Look closely at this man.


What do you think?
What kind of person might he be?

I took the photo myself. He really looks like this.

Got your first impression down?

Good. Then read on.











































This is Malcolm Gladwell.

He wrote The Tipping Point. After growing the 'fro, the police profiled him. Several times. He contemplated what goes into first impressions. He writes about it in his new book, Blink. An article in Fast Company, The Accidental Guru, describes Malcolm's logic:

While most of us would like to think our decision making is the result of rational deliberation, he argues that most of it happens subconsciously in a split second. This process -- which Gladwell dubs 'rapid cognition' -- is where room for both error and insight appears. Many of the snap judgments we make are based on previously formed impressions and are competing with subconscious biases such as emotions and projections. Once we become aware of this, Gladwell argues, we can learn to control rapid cognition by extracting meaning from a 'thin slice' of information.

Amen.

Gladwell discovered that the vast majority of their CEOs were at least 6 feet tall (only about 14.5% of all American men are 6 feet or taller). What does this say about the way we hire? "We have a sense of what a leader is supposed to look like," he writes. "And that stereotype is so powerful that when someone fits it, we simply become blind to other considerations."

So that's why I've never been offered a Fortune 500 CEO slot. (I'm 5'8" on a tall day.)

Malcolm gets $40,000 for a presentation. If I remember correctly, he's not more than 5'8" himself. Hey, I'll do a presentation for you for a mere $20,000.

By the way, the few times I've chatted with Malcolm, I've found him to be a totally charming, down to earth guy. Even when I asked about the hair: "Did you stick your finger in a light socket?"