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

This book is an interesting and easy read. Gladwell introduces the idea of a tipping point - a moment when an idea, trend or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire. He integrates observations from a variety of applications from Paul Revere's ride to the lowering of crime in New York to the spread of Hushpuppies to epidemics, among others.He concludes that there are three rules of the tipping point - the law of the few, the stickiness factor and the power of context. In defining the law of the few, he reiterates some of the well-known observations about networking, but adds some additional structure. He identifies three types of people that have to be operating in the network - connectors, mavens and salesmen. Connectors are people who have many connections. But, he goes on to describe the importance of weak links (links with people we don't know well). It's apparently not telling friends about something that helps, its telling acquaintances.Using job hunting as an example, he reports that successful job applicants found their jobs in a variety of ways in a 1974 study - 20% applied directly, 19% used formal means and 56% used personal connections. Of those who used a contact to find a job, 17% saw that contact often, 56% occasionally and 28% rarely. "People weren't getting their jobs through their friends. They were getting them through their acquaintances." Why, because we share much in common with our friends so nothing new is added. Our acquaintances have their own networks that bring entirely new people into the web.Mavens are experts who act as sources on information and can qualify the idea or product. And, salesmen are well, sales people.The stickiness factor becomes harder to quantify. There is not a science of what makes something stick, that is stay in a person's mind. It's an art. If you create something, peoples' response to it can be tested. Stickiness is not in the content but in its package. "There is a simple way to package information that, under the right circumstances, can make it irresistible. All you have to do is find it."The power of context refers to the conditions and circumstances of times and places for a tipping point. "But the lesson of the Power of Context is that we are more than just sensitive to changes in context. We're exquisitely sensitive to them." In reviewing studies on crime and behavior he states, "Weird as it sounds, if you add up the meaning of the Stanford prison experiment and the New York subway experiment, they suggest that it is possible to be a better person on a clean street or in a clean subway than in one with trash and graffiti." The other major part of the context he discusses is the influence of groups. "Once we're part of a group, we're all susceptible to peer pressure and social norms and any number of other kinds of influence that can play a critical role in sweeping us up in the beginnings of an epidemic." If you want to introduce new concepts and beliefs and bring about change that will persist, "you need to create a community around them, where those new beliefs could be practiced and expressed and nurtured."This is a good book for anyone interested in innovation to read. It's the type of book I like, one that synthesizes knowledge from many fields. And, I believe it offers some insights of value to innovation practitioners. Read together with Ubiquity, it can provide insight and meat for a lot of discussion.Malcolm Gladwell is a former business and science writer at the Washington Post. He is currently a staff writer for The New Yorker.

The Tipping Point is a thought-provoking look at how small changes can trigger big shifts in society. Gladwell’s accessible storytelling and memorable case studies make the ideas easy to grasp, though at times the analysis feels stretched. Still, an engaging read. 7/10

The Tipping Point is one of the best books I’ve ever read. Understanding what causes dramatic change and the key factors of it, provides insights that can be used to improve an organization.This book has within it, critical information that can help you effectively plan and effect meaningful change.This book is thought provoking and will help you see things in a different and meaningful way.Give this book a read, you won’t be disappointed.

