"Boss" is THE 4-letter word

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Book Review of “THE BOSS IS NOT YOUR FRIEND” by VIJAY NAIR

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The Review:

“THE BOSS IS NOT YOUR FRIEND” by VIJAY NAIR
Publisher: Hachette India
Pp: 210
Cover Price Rs.295
Genre: Business/Humour


Available at: Booksorbit




My first thoughts: The front cover design is attractive and then I quickly flipped it to see the back cover to see the Genre – is it ‘Fiction’ or ‘Non-Fiction’? – oh it could even be ‘Self-help”? – but I found it was mentioned as “Business/Humour” – aha - just what I would want to read and review!

The book is a treatise on this creature of business enterprise that walks the corporate world and responds to the four-letter word “Boss” with much aplomb. The author surprises the readers by declaring the findings of his subject research at the very outset – that all bosses and corporations are necessarily ……EVIL! (another 4-letter word). This conclusion saves us readers the task of inventing the sorting hat or the measuring yardstick to find the elusive species, which could be called a “good Boss”. An oxymoron? Instead, the author introduces us to a structured methodology to find out what kind of evil boss could he/she be? The Boss is not referred to as “he’ or “she” in this book, but I wont tell you what the boss is referred to as, because [SPOILER ALERT], IT could be a big spoiler for prospective readers of this book!

The author then delves into how a boss can, not just be human, but superhuman – almost God-like in shaping your career in the industry and how you must completely depend on him to help you in your organisational successes! Ok, he doesn’t!...Just didn’t want to give away the treat and treatise on a platter, sorry! Talking of spoilers, I was just thinking anything I reveal to you readers about this book here could be a SPOILER!

I like books which coin new words! So when I found a new word introduced at the very beginning, I knew I would love this book! I won’t reveal this either – but just suffice it to tell you that it rhymes with Six Sigma! The figure six has great importance in this novel – there are six types of bosses, six strategies to bang each of these types, six types of peers and so on and so forth! Sixes rain here like the DLF IPL matches – in every chapter! There are interesting quizzes to discover which boss type your boss fits into – all very humorously revealed to the victims of corporate world who enter it with dreams of making it big with the assumption that your boss would be instrumental in helping you climb the corporate ladder – all the way!

The author helps you recognise the beast within and tells you how you’re not in the workplace, but at war in the battle-field! Just like Krishna, who explains Arjuna, the brave warrier in Mahabharata - brave until, of course, the war starts - about how he is not fighting his cousins, but fighting adharma on earth, Vijay Nair here blows the conch to declare the war one must fight so that the good (read: self) wins over evil (read: boss)! Naturally one will need the astras, strategies, knowledge about the adversary’s weaknesses and it’s Achilles heels, where the blow is to be struck. Hey did I give away too much, after making all this fuss about spoilers?

The author describes several episodes to distinguish boss-types and the kinds of evil acts that such types are capable of unleashing on unsuspecting entrants in a distinctly simple narrative, without much use of corporate jargon or repeated use of the f-word, as is common these days, which I liked very much. The author talks about peers, outsiders (read: consultants, coaches etc), CEOs, HR professionals, systems and processes besides bosses to complete the canvas of the landscape in which bosses lurk in search of their next prey.

Although there were some parts of the book which I found to be a bit dry (for my taste) and difficult to wade through, overall it proved to be a really nice and light read. The book concludes by guiding how to survive and prosper – and how to avoid becoming prey to the predator and instead be the predator itself and hunt down the hounds to survive the corporate world in all its splendour! Do read it – I am sure you will enjoy it as I did! But if you do apply the advice in real life, and if you happen to become the predator and not the prey, they’ll all be calling you “Boss”!

Rating 3.5/5

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