Outlier means something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body. It also means a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample. In Outliers, author Malcon Gladwell uses the term outlier to mean a truly exceptional individual (or group) who, in his or her field of expertise, is so superior that he defines his own category of success. In this book, Gladwell examines the story of such outliers—people, teams, groups, and nations—to find out the reasons for their success. In the introduction he writes about the goal of his book:

In Outliers, I want to convince you that these kinds of personal explanation of success don’t work. People don’t rise from nothing. We do owe something to parentage and patronage. The people who stand before kings may look like they did it all by themselves. But in fact they are invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn and work hard and make sense of the world in ways others cannot. It makes a difference where and when we grew up. The culture we belong to and the legacies passed down by our forebears shape the patterns of our achievement in ways we cannot begin to imagine. It’s not enough to ask what successful people are like, in other words. It is only by asking where they are from, that we can unravel the logic behind who succeeds and who doesn’t.

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