The Tipping Point

The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

My mind filled with thoughts of ‘Making a Difference’, I stumbled upon this book while killing time in a shopping centre. Written in 2000, I may be a little late coming to this book, but perhaps Gladwell’s thoughts may have meant nothing to me 8 years ago.

As I write this, I am still reading it so perhaps a review is a little premature. Still, for reasons I shall get into in another post, I am not just caught up with thoughts of making a difference, but also with the realisation that achievement doesn’t necessarily follow purpose. At least, not immediately.

People who set out to make change happen, in whatever form, generally start with a huge well of good intention. If that intention is focussed, a sense of purpose, a clarity of vision is usually manifested and energies become more tightly concentrated and results a little more efficaciously attained.

And yet, there is much more to success. A wrong strategy, failure to leverage on the resources at hand, poor strategy, even the lack of the right mix can make the road so much tougher. And that is where ‘hope’ comes into the picture.
The blurb on the cover proclaims that this book explains ‘how little things can make a big difference’. Reading that, I was transported back to my earlier thoughts on ‘gnat bites’. And how millions of Malaysians, together, made change happen on March 8.

How much change can one person, one gnat, create? Or perhaps, we should be asking how much change one person can influence.

The answer appears to be ‘quite a lot indeed’.

Tipping Point is, to me, a book of hope. Gladwell examines the little factors that lead to a tipping point - a moment when an idea or a trend catches on and spreads like wildfire. Citing examples like Hush Puppies shoes (remember when they went out of fashion? And then suddenly caught on again?), he explains that it really is ‘the few’ that create change in the many.

And that is why I think this is a book of hope.

Gladwell goes on to talk about ‘stickiness’, that aspect of an idea that is engaging, captivating, appealing, compelling and I’m currently at this point, about halfway through the book, immersed in ideas why Sesame Street works, and why Blue’s Clues works better.

I’ve been quite busy of late and have not devoured this book in my usual manner. As such, it has been accompanying me everywhere for those few minutes when I do have time. Some have accused Gladwell of over-simplyfying or failing to consider or do justice to some key research. Perhaps, nevertheless, it is an absorbing read and I can’t wait to finish it. I may then have a more complete review.

Have you read this? Tell me what you think.