Antilogic: Why Businesses Fail While Individuals Succeed

Antilogic is the opposite to logic, not the absence of logic as in random or chaotic events but the mirror image of logic, in a similar relationship that antimatter has to matter. It is the systematic pursuit of a course of action that may on the surface appear rational or impressive but in reality is little more than a generator of vapour. As with a looking–glass, if the reality and its mirror image meet they negate each other.
The word, ′Antilogic′ has very early origins having been associated with the Sophists in ancient Greece. It is, however, alive and strong in the modern world of business and finance. All too frequently people have difficulty in distinguishing logic from Antilogic and cash from Vapourcash. Most people will be familiar with examples of Antilogic, such as share prices that drop on good results and poor managers who are given golden farewells or large salary increases while good staff is worked to exhaustion.
This thought–provoking book challenges conventional wisdom and helps readers to see through the vapour. It sweeps through time and over continents, from the Yap islanders to the English mercantilists, from Groucho Marx to the indigenous peoples of Papua New Guinea. The author′s wide–ranging knowledge and his astute business expertise will challenge, delight and inform the reader.

Spis treści:
Preface.
Introduction.
Believing Because of the Way Things are and Why We Think the Way We Do.
Believing the Corporation.
Guided by the Market.
Believing the Words.
Believing the Numbers: The Contribution of the Accountants.
Believing the Numbers: The Contribution of the Statisticians.
Buying the Forecast: Falling for the Non–Forecast–Forecast.
The Amazing Role of Cash.
Vapourcash Explained: Cash, Not as Real as You Thought.
Anticash Explained: Anticash and the History of Money.
Anticash: The Bankers and the Accountants.
Anticash More Rea l Than You Hoped.
References.
Index.

Nota biograficzna:
BRUCE MCCOMISH has 20 years′ experience in senior management roles with leading multi–national companies. His considerable boardroom expertise traverses products and services as wide–ranging as banking, food manufacture, cleaning products, forestry and mining in locations as far apart as the UK, Australia, New Zealand, US, Indonesia and Continental Europe.
He is a former Chief Financial Officer of National Australia Bank, in which capacity he was responsible for group–wide financial and management reporting, capital management, group funding, balance sheet quality, tax management, acquisitions and investor relations. His wide–ranging experience also includes, amongst others, the posts of Financial Director at Unilever Australia Ltd., Managing Director at Lever Industrial and Executive General Manager at North Ltd.
Bruce is currently Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Burdett Buckeridge and Young, an Australian investment bank. He holds degrees in commerce and in economics and economic history and is a chartered accountant.

Okładka tylna:
Antilogic is the opposite to logic, not the absence of logic as in random or chaotic events but the mirror image of logic, in a similar relationship that antimatter has to matter. It is the systematic pursuit of a course of action that may on the surface appear rational or impressive but in reality is little more than a generator of vapour. As with a looking–glass, if the reality and its mirror image meet they negate each other.
The word, ′Antilogic′ has very early origins having been associated with the Sophists in ancient Greece. It is, however, alive and strong in the modern world of business and finance. All too frequently people have difficulty in distinguishing logic from Antilogic and cash from Vapourcash. Most people will be familiar with examples of Antilogic, su ch as share prices that drop on good results and poor managers who are given golden farewells or large salary increases while good staff is worked to exhaustion.
This thought–provoking book challenges conventional wisdom and helps readers to see through the vapour. It sweeps through time and over continents, from the Yap islanders to the English mercantilists, from Groucho Marx to the indigenous peoples of Papua New Guinea. The author′s wide–ranging knowledge and his astute business expertise will challenge, delight and inform the reader.