In today's society, people are obsessed with the notion of success and how to achieve it. Many people wonder if there really is a secret to success. According to Colin Powell, former Secretary of State: “There are no secrets to success. It’s the result of preparation, of hard work, of learning to fail. Throughout the book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell proves Colin Powell's quote to be true. There are no secrets that one can use to achieve success. Success is truly the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure. Preparation is a key element to success. Gladwell states, “Success is about talent and preparation” (38). Although Gladwell's statement is generally true, psychologists say that preparation plays a more important role in success than mere talent (38). According to Outliers, “Ten thousand hours is the magic number of greatness” (41). Gladwell explains that the minimum required to master a skill is ten thousand hours. Computer scientist Bill Joy and lawyer Joe Flom are no exceptions to this rule. Bill Joy, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, became a computer expert in the 1970s, long before the personal computer revolution. Bill Joy devoted ten thousand hours to computer programming before rewriting UNIX, an operating system still used today. Gladwell quoted David Gelernter as stating that "Bill Joy is one of the most influential people in modern computing history" (37). Joe Flom honed his skills in proxy fights at the law firm Skadden, Arps for over twenty years, although they were not the norm in the field at the time. By the time takeovers became the norm, Flom was an expert, with over ten thousand hours of preparation (128). Joe Flom is the only surviving partner of Sk...... middle of paper ... English aviation” (218). By changing the language spoken by Korean Air pilots, Greenberg was able to eliminate the different forms of addressing someone and allowed the pilots to communicate effectively in simple English. Because Korean Air knew how to learn from its failure, the world of air transport awarded it the Phoenix Award (182). Malcolm Gladwell and Colin Powell would both agree: “There are no secrets to success. It’s the result of preparation, of hard work, of learning to fail. The book Outliers gives several examples that support this idea. Although the idea that success comes from preparation, hard work, and learning from failure, Gladwell also maintains that there are other factors that contribute to it. However, three common factors exist when examining successful people. These people prepared vigorously, worked hard, and were able to learn from their mistakes..