Clutch

Paul Sullivan, “Clutch: Why Some People Excel Under Pressure and Others Don’t”, Penguin Group (2010) 230 pp.

New York journalist Paul Sullivan investigates just why some people operate just as they do any other day regardless of extraordinary high stress on some of those days.  This book is full of interesting anecdotes gathered from interviewing a multitude of individuals in business, the military,  and in sports: the sergeant who saved his battalion in Iraq, a lawyer who barely survived school but became a top litigator, a rookie baseball player who pitched his team into its first World Series,

The most intriguing premise of the book is the claim and documentation that those who perform well under stress do so not from innate ability but from a learned skill.  Furthermore, according to the author, anyone can learn this skill.  As I am retired, I do not need to learn this skill but believe this book is quite useful for those needing to perform well under pressure.

(I have no notes on this book, literally, as I lost them!!.  The pressure was just too great.)