Healthsouth: The Wagon to Disaster

Beam, Aaron with Warner, Chris

ISBN 10: 0979628482 / ISBN 13: 9780979628481

Published by Wagon Publishing, Fairhope, AL, 2009

About this Item

208 pages. Illustrations. References. Inscribed by Aaron Beam on fep. DJ has slight wear and soiling. Aaron Beam is a popular, highly regarded speaker at universities, healthcare companies, auditor meetings and conventions, securities training seminars and ethics institutes across the U.S. He has spoken to student audiences as a guest lecturer at many business schools (Univ. of Chicago, LSU, UAB, Penn State, Stanford, Arizona State, and over fifty other schools) over the past four years. Mr. Beam was the first CFO at Healthsouth Corp., and as a co-founder witnessed first-hand the series of accounting, stock manipulation and leadership failures that led Healthsouth to the $2B securities fraud scandal and ultimate prosecutions of Richard Scrushy. He relates to students and professionals the heights of success, followed by the unethical and illegal mistakes that led to his professional downfall. Serving three months in federal prison for his role in approving fraudulent quarterly numbers in 1996 and losing his CPA credentials, led Mr. Beam to his current speaking career; trying to make a positive difference by educating others about the pitfalls of unethical business practices. Through his Ethics First message he identifies early warning signs, influences and the bad choices he and others made at Healthsouth, allowing the audience to apply what they learn to their business practices and the organization's culture and environment. "Ethics First" is the primary message former CFO of Healthsouth Aaron Beam conveys to his audiences. His experience with Healthsouth and the research he's done about ethics in American business, qualifies him to deliver this compelling story and message to any organization, group or classroom that values ethical behavior, and the process of achieving it. Aaron Beam's story is "the untold story of HealthSouth", one of America's most successful health care companies and subsequently the perpetrator of a $2.8 B accounting fraud, one of the largest in American history. Seller Inventory # 74167

Bibliographic Details

Title: Healthsouth: The Wagon to Disaster

Publisher: Wagon Publishing, Fairhope, AL

Publication Date: 2009

Binding: Hardcover

Illustrator: Scott Harris (Jacket design)

Condition: Very good

Dust Jacket Condition: Very good

Signed: Signed by Author(s)

Edition: Presumed First Edition, First printing.

About this title

Synopsis:

It was the quintessential American success story: Identify a niche; form a company to exploit it; raise millions in venture capital; take the concept public; meet stockholder expectations for 40 straight quarters, in the process becoming a darling of Wall Street; and of course make * plenty of it while the stock price steadily climbs and revenue projections increase. In a few short years you ve gone from rags to riches...you re on a monster roll... Until your boss, saddled with the realization that the Street expectations cannot realistically be met, asks you to creatively fix the numbers. It s the toughest decision you ve ever made, and one where the easiest way out could be the most difficult, given the circumstances. Caught squarely between greed and fear, Aaron Beam did the unthinkable. Corporate greed is the Black Plague of the modern financial world threatening America s ability to maintain * market capitalism in an increasingly distrusting, changing, and socialistic world economy. The Wagon to Disaster, told by former co-founder and CFO Aaron Beam, is the untold story of HealthSouth, one of America s most successful health care companies and consequently, the perpetrator of one of its biggest frauds in history. How big was the fraud In 2003, just before news of the crime broke in the mainstream media, HealthSouth paid more * in taxes to the Federal Government than it legitimately earned the previous year. Beam takes the reader from HealthSouth s humble beginnings, through its meteoric rise and to its disastrous revelation, subsequent trial and his three-month incarceration in a federal prison