The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of

Question

The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of how an astute chief executive officer can rechannel a company’s assets toward profitability. With the new CEO at the helm, LEX has gone, in only three business quarters, from a 10 million dollar operating loss to a 22 million dollar operating gain.

A major flaw in the reasoning of the passage above is that

A major flaw in the reasoning of the passage above is that

A. the passage assumes that the new CEO was the only factor that affected the corporation’s recent success

B. the recent success of the corporation may be only temporary

C. the chief executive officer may be drawing a salary and bonus that will set a damaging precedent for this and other corporations

D. the author does not define “profitability”

E. rechanneling assets is only a short-term solution

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Souradeep17 · Answer

Other than option A all the options seem to be assumptions or speculative. hence i choose option A.

okHedwig · Answer

I chose Option A, since other options looked like assumption only A looked like a flaw. Is it correct?

bb · Answer

This is a bit of an odd-ball question.

Option B is not bad wither for example. It is a flaw as well though it is weaker as it is speculating about the future and that's outside of the scope. In this situation, you really want to look at scope of the argument. All other options go outside. They may be relevant flaws in the business world such as what is a definition of profitability, (D), or what the heck is rechanneling (E). The only easily-removable answer choice is C) which is pretty irrelevant but all others are real flaws but A) fits best and within the argument scope. That's how you are supposed to eliminate them.

Bunuel · Answer

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION

The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of how an astute chief executive officer can rechannel a company’s assets toward profitability. With the new CEO at the helm, LEX has gone, in only three business quarters, from a 10 million dollar operating loss to a 22 million dollar operating gain.

A major flaw in the reasoning of the passage above is that

A major flaw in the reasoning of the passage above is that

You know from reading the question that you’ll need to find a flaw in the reasoning of the argument. As you read the passage, look for the conclusion. The correct answer choice will weaken this conclusion. In this passage, the conclusion is in the first sentence: “The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of how an astute chief executive officer can rechannel a company’s assets toward profitability.”

Because this is a weaken-the-argument question that will almost certainly contain a gap in its reasoning, you should look to see whether the argument is causal, statistical, or analogical. In this case, the argument is causal. The passage implies that the sole cause of the LEX Corporation’s turnaround is the new CEO. While this may be true, it is also possible that there are other causes. If you didn’t spot the causal argument, don’t worry. You would probably have seen it when you attacked the answer choices. Let’s do that now:

A. the passage assumes that the new CEO was the only factor that affected the corporation’s recent success

This is the best answer. The new chief executive officer may not have been the cause of the turnaround—there may have been some other cause we don’t know about.

B. the recent success of the corporation may be only temporary

It may be hasty to crown LEX with laurels after only three economic quarters, but this statement doesn’t point out a flaw in the reasoning of the passage. Eliminate it.

C. the chief executive officer may be drawing a salary and bonus that will set a damaging precedent for this and other corporations

This answer choice may seem tempting because it’s not in favor of the new CEO. But this alone doesn’t represent a major flaw in the reasoning of the passage. Eliminate it.

D. the author does not define “profitability”

An author can’t define every word he uses. Profitability seems a common enough word, and a change in the balance sheet from minus 10 million to plus 22 million seems to qualify. Eliminate it.

E. rechanneling assets is only a short-term solution

Like the second answer choice, this statement implies that all the votes aren’t in yet. This does not affect the reasoning of the argument, however. Eliminate it.

The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of

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GMAT Critical Reasoning (CR) Questions

The recent turnaround of the LEX Corporation is a splendid example of

Prep Toolkit

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards