The Tipping Point

So my most recent book read was The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. It says #1 National Bestseller so it must be good. I picked up this book because it seemed to have a Discourse and Jargon feel to it. It is a theory about how little things can make a big difference. The theory discusses how trends, fashions, ideas, disease, and behavior usually gradually change wax and wane but in certain situations they reach a tipping point where the trend or idea becomes an epidemic and swings into exponential change. See the D and J? A theory that applies to many different areas of life… candy bars, and people.

The basic layout of the book is his discussion and proof of the inner workings of the 3 things that play a role in causing an epidemic. The Law of the Few, The Stickiness Factor, and The Power of Context.

The Law of the Few points out 3 categories on individuals that can be instrumental in creating an epidemic.
1. The Connector is a person that has a large network of people at his disposal. These people are fascinatingly proficient at developing acquaintances and so know many people. They also have the gift of connecting these people together. This person often is someone who has his feet in many circles and so can create a network that includes more than one “circle” of people. At a university this person may be in many different organizations, in the “real world” this person may have had a few different careers or multiple careers at one time. It is this person that allows word of mouth communication to explode. Malcolm’s theory is that word of mouth epidemics don’t occur from you telling 4 people and each of those 4 people telling 4 more themselves. This does develop growth, and rapid growth at that but he points out that if you tell 4 people that those 4 people will have more difficulty finding others to share the new information with. Especially at the next level the number of people in your “circle” that don’t have the information is declining and the information must make the leap from one “circle” to the next. A connector, with his characteristic involvement in many circles allows this explosion of information travel by involving many of his circles at one time. In order to create an epidemic you might need a connector or something that serves as one.
2. The Maven is another person that is needed to create an epidemic according to the author. “The word Maven comes from the Yiddish, and it means one who accumulates knowledge”. This is the second of the individuals Malcolm mentions. I think it should be the first. It is less exciting but maybe more instrumental in the beginning stages of a word of mouth epidemic. A Maven is a wealth of knowledge and an amazing teacher. A Maven is an information specialists ready and willing to share his knowledge with anyone who will listen. An epidemic needs this person to weed out the bad new products. An epidemic needs this person to qualify if the product is indeed what it is being hyped up to be. This is the person who knows movies, sees movies early, and wants to help you avoid wasting your money on a bad one. He also will eagerly take you to the best theater and help you find the best seat in that theater (because he knows this much about theaters) to watch the movie because he is that passionate about it. He also is usually correct. This person is essential to ensuring that only good information, good products, and good trends make it into word of mouth information that is going to be shared by connectors. Without mavens connectors and the rest of us would go around yelling wildly about anything and everything we heard. With mavens we are able to appropriately sift through and find the products and ideas that are worth their weight/wait.
3. The Salesman is the last of these crucial individuals that are mentioned. These are the people that can convince you that they have found something even better than sliced bread when all they have to show you is sliced bread. I don’t know if that makes since. This is the most main stream of the individuals to explain. You know those people who make everything sound like the best thing ever!!! They are often outspoken, friendly, personable, and sometimes lawyers.

The second section of the book lost a little steam for me. I was loving all this stuff about people and the characteristics and what made them essential to creating epidemics with information. The Stickiness Factor pretty much means the product actually has to be good. If a Maven tells you its good and you rightly believe him, and Connector tells all his friends, and an amazing Salesman convinces you to visit a restaurant and you go. The food and service still has to be good in order to secure your second visit. Your personal experience with a trend, product, or any information makes the final call. If the Law of the Few fall into line and the product doesn’t “stick” the tipping point will not be reached. Here he spends a looong time discussing the process by which Sesame Street and Blues Clues developed their programs in a way that would “stick”. The children would pay attention, the children would learn, and their parents would let them watch.

The final law of epidemics as described by Malcolm Gladwell is the Power of Context. The environment has to be right to reach a tipping point. The people have to be ready for a green restaurant in order for a green restaurant to work. The spread of STDs in northern urban areas in slower and more controlled during the winter because people don’t go out. The interesting issue here is that the author takes this another step. He suggest that action is a result of environment more that of personal character. Not sure I am completely in agreement with that but he does make a good point that environmental context does change how messages are shared and what effect they have.

The second half of the Power of Context discusses how the power of groups of people can be used to encourage the spread of an idea. In groups people are more passionate, they are able to make good decisions and then develop many positive conversations about the topic which turns them into focused and determined people. Look at third camp. In a small group of people ideas are taken form one person to a trusting group and very quickly turned into a passionate idea that those group members use in their lives and share with others. Taking a message, idea, or trend to the next level sometimes involves taking that idea to small groups of people and allowing the idea to percolate and emerge stronger than ever.

That is a short concise summary of the book. The fascinating things of the book came from the additional research, stories, and theories he used to highlight each of these main points and therefore his tipping point theory overall. That is what kept me reading. Hopefully that makes you interested in future posts as well.