The Extrovert Ideal

Cain estimates that a third to a half of people are introverts, yet modern culture, especially in America, prizes the bold, talkative person. She calls this the Extrovert Ideal and traces it to the early twentieth century, when a culture of character, which valued being good, gave way to a culture of personality, which valued being impressive.

She visits places where this ideal is taught, from a Tony Robbins seminar to Harvard Business School, where students are pushed to speak up quickly and confidently. The danger, she argues, is that we confuse talking a lot with having good ideas.