Bingsop's Fables: Little Morals for Big Business

by Stanley Bing, Gil Schwartz, Steve Brodner

“A masterful curmudgeon who causes laugh-out-loud moments.”— USA Today “Bing delivers his works smoothly, projecting tones of deadpan sarcasm and animated mockery befitting the often irreverent content.” — Publishers Weekly From celebrated business writer and  Fortune  columnist Stanley Bing, the bestselling author of  What Would Machiavelli Do? ,  Throwing The Elephant , Sun Tzu is a Sissy , and more, comes a collection of playful fables poking fun at corporate archetypes while imparting useful and humorous lessons for anyone striving to make it big in big business. Illustrated throughout by  New Yorker  artist Steve Brodner,  Bingsop’s Fables  is the perfect addition to any executive bookshelf in need of a little humor—and a lot of excellent advice.

Genres: Business

240 pages, Hardcover

First published April 26, 2011

About the author

Gil Schwartz, known by his pen name Stanley Bing, was an American business humorist and novelist. He wrote a column for Fortune magazine for more than twenty years after a decade at Esquire magazine. He was the author of thirteen books, including What Would Machiavelli Do? and The Curriculum, a satirical textbook for a business school that also offers lessons on the web. Schwartz was senior executive vice president of corporate communications and Chief Communications Officer for CBS.

Reviews

[Kent · Rating 1 out of 5]

The moral of this story is: too much Bing is not a good thing! Once every two weeks in Fortune magazine is okay and occasionally even funny. All at once, not so much.

[Boni Aditya · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was thoroughly disappointed with this book.

When I saw the premise of the book, I had great expectations.

The author is just careless and callous, he just converted some Aesop fables word-for-word into corporate.

The morals are irrelevant and often absurd.

This author has not done proper research, he just created some corporate jargon of investment bankers, wall street, of VCs and vice presidents, of equity, shares and bonds and so on and on and on about moghuls and barrons and others in the corporate jungle, making the book extremely irrelevant to everyone including the people actually in corporate.

This book is just random corporate stories with no rhyme or reason.

On the contrary, every Aesop fable has wisdom for ages.

I now understand why this book is rated so low, the book had a huge potential but the author squandered it away.

[Wellington · Rating 1 out of 5]

So, my daughter has trouble sleeping and I was stuck with just this book to read. It was a REALLY long night ...

The cover got my attention while perusing through the new book section. Mostly, while reading the book, everything went over my head. Or under my feet. Or something.

It was filled with two to four page short stories finding humor in corporate life. I work in the corporate world ... surely, some of these corporate jokes would tickle a funny bone once in a while.

Nope, sorry.

[Doris · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a really great idea, using Aesop's Fables to mimic real modern corporate life and give us some metaphorical food for thought. Unfortunately, it managed to poke fun at many aspects of the work place without giving too much in the way of true moral value. Blah.

[Theodore Kinni · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bing always cracks me up and the advance copy of his new book -- a take on business ala Aesop -- is no exception. I just can't figure out how somebody this subversive gets to keep a day job as an EVP in corporate communications.

[Seamus · Rating 1 out of 5]

The stories were mostly forced, not interesting, and even less entertaining

[Jeri · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is supposed to be a humorous take on big business. Some of the morals were funny, but most were actually sad in my view. It was an interesting way to present his ideas.

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not the best of Bing, but not the worst.

[Junaid Noor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very cleverly written piece of humor and sarcasm.

[Howard · Rating 1 out of 5]

A lot of times, the so-called moral did not seem to flow from the story supposedly highlighting it.