joy was quoted guessing that 10,000 hours of practice spent at the University of Michigan and Berkeley to develop his mastery is "about right" (Gladwell, 2008, p. 60). Again, the study about Berlin's Academy of Music showed that "elite" violinists practiced for 10,000 hours (Gladwell, 2008, p. 59). Bill Gates used access to a computer club, a company and a university to log much more than 10,000 hours of programming practice by the time he dropped out of Harvard (Gladwell, 2008, p. 61). The Beatles performed 270 nights for 8 hours per night in a little more than 1 1/2 years in the unusual nightclubs of Hamburg, Germany and performed approximately 1,200 times before their big break came in 1964 (Gladwell, 2008, p. 60). Gladwell also quotes researchers as finding that 10,000 hours of practice seems to be required for world-class mastery of a field. Gladwell's repeatedly uses the 10,000 figure to hammer home his 10,000-hour rule.

3. Personal Response