A SJE Nemzetközi Tudományos Konferenciája – 2012 – Medzinárodná vedecká konferencia UJS – 2012 „Művelődés – Identitás – Egészség“ – „Vzdelávanie – identita – zdravie“. Komárom, 2012. szeptember 13–14. – Komárno, 13.-14. september 2012 707 BUILDING BUSINESS FABLES, TALES AND SHORT STO- RIES INTO MANAGEMENT EDUCATION Árpád Ferenc PAPP-VÁRY 1 ABSTRACT Tales are short and business people have less and less time. Tales carry a universal moral, while managers look for basic principles. Tales are simple, and simplification is essential in business world. Good always wins in tales, while workers in the corporate world are success- oriented. In addition, the smallest one always wins in tales, and we all need such motivating examples. It is no wonder that an increasing number of short story books used in business education (that also can be read during a short flight or train) has been published in the past decade. Before we would sneer at the genre, it is worth seeing who the authors are – they include peo- ple with considerable scientific record such as John P. Kotter („Our Iceberg is Melting!”), Ken Blanchard („The One Minute Manager” series), Spencer Johnson („Who Cut the Cheese?” among others), Stephen C. London („FISH!”). Therefore the present study argues that it would be important to incorporate short stories into management education as recommended reading since they possess advantages that classical study books and specialized textbooks do not. Short stories are short, exciting and easy to abstract, with advice that can be applied immediately. Furthermore, they are extremely inspir- ing. KEYWORDS Management education, short story, business fable, tale, inspiration. INTRODUCTION The present study summarizes the experiences of the most successful business short stories and a critical piece, a parody of one of them. Their alphabetical list is as follows, with the first (international) publication date in parentheses: - Allen, Roger E.: Winnie-The-Pooh On Management (1994) - Blanchard, Ken PhD - Johnson, Spencer PhD: The One Minute Manager (1981) - Blanchard, Ken PhD – Oncken, William, Jr. – Burrows, Hal: The One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey (1989) - Blanchard, Ken PhD – Carew, Donald – Parisi, Eunice: The One Minute Manager Builds High Performing Teams (1990) - Blanchard, Ken PhD – Hutson, Don – Willis, Ethan: The One Minute Enterpreneur: The Secret of Creating and Sustaining a Successful Business (2008) - Burg, Bob - Mann, John David: The Go-Giver: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea (2007) - Brown, Mason J.D.: Who Cut the Cheese? A Cutting-Edge Way of Surviving Change by Shifting the Blame (2000) 1 Árpád Ferenc Papp-Váry PhD is head of the Marketing Department at Budapest College of Communication and Business