trentmaryharryandcara

I finished reading The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference a little while ago and I’ve continued to think about the ideas and themes of the book for the last month or so… not something that happens with every book I read.

Gladwell is basically writing about what causes epidemics and even (on a more global level) what facilitates change. However as the “tipping point” suggests he’s talking about dramatic rather than incremental change.
So what’s the answer? Three things, that I’ll summarise as: people, the message and the context.

People
The people category is interesting. Gladwell talks about three different types of tipping point agents: connectors, mavens, and salesman. Connectors are the people who know everyone else, the nodes – people hubs. Apparently if given 250 random surnames from a phone book the average person knows around 20 people with the same surnames. The connectors will be able to name 100 (I did the test and can confirm that I’m no connector!)

Throughout, his explanations are written using great examples that are worth the read even without the context of his tipping point theme. The only downsides with his examples are their almost exclusive American background, should I feel ashamed that before reading this book I hadn’t heard of Paul Revere’s midnight ride?

He goes on to talk about mavens and salesman as other tipping point agents, though I suspect they play a secondary role to the connectors.

The Message
The “stickiness” of the idea, habit, product, or behaviour is key. You start to get the feel that this book is probably really aimed at marketing people at about this point, however once again the examples he discusses are fascinating in themselves. I guarantee you’ll learn heaps of interesting facts about Sesame Street that you’ll use in conversation at coffee breaks (..I did anyway)

The Context
Here’s where things start to get event more interesting – the power of context and timing in the evolution of epidemics. A few of the issues discussed include:

• how context influenced crime rates in New York
• how the size of groups can affect the context and spread of ideas
• fundamental attribution error (Reading this section I could almost hear my Dad talking and I’m not sure if it was this upbringing or not but I’ve always had the belief that people place far too much emphasis on simple personality traits when they judge others and too little on the context in which the actions took place)

There’s probably not too much that’s new in the book but it does wrap it all up in a nice and holistic way. I read it at a time when I was really trying to understand how workers’ perceptions of risk and safety can be changed in a way that will improve safety performance. I can’t say I’ve implemented the “tipping point” principles, but it contained a lot of useful insights.

I’ll give it a 3.5/5. It loses marks for its American flavour which makes it harder to relate to some of the examples that I wasn’t familiar with. But it makes up for it in terms of ’stickiness’ (I’m still thinking about it) and context.

Browse a pretty raw Mind Map here with the MindManager Viewer

Trent

As we continue to explore the possibilities of blogging, I’ve instituted the video of the month page.  You can find the link in the bar towards the top of the blog (or Click Here).  This month features Harry saying is first words… kind of…

Harry has just woken up from a 3 hour afternoon nap.  At last we seem to have the sleep thing under control.  OK so he’s still a little grizzly when he goes to bed in the evening but on the whole he’s great.  He set a personal best last week at Grandma and Pa’s (10 hours: from 7pm-5am) and went close to beating it last night – needless to say his parents are supporting him all the way in this quest!

More good news on the feeding front.  Harry’s been happy with 6 feeds today, down from the usual 8-10.  Mum’s relieved.

Finally on the development front, over the last 1-2 weeks there’s been some significant progress in his ability to reach and hold onto things.  Up until now most of his movements look pretty random or at least uncontrolled.  Now he’s definitely reaching and holding objects and the movements are much more purposeful.

Thought this was a pretty cool photo of Mary and Harry taken on the front steps of our place this afternoon. (An enlarged photo can be seen here)

Mum came across this article from the Sydney Morning Herald earlier this year, Generation Vexed. The article talks about how us generation x’ers might be overdoing things when it comes to parenting…

Mark, 31, a social researcher, has investigated how generation X parents handle parenting. He and other researchers have found that contrary to the dated image of a cynical, aimless generation, Xer parents can’t do enough for their offspring, investing almost every spare moment in their children’s futures.

