Customer Reviews

Dirty Rotten Ceo's: How Busine

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Dear Sirs:

I am the author of Dirty Rotten CEOs, and I must point out a serious error in the review posted by the anonymous reader from Mount Kisco, N.Y. He states that the highest paid executive in 2001 was Michael Dell, not Larry Ellison, and takes me to task for that mistake. But it is the reader who is dead wrong. The top earner in 2001 was indeed Larry Ellison, whose total compensation for 2001 was $ 706.1 million. (Michael Dell was a distant second in 2001, at $201.3 million.) Those figures come from Forbes magazine, May 13, 2002, p 116, and were reprinted in my book on page 25.

In view of that drastic error, I would like to request that his review be removed . Yes, there were some regrettable but minor errors in my book (corrected in the subsequent edition). But the reader committed a whopper, using figures from the wrong year! I would suggest you kill that review, or print my reply immediately after it.

Sincerely,

William G. Flanagan

This the most compelling work I have ever read on this topic. Flanagan builds the characters like in a novel, reports the facts like a top notch reporter, and provides incredible insights into the rotten world of big businss. He is remarkably witty and keeps you begging for more. It is a real education and an enjoyable reading journey, like none I have read in a long time. I thought I'd o.d.'d on business topics but this one makes you hope Flangan is writing the next version!! Every shareholder and Board member needs to read this and soon!

This is NOT a diatribe against The Man by some leftie. It's far more dammning than that. It's an angry, detailed condemnation of America's business leadership and its spineless confederates in our legislatures and in the accounting, banking, legal, and journalistic professions--written by a veteran business journalist who has worked for Business Week, Forbes, and the Wall Street Journal.

The book targets America's small investors, which includes anyone with a 401K plan; i.e. most of us. And he doesn't spare the investment community for failing to start asking questions until their nest eggs vanished.

But his main focus is the bad guys. He shows how they did it to us; how they [destroyed] the very people we depended on to keep them honest; how they silenced the few regulators, accountants, analysts and fellow executives who opposed their schemes; how they ran up their incomes from 40x that of hourly workers in 1980 to over 535x today.

He proves conclusively that the problem was not--as President Bush claimed--a few bad eggs. Rather, it is so widespread it requires far-reaching, systemic reform.

You should read this book even if you don't agree with his proposals for reform, but those proposals are truly interesting and provocative. Above all he calls for transparency. For example, all these CEOs were dumping their own stock just as they were exhorting employees and other investors to buy, buy, buy. If they'd had to reveal this fact, investors would have gotten a big red flag. However, he adds that CEOs should be prohibited from dumping more than a quarter of their company stock while they're employed by that company.

He also calls for the elimination of taxes on dividends, which I always assumed would just help the fat cats get fatter. But he's arguing on behalf of the little guy with the 401K, and he persuaded me that I'd been wrong about this. And to be fair to President Bush, I'd held his support for eliminating
dividend taxation against him, and I'm having to revise that now. I especially appreciate a book that refines my understanding, even if it means abandoning something I'd believed.

The only reason I didn't give it five stars is because it's not edited as well as I'd liked. This has nothing to do with the content, which is exemplary and well-substantiated. The few typos and [weak] metaphors do not detract from that content materially. And I did appreciate the touches of humor amidst all the fury-inducing revelations, such as this Kin Hubbard quote: "The safest way to double your money is to fold it over and put it in your pocket."

When I bought this book, I had rather meager expectations since I know well what happened before and after the telecom crash. However, I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out to be a very informative book with some nice detail that I did not know about some of the crooks on Wall Street and CEOs of the companies that bilked billions from investors.

By now, the book has become a bit of a history book. Nonetheless, I recommend it as both an entertaining read and as a reminder that the same fraud is still going on.

We all heard the "news on speed" sensationalist hype about Enron, et al. Mr Flanagan tells the real stories that the hype came from. And he kept my interest all the way through, which surprised me no end. His skillful literary references, the "interviews with Mr. B," and the sheer storytelling make this business book as readable as any good novel. I wish all of Wall Street would read it!

I enjoyed this book so much, I just ordered a dozen for my friends and clients...need I say more! You will too...it is so well written and documented...no wonder Forbes and Wall St. Journal wanted Flanagan amongst their ranks...incredible book.

On page 37, Flanagan writes: "The top-paid executive in 2001 was Ralph Ellison, CEO of Oracle, who made 175 times that amount." ("That amount" was $4.4 million.) First off, it would be Larry Ellison, not Ralph. Second, it wasn't Ellison; in 2001, the highest paid CEO (according to Forbes, who Flanagan worked at for 17 years) was Michael Dell, to the tune of $235 million; by comparison, 13th spot Ellison took home $75 million. Also, $235 million is only 53 times $4.4 million, not the 175 the author claims.

Pass on this one. $25 mistake as far as I'm concerned.

Author makes some points that are rather obvious and then proposes solutions that you may or may not agree with. Overall, I found this book mediocre at best - just another financial journalist trying to make a buck with a provocative title.

Save your time. Save your money.