The Wisdom of Bees by Michael O'Malley – review

We should take seriously works that would have us learn from bees. These have an impressive lineage. For example, Sherlock Holmes retired to live the life of an apiarist in the Sussex Downs, where he wrote his great work, The Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, before being summoned back to London, in His Last Bow, to help capture the German spy Von Bork. Might he not have become intellectually rusty and out of practice in the countryside? wonders his friend, Dr Watson. Not so, Holmes insists. The hive gives "as much incident as can be found on the streets of London" and had provided many "pensive nights and laborious days".

Michael O'Malley certainly concurs. Indeed, it would be "phylogenic hubris to think we have nothing to learn from bees," he tells us. Just look at their patience and restraint. They act today in anticipation of tomorrow, says the author, an avid apiarist and a Columbia Business School professor. Bees will seek new nectar fields while still exploiting rich ones. In short, they invest in research and innovation and don't concentrate inordinate resources in one place for too long. Bees live for long-term profit only. Sub-prime mortgage lenders please note.

Almost everything that Apis mellifera does, it does for the benefit for the hive, says O'Malley, just the kind of attitude that is needed to maintain an effective company. The hive is also typified by excellent communications, networking and enforced co-operation. "Bees do not get in their own or one another's way," adds O'Malley. "They are not distracted by the latest office intrigue or happenings at home and they need not huddle in endless meetings." Hives are well-managed, highly efficient operations, in other words.

There is a limit to how far you can stretch these analogies, of course. The Wisdom of Bees is an amusing read but it is scarcely a recipe for financial success. Humans do not submerge their identities to the greater good of the hive or nest as do social insects. This point was made, succinctly, by EO Wilson, the Harvard natural historian and ant expert. Asked for his views about communism, Wilson looked askance. "Great idea, wrong species," he replied. Bee lovers please note.