Could you associate this behaviour with someone who writes blogs and posts copious photos of their child’s development? And there’s more…

But many generation Xers have become “hyperparents”, trying to plan every aspect of their children’s education and leisure

Mmmm that reminds me, must not forget to take Harry to his swimming lesson tomorrow. Seriously, I almost feel guilty because unlike some of our friends we’re yet to enroll Harry into any form of secondary education!

There’s also some interesting statistics on the social changes since the baby boomers…

Parents today are squeezing what they can out of that non-work time to actively care for their children. In 1974 boomer mothers of children aged four and under spent 17.1 hours a week in physical interaction – playing, reading, emotional care, driving them around – compared to generation X mums spending 19.6 hours in 1997 (though that figure is down from 24.3 hours in 1992). Boomer dads in 1974 spent just 4.2 hours a week, while generation X dads in 1997 spent 9.6 hours. Michael Bittman, of the Social Policy Research Centre at the University of NSW, predicts the next Bureau of Statistics parenting study, planned for next year, will show even more time actively spent with the children.

Glad I’m not a boomer Dad, I don’t think I’d survive on only 4.2 hours of Harry a week!

We just arrived back from a very relaxing and enjoyable weekend with Mum and Dad. It was great to spend some time with them and also have a bunch of other friends drop in along the way. More photos from the weekend can be found at our flickr site.

Welcome to the new trentandmaryandharry blog site, where we’ll endevour to keep you up to date on all our news in the same way we used to do at myblogsite (until they stopped it).  Hopefully this new site will have a longer life.

Our old site will cease to exist on November 30, so from now on all updates will appear here, and we’ll gradually move the old stuff over.

Cheers

Trent & Mary

We met so many people and had lot’s of fun (while poor Dad was in Mt Isa). It was a special time for us all (except Dad!).

There’s also a few other photos: Grandbob at bathtime, Tummy time with Gran, and another Harry photo!

Harry still hasn’t been quite himself lately (even after trying to introduce some better routines).  So Mary took him to the Doctor, who couldn’t identify anything in particular, but thought it best to go up to the hospital just to make sure…

We have spent enough time at the Townsville Hospital for a dozen life times! But once again the paediatrician we saw was great.  The preliminary diagnosis: a healthy baby with a possible case of reflux, but a mild to moderate form given that he’s still growing well (6kg measured today – see his chart).  The biggest symptom’s a reluctance to lie down under any circumstance.

He’s still very cute though – see the latest photo!

Situation:  Harry making embarrassing dying noises (anh, anh, anh), while fighting sleep both at home and when out and about.

Diagnosis:  Overtired as a result of systematic over stimulation.  (What don’t need to read every book, sing every song and practise using every muscle in the body during every play session??????  How disappointing).

Remedy:  Slow down and let Harry smell the roses.  Back to the Sleep, Feed, Play Routine in earnest.  One new toy every three days, no more than three toys per play session.  Antics at bathtime severely scaled down.

Result:  Mum exhausted and Harry still not very happy

…..but wait there is a light…..

I am so happy the techniques seem to have worked. Well worked once anyway…….

• 3.45pm – Harry not slept since 9am and extremely tired and cranky and falling asleep on boob
• 3.46pm – Harry asleep and lying in bassinet mattress, Mum exhausted and flaked out on the couch.
• 6.20pm – Harry wakes slightly cranky
• 6.20pm to 6.40pm – Super feed, Harry much happier
• 6.40pm to 6.50pm – Harry bathed by Dad
• 6.50pm to 7.00pm – Harry cuddles Mum and watches Dad cook steak
• 7.00pm – Harry shows first tired sign – a yawn
• 7.01pm – Harry starts to crack when Mum attempts to put him in Rocker. Beep, Beep, Beep Alarm. Harry put to bed with no fuss, no crying, no dying noises.
• 7.15pm – Harry sound asleep. Mum and Dad fed and very happy.