The episode title is a spoof on the name of Shepherd Mead's 1952 book How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, which opened as a musical on Broadway in October 1961, and in 1967, a film based on the musical was released.
Laura Prepon (Chelsea Newman and Lauren Lapkus (Dee Dee) also worked together on Orange Is the New Black (2013) as Alex & Officer Fischer respectively.