Customer Reviews

The Ape in the Corner Office: How to Make Friends, Win Fights and Work Smarter by Understanding Human Nature

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The Ape in the Corner Office is an interesting, entertaining and often too truthful a read. It appears we cannot divest ourselves fully from our instinctual ancestors, the Ape and even the Rat. We share too much biological similarities.Richard Conniff has researched and written a credible account of how our ancestral behaviors play an important role in establishing and maintaining a sense of safety, social hierarchy, community and competitive advantage. This could be a terrifying thought, yet, Conniff's storytelling ability, vast business experience (reads like a who's who in business), well-cited research and humor serves to pacify the reader, at least momentarily.

As a trainer and speaker I want to beware The Ape in the Corner Office, lest I become buffaloed by a passive, yet, hostile audience. This is a book I will return to for insights anytime I see the furry face rising in either myself or others.

Conniff candidly shares how his behaviors have at times prevented him from endearing the client and gaining the contract. His advice: if you are going to let your beast roar, compete or fight consciously, be aware of the risks, rewards and lasting implications your instinctual behavior may have. The book is entertaining, thought provoking and a useful tool for people who want to know the human and beastly side of their business.

And we are not out of the woods. Just because humans have verbal communication, a relatively newly acquired form of communication, it only serves to cover up our more instinctual responses. Despite polite words and social appropriate manner it is still our nonverbal communications that reveals the truth.

Armchair Interviews says, after you read The Ape in the Corner office, you'll have a pen handy to jot down any of the great contacts and resources the author gives you to navigate the river of commerce that runs through your office jungle.

This book is an excellent treatment of how we behave in organizations. The comparisons and metaphors to apes, tribes and others in the animal kingdom provides a terrific lens through which we can view all sorts of corporate behavior. As a management consultant and executive coach, I am always looking for unique and interesting ways to teach my clients new approaches for performance improvement and organizational effectiveness. Conniff's book gives you all that and more.

This book would have done even better if the publisher hadn't decided to put a photo of an ape in a suit on the back cover. The title suggests a critique of corporate executives - more like a diatribe or light-weight commentary. Unfortunately comparing people to apes comes across as an insult (to put it mildly) rather than as a scientific statement about the biological basis of behavior.

In fact, the book draws on published research to explain why people behave as they do in the workplace. Conflict and day-to-day hassles just go with the territory. Conniff doesn't give us a lot of guidance for handling sticky situations, but I think many people will benefit from understanding that their own situation is hardly unusual.

As he says, we tend to focus on what's negative, and we tend to behave dysfunctionally. Some examples are chilling: the consultant who went oout of his way to scare a junior consultant just before a big meeting and the angry rant of Andy Grove at a big Intel meeting.

Definitely recommended.

I've seen Conniff's work before in some documentaries he did for National Geographic. His loving look at praire dogs being sucked into giant praire dog sucking machines, all seen through a special 'dog cam' inside the machine, should give you some idea of his sensibility. It's all true, it's all facts and it provides a perspective on the larger world- but it's also hilarious. He balances the right mix of anecdote with hard facts to produce an accessible and breezy book that says some very disturbing things about our close relationship to the animal world, and what we're really doing in our day to day interactions at the office. But if you are in fact a monkey, my friend, the gig is up.

This book was selected by the teacher (American Lit) for my son's summer reading. I was flabbergast by the name but as I read a few pages, I get to find out the APE is a replica of the real "working world" we're living in. I encourage everyone to read it along with your children...you/they will learn alot through this book. Enjoy!!!

This book is a must read for anyone who wants to succeed to their full potential in an organization. Conniff doesn't give you methods to adopt, he just brings to light the reality of human relations and interactions, which in turn gives the reader the upper hand when dealing with others, peers, subordinates, or superiors. MUST READ, EXCELLENT!!

This is a well written and humorous take on comparative psychology. The author gives many examples of similar behavior among all primates and even lesser animals to illustrate recent developments from studies of human and animal behavior.

This was a gift,
so I don't know if it was any good, but the transaction was fine.

I liked this book so much I did an interview with the author on my podcast, The Invisible Hand.

This book is a study in attempting to popularize biology (from worms to primates, with an occasional use of human psychological studies). It does not advance a tendentious sociobiological view. Even where I found the writing to be less than careful, it held my attention, since it is written fluidly by an experienced magazine editor. The various chapters could be slipped into a magazine, such as Esquire, without any incongruity. The coverage of topics deserves a B+. A recurrent speak-o (audible solecism): the name of the primatologist, De Waal, whose Peacemaking among Primates is quoted from extensively, gets teutonized into Devaal, even though he's Dutch.