Book Review on Thank you for being late

1. BOOK REVIEW
ON
THANK YOU FOR BEING LATE
SUBMITTED BY:
ASHISH MISHRA (17BCH001)
ZEEL ASTI (17BCH002)
MOKSHA BHATTI (17BCH004)
RAJNI ROKAD (17BCH065D)
NIKUNJ AGRAWAL (17BCH027)

2. What did the author wanted to convey?
• Friedman offers some sound advice for readers early in the book—drop the ideology and labels,
Focus on facts and realities and work for a better world from these observable foundations.
• He attempts to shed his own biases, not always successfully, and present a case for the new world
we are in and the difficult demands we all face if we are to survive and thrive in such a world.
• He shows how the confluence of rapidly improving technology, globalism, and climate change are
altering the shape of our world faster and in so many different ways that the political, social, and
economic systems can’t adjust fast enough to keep up.
• This inability to adjust is part of human nature and inherent in each one of us. The resulting
disruptions are creating political, economic, and social upheavals, large and small, throughout the
world.
• Many of the disruptions hold much promise for improving the world and the human condition and
others may mark our world for near or far term, steady or rapid destruction.

3. About author
• Thomas L. Friedman is an internationally renowned author, reporter, and, columnist.
• He is the recipient of three Pulitzer Prizes and the author of six bestselling books, among them
From Beirut to Jerusalem and The World Is Flat.
• Thomas Loren Friedman was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on July 20, 1953, and grew up in
the middle-class Minneapolis suburb of St. Louis Park.
• He is the son of Harold and Margaret Friedman. He has two older sisters, Shelley and Jane.

4. About the book
• Thank you for Being Late: an Optimist's Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations is a non-
fiction book written by Thomas Friedman.
• Thomas Friedman is a Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist and author. The book’s
title comes from an offhand comment to a friend whose tardiness allowed a few welcome minutes
of contemplation.
• The book was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in the year 2016.
• “Thank You for Being Late” has two aims. First, Friedman wants to explain why the world is the
way it is why so many things seem to be spinning out of control, And then he wants to reassure us
that it is basically going to be OK.
• Friedman, taking some time to reflect on the state of the world, argues that we are living through
“one of the greatest inflection points in history”. That critical point is dominated by “the three
largest forces on the planet – technology, globalization, and climate change – all accelerating at
once.”

5. • The first part looks at those three accelerations, beginning with technology. It explores Moore’s
law and the boom in computer processing power, leading to new opportunities in big data, the
internet of things, and cloud computing
• We can all do more, as individuals, than any generation before us – and that’s true for both makers
and ‘breakers’ – those who want to do good in the world, and those who want to wreck stuff.
• One of the key points here is that these three trends are accelerating so fast that change “can
outpace the capacity of the average human being and our societal structures to adapt and absorb
them.” That leads to cultural angst, unrest, failing institutions, conflict and migration, scapegoating
and extreme politics.
• If we think we can slow the world down and catch up, we’re deluding ourselves, Friedman
suggests. Technological advance won’t be curbed, and neither will globalization. Climate effects
are only beginning. We urgently need to find ways to adapt faster. As individuals, nothing will help
more than a commitment to lifelong learning, something I would agree with. As nations, we need
faster and more responsive governments and workplaces.

6. • What’s particularly unfortunate about this narrowing of the lens is the assumption of American
leadership. “We are indeed present again at the creation of something new in the geopolitical
arena, and much responsibility will fall to America to figure it out and offer policy innovations, and
generosity, to manage it.”
• Maybe, but it’s clear the book was written in the first half of 2016. There’s a list of policy
innovations in one chapter, all about global cooperation, openness to the world, tolerance and
integration. The US has chosen the polar opposite position on almost every one of them.
• That left me with a rather hollow feeling, especially given the subtitle, ‘an optimist’s guide to
thriving in the age of accelerations’.
• If Friedman is right about what it takes to thrive in the 21st century, then the US is off into the deep
weeds. Ironically enough for the title, the book feels a year too late in the writing.
• Still, the central message of the book is one I agree with entirely, regardless of America’s choices.
Friedman argues that we need to be able to innovate politically and socially, pay more attention to
ethics. And while he clearly gets very excited about new technologies, he’s committed to old
fashioned human relationships, building trust and community. He sees the potential of simple
interventions as well as high tech ones, and the need to be open to new ideas wherever they come
from.

7. THANK YOU