The Right Birthday is the Key to Success in the Matthew Effect Essay

The Right Birthday is the Key to Success in the Matthew Effect - Essay Example In hockey, for instance, being born between the months of January to March, gives some talented children the benefit of looking bigger and stronger. As a result, they get drafted to leagues that prepare them for the Memorial Cup. They receive better training, education, and attention, which enhance their chances of success. This is called the â€Å"Matthew Effect,† which is based on the concept of â€Å"accumulative advantage.† It states that a little advantage early in life, when sustained through subsequent opportunities, lasts a lifetime. I agree with this theory, because I also experienced and witnessed how older people and people, who had the looks and background, find the way to the top easier than the rest, who do not have these advantages. Gladwell’s idea of success is different from the general public, because the latter romanticizes the idea of self-effort, which is vital to the notion of the American Dream. On the contrary, Gladwell asserts that succes s is largely a product of environmental and biological factors. The general public often thinks that successful people are wholly self-made. They started from the bottom and inched their way to the top. Self-determination and individual effort are well-admired ingredients of the American Dream. In essence, this dream stresses that no one can stop a driven individual, whatever his/her color, gender, and age might be. Gladwell disagrees with this thinking, because he believes that successful people have certain advantages in one way or another. He examined the trends in the birthdays of children and adolescents getting into Canadian hockey teams. He discovered that the cutoff dates in the educational and sports systems give advantage to children, who were born at certain months. As a result, those who were born in other months do not have the same training, education, and attention given to them, which disadvantage them as students and athletes in the long run. These examples suggest that the public’s idea of individual success is not so individual-driven after all. Gladwell’s thinking is important, because he brings into public discussion the implanted disadvantages in society, which is bad for individuals and the general public alike. The â€Å"Matthew Effect† suggests that children, who do not get through different kinds of cutoff, get lesser resources and attention than those who do. At the same time, children, who are born at the right time and place, also get unwarranted advantages. This means that one of the negative outcomes of the â€Å"Matthew Effect† is social inequality. The society does not benefit from this system too, because it does not maximize all potential talents and skills, as Gladwell points out. This kind of system prioritizes particular people, which promote social inequality in the long run, and leads to unused or undeveloped talents, talents that society can also reap to become more developed as time goes by. Gladwell recommends overhauling the system to ensure that people, who are born at the same months or at certain clusters, are trained together, so that they can access equal resources and attention from their teachers and talent scouts. I agree with Gladwell, because I think that the â€Å"Matthew Effect† is real and significant in actual life, based on first-hand experiences and memories. I have a younger brother, who is now14 years old and his birthday is in December. The cutoff for kindergarten is January. Our parents held him back for

Examine the nature of the distinctive managerial, organisational and Essay

Examine the nature of the distinctive managerial, organisational and developmental characteristics of small businesses vis-a-vis - Essay Example Coaching is more task-oriented whereas mentoring is driven by knowledge sharing meant in a spiritual context with the purpose of developing the personality of a learner. The understanding developed through the work of Garvey et al. (2008) is further strengthened through literary explanation provided by Robert Thurman, Meredith Belbin and Rosemary Ryan. Where Garvey et al. (2008) describes how the definitions of these two terms have evolved over centuries, other three authors explain their relevance to present life. According to Garvey et al. (2008), self-realization is a foundation of coaching and mentoring. The follower has to understand his/ her inner self and then interpret the meaning of knowledge provided to them. Furthermore, they believe that coaching and mentoring are rooted in our cultural norms and values. Like Bruner stated in Garvey et al. (2008), folk wisdom is distributed through interpretations of historical events that later on form our culture; this understanding of cultural norms is further strengthen through dialogues (p.11). In order to elaborate the historical background of coaching and mentoring, frequent references to the work of Plato, Homer, Socrates and Aristotle are given in Garvey et al. (2008). It is stated that frequent questioning and critical debates lead to emergences of true knowledge. Therefore, without questioning the pre-established norms, new ideas cannot be created. While defining their work, it was found that only Plato and Aristotle have used the word mentor for a figure known for disseminating knowledge. Later on, it has been added that Aristotle has introduced a differentiation between practical and theoretical knowledge. He further introduced the concept of productive work which defines creation of something new. Careful analysis of contemporary coaching techniques would reveal that these three concepts are used frequently in present coaching and mentoring. Further referencing to Homer indicated that the word mentor w as introduced into literature around three thousand years back. The word itself meant an advisor. However, Homer’s work has been highly shadowed by unnecessary criticism and relevance to gender issues without giving much attention to social norms. Garvey et al. (2008) further analyzed the literary work with reference to coaching and mentoring in 18th century. According to Fenelon, observing life events is itself a learning process that can provide positive as well as negative lessons. Presence of mentor helps in interpreting important lessons out of these events that helps in attaining better insight of life and virtues. The concept of experiential learning also stemmed out of Fenelon’s ideas of learning and development. The idea was extended by Rousseau in 18th century when he introduced the ideal class size for effective education. The present day concept of multiple students in one group headed by a single teacher was not accepted by Rousseau; in fact he emphasized on having a one-on-one interaction between the student and a teacher whereas the term teacher was replaced by mentor. Where mentor was considered as a figure of knowledge and wisdom, Louis Carccioli attached spiritual attributes to this personality. According to him, a mentor is someone who not only enriches the mind but also lights the heart. Hence, a therapeutic effect of mentoring was introduced by Caraccioli when he writes, â€Å"