The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition that private equity is good at taking perfectly healthy companies and eviscerating them in the quest for higher valuations for resale. The Globe's Gus Carlson writes that too often, chief executive officers of public corporations do not love their businesses and, in many cases, know very little about them. However, they know lots about financial engineering, cutting corners to reduce costs, downsizing and outsourcing -- anything to deliver the quarter. Increasingly, the balance sheet is becoming a strategy document, cultural manifesto and code of conduct rolled into one. Look no further than Boeing's disgraced CEO Dave Calhoun. An accountant, not an airplane guy, he was brought in from the financial-services sector to solve an operational crisis when the company's Max 8 jets were falling from the skies and lives were being lost. Not surprising, the crisis got worse under Mr. Calhoun. Failure to understand the business, especially anticipating the pitfalls and fixing crises when they happen, is a life-and-death liability. Knowing the business is much more than how much things cost and through what outsourcing channels its component parts can be manufactured the cheapest.