Do you know how to ride a bicycle? Do you still have the manual that taught you?

I have asked many people these questions. Most answer yes to the first, but I have never heard assent to the second. I think the reason for this is obvious. We don't learn how to ride a bicycle from a manual: we learn how to ride it intuitively. We sit on the saddle, we start to pedal, we fall off at first, but we practise some more and then almost by magic, we find that we can ride it successfully.

So we don't need an instruction manual to teach us how to ride a bicycle: instead we just use our intuition. The aim of Financial Management for Business is therefore to provide you with an intuitive understanding of how business works and how to succeed at it. The idea is not for me to teach you: it is for you to teach yourself, and so I also call this approach Amplifying Intuition.

What about the book's subtitle, Cracking the Hidden Code? Is this just over-enthusiastic marketing? In fact it is an exact description of the challenge faced by anyone who wants to succeed in business.