I love Malcom Gladwell’s work. He’s such a thoughtful writer, and I was excited to read Blink. In fact, I read this book in about a month. Impressive for me these days with Nixon, work, and summer. But, it was another interesting read.
This book though doesn’t have a clean cut conclusion. Mainly at times our instinct (from experience) can guide us to the best solution. But our instinct can take in too much information (e.g. race, sex, etc.) and betray us. The idea is to “thin slice”. It’s paying attention to the details that matter built with our experience.
That’s not easy. So, here’s the overall gist.
1. From experience, we gain a power gift, the ability to act instinctively, in the moment
2. Understanding the true nature of instinctive decision making requires us to be forgiving of those people trapped in circumstances where good judgement is imperiled.
3. Knowing too much can often hurt people, rather than help them. The one with the most information can be overwhelmed and surprised.
Some other great quotes:
- Thin slicing – pay attention to the details that matter. This is key to success to look past what everyone else is looking at.
Remove your emotions; remove outside distractions; focus in on what matters - The task of how to combine the best of conscious deliberation and instinctive judgement is one of the great challenges of our time. e.g. when to rely on our instincts and when not to
- Not everything can be measured. When Michael Jordan was a 17 year old, he wasn’t the strongest or tallest. But he had passion and drive. It’s the ability to blend our instincts with the data to come up.
- We have come to confuse information with understanding
- We have some experiences. We think them through. We develop a theory. And then finally we put the two together. That’s the way learning works.
- The frame of mind you are in matters. If you do something smart each morning, this will make you feel smart the rest of the day.
- The environment we live in has an affect of our subconscious.
- A successful salesman has to gather all the information, interpret, and adjust his behavior accordingly.
- Many bad decisions are based on appearance. Throw that off your radar to remove assumptions.
- We learn more from body language than anything else.
- We should always know intent, over plans. Plans are great. They help us think about the situation, but intent will lead our decisions when the plans go out the window
- The face is a window to your emotions, however brief. Be able to see this.
- Nervous can elevate our thinking, but hysteria makes us blind. This hysteria can last quite a bit of time.
- Stay calm and think.
- “Mind reading” (interpreting the face) allows us to see the intention