The bank was famed for its "alpha male" encouragement and "a cutthroat corporate culture that rewarded risk-taking with massive bonuses, punishing poor results with a swift boot." In Michael Lewis' 1989 book "Liar's Poker", the insider descriptions of life at Salomon gave way to the popular view of banking in the 1980s and '90s as a money-focused and work-intense environment. The expression "Big Swinging Dick" was born at the bank, and was used to refer to the Salomon bankers who dominated the game of extraordinary profit-making.