Incompetence is context specific.
Situations Matter 
is a thought-provoking and entertaining exploration of the invisible forces that influence your life—and how understanding them improves everything you do.
Just who do you think you are anyway?
We humans make it a habit wrestling with questions about the self. Existential musing lies at the heart of our most beloved forms of art. The question of who we really are sends us off on inspiring journeys of self-exploration but also toward sobering epiphanies of personal shortcomings.
As with much of daily life, this process of self-perception is subject to the power of context. That is, the conclusion that situations matter isn’t limited to public behavior or how we think about others. Even the most private of perceptions–our very sense of self–is shaped by where we are and who we’re with, though we may resist this notion.
One of the biggest misconceptions we have is that we and the people around us are consistent and predictable.In reality we are complex mixtures of ideas, preferences, identities, and needs. How we react to the world is actually given by situations. You devote a tremendous amount of time each day trying to explain and predict the behavior of others and when doing this wheather reading the news, interviewing job candidates, talking with family or just people watching, what you usually rely on is personality.
When you learn to embrace the idea that there’s more human nature than personality, you become a more insightful and effective person.
We overlook the ordinary circumstances that make all of us–yes, you and me included–less likely to get involved in the affairs of others.
Research indicates that even in emergencies we’re less likely to intervene in part of a large group than a more intimate settings because we feel less personally responsible for what happens. In fact, just visualizing a crowd is enough to decrease the likelihood that we help.
