Alastair Dryburgh is one of the heroes of Loose for his willingness to challenge conventional thinking. Here, for example, is his description of forecasting: “an activity that is at best useless and at worst actually counterproductive … forecasting nourishes the dangerous illusion that we know what is going to happen.” His advice, which concurs with one of the main themes in Loose, is to “Stop forecasting, embrace uncertainty, start managing.” It is therefore appropriate that I should encourage you to buy Alastair’s new book: ‘Everything you know about business is wrong’, which expands the wise words in his wonderful column in Management Today into an extended critique of complacent ideas and lazy business practices. With forensic skill and subtle wit he challenges commonly-held views on such core business disciplines as pricing, budgeting, measurement and of course forecasting and highlights how many of the initiatives undertaken by business people end up achieving the exact opposite of what was intended.