The Universe Invisible Sales Force-- Epidemics"I wrote my book without any clear expectation of who would read it, or what, if anything, it would be useful for, It would seemed presumptuous to think otherwise." ~Malcom GladwellI've been experimenting with ways to tap deliberately into the energy that makes things go viral. That is one of the reasons I wrote How To Gain 100,000 Twitter Followers. Imagine if you could turn your ideas into viruses that spread like wildfire? Marketing mavens have been trying to discover the secret formula for years, but now with advances in technology and the Internet it opens up new galaxies of possibilities.The Tipping Point. It's a fascinating study into why things spread. Just as there is a Tipping Point for diseases, there are also epidemics for--ideas, trends, crime, books, diseases, smoking, drugs, alcohol, suicide, etc. The book delves deep into the phenomena why and how things go viral--moving from one person to the next, and from one street corner to the next, from one city to the next, and from one country to the next. Epidemics are the Universe invisible sales force--it carries and distributes everything without care or concern--leaving participants unaware what happened. "The tipping point is the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point."The tipping point occurs when the right energy, elements, circumstances, people, time, and place, crosses a certain threshold--it tips and affects everyone it touches. It affects social behavior, health, buying patterns, and the way people think. This phenomena can lead to success, failure, or devastation. No one can predict or explain its power--why, or how it happens. It just happens--turning an unknown author into a success, a Fortune 500 company into a fallen empire or an entire country devastated by disease."We need to prepare ourselves for the possibility that sometimes big changes follow from small events, and that these changes can happen very quickly. This possibility of sudden change is at the center of the idea of the Tipping Point and might well be the hardest of all to except."The slightest change in context can make the biggest difference, and cause things to tip, for better or worse. A sudden reversal of fortune can turn your life upside down. Your vision changes--you don't see things the same anymore. Your memory is not normal, you don't think the same. Your capabilities change. What you normally wouldn't do, now you do. Look back on your life, and tell me, this isn't true? When things hit a boiling point, something happened--a Tipping Point, that sent things reeling in the opposite direction.This book is thought provoking and illuminating--a look into the Universe invisible sales force--epidemics of all types. This is a Game Changer--businesses and marketers will never be the same. As one reader said, "Use the thinking in the book to create something new." If you want an illuminating rush, then read this book. Five Big Stars.

I first came across Malcolm Gladwell’s bestseller The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference during a job training event 2 years ago. Highly touted by my training director, the book piqued my interest from a marketing perspective in regards to how little things, when in contact with the appropriate factors, can trigger a dramatic epidemic of change in our society. The upswell ultimately resulting in that epidemic is what Gladwell terms ‘the tipping point’.Through his allusions to various examples throughout history, Gladwell’s primary objective in Tipping Point is to demonstrate how ideas, trends, products and social attitudes spread like viruses. In doing so he constructs a theoretical model which presents factors he deems most prevalent for initiating an epidemic.He first gives ample time to illustrate the human element. Gladwell writes, “The success of any kind of social epidemic is heavily dependent on the involvement of people with a particular and rare set of social gifts (pg. 33).” From here he lists and defines three such types of people: Connectors, Mavens, and Salesmen, each critical to the epidemic process.Connectors are defined as people who maintain extensive and diverse social connections and who possess both the ability and tendency to link people together from across such varying groups. Mavens, seen as responsible for starting word of mouth epidemics, are adept at acquiring new information and have the knowledge and social skills to communicate that information. Finally, Salesmen are described as those with the keen ability to persuade people to acknowledge value in a product or idea.Gladwell goes on to note two additional factors of importance. He describes one as the ‘stickiness factor’, which pertains to how well an idea sticks or how memorable an idea is. He asserts a key aspect of effective ‘stickiness’ is predictability, as explained through the example of successful children’s television models in Chapter 3. He wrote, "The driving force for a preschooler is not a search for novelty, like it is with older kids. It's a search for understanding and predictability (pg. 126).” The second factor he defines is understood as the ‘power of context’, pertaining to the impact environment, time frame, and the precise number of people, have on cultivating a movement’s success.While Gladwell is effective throughout the book in explaining prevalent factors – and describing what took place – to propel an idea or product to a tipping point, I found myself agreeing with other analyses that highlighted the books shortcomings in regards to theoretical relevance. Whether it was the case highlighting the resurgence of Hush Puppies, the success of Paul Revere’s ride, or the decrease in crime rates in New York City over the 90’s, Gladwell ironically uses what has already occurred to validate his argument of the tipping point and thus, if it were a theory, it can’t be proved false or countered with an opposing theory. In this light I would argue that Tipping Point is more appropriately a thorough observation of societal connections and chain reactions that have led to successful outcomes as opposed to a presentation of methodical approaches to success.With that being said I found the book a quick, enjoyable, and interesting read. Each chapter, with its segmentations describing factors promoting the ‘tipping point’, flowed nicely. Statistics and excerpts of examples were seamlessly integrated and quit naturally, as they formed the basis of Gladwell’s argument, enriched the literature. I feel the book would be appropriate for any teenage group or older and would be most ideal for students delving into the fields of sociology, given the dearth of observations regarding the impact of societal factors and potential cause-effect relationships. Likewise, from a marketing perspective, the book definitely can serve as a starting point for advertising strategies, product promotion, and consideration of alternative prime market conditions.