Description:
If you're like most people, you probably have at least two different book piles: the vocational and the recreational. The books from the first pile you read for information, guidance, professional advancement, and, hopefully, inspiration. The books from the second you read for pleasure. Some overly dry business writers seem to think the two piles should never mix, but not so the Mayer and Mayer team. Goldilocks on Management is an entertaining primer for managers, a fictional romp through the past that simultaneously illustrates important management strategies and techniques firmly rooted in the present. The authors have taken time-honored fairy tales and rewritten them in a contemporary style, often with an ironic, humorous twist. Goldilocks, for instance, does sales and marketing for an institutional food products firm, and, when discovered in the three bears' living quarters, grabs an inopportune moment to make a pitch. The infamous new-clothes-seeking emperor is persuaded by foreign investors, two charming and flattering fashion designers, to buy an expensive royal outfit made of "Spinlight." Each fairy tale is followed by an interpretation and advice on how its lessons can be applied by serious managers in less fantastical situations, together with a real-world business example. Though the authors sometimes sound trite, using such overused management-speak as win-win situations and thinking outside the box, their points are useful reminders of common-sense ideas, presented in an unusual but readable format. This is a book with which to wind down, have a quiet chuckle, and hopefully relearn a thing or two to take back to the office. --S. Glass
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