How Can We Make You Happier? Summary and Analysis

The small sales unit follows a routine of monthly performance evaluation, weekly office meeting and daily phone calls. Dash beats Michael to the desk by an hour daily. They talk about the future, beating the market, Salomon Brothers' fate or the three geeks that work for them. The routine is broken on September 24, 1987, when the hostile raider Ronald O. Perelman, bids for Salomon stock to put it "in play." He is backed by Drexel Burnham and advised by First Boston's Perella and Wasserstein in the first time Wall Street firms turn on each other. Customers call to sympathize or gawk like onlookers at an accident. Gutfreund and Michael Milken are unfriendly since 1985. Gutfreund insults Milken at a breakfast meeting and throws an angry Milken out of the building. Gutfreund cuts Milken's